Usually the bark removal on my property is done by pack rats. They strip large sections of bark anywhere they can reach. I've gotten the point that I blame them for nearly all the bark damage.

But this damage extends much to high up the tree. And the marks look like big teeth. So I'm thinking beaver? One passed through a few months ago. I haven't noticed any other signs of it.

I do not think it is beaver. they have more definite teeth marks.

got porkies in that part of kansas?

Not beaver...do you have quill pigs ?

Any sheep near by ?

no sheep.

I've never seen a porcupine, but I'm told the prior owner shot one on this property.

now you have me wondering if some the damage I've been blaming on pack rats might be porcupine also... Is it likely to come back to that same tree to chew some more? Its a hackberry and there's not a lot of them on the property.


Some of what I blame on rats certainly is rats - they build some nests at chest height in the forks of some trees and chew the bark off inside their nest. So that's definately rats. But I guess some of the other damage I blame on rats could be porcupine.

Is there water close by?

yes, that tree less than 10 yards from a creek bed.

That looks like a porky was chewing to me.

looks like high water damage??

How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?

It's beaver, see it all the time in my area.

Whatever did it was eating it, including the exposed roots. Beavers generally cut them down and eat the thin barked limbs to reduce the amount of useless bark in their gut.
I have seen nutria do that kind of damage to wild cherry. It was a very large, heavily leaning tree and they climed way out on it and chewed off all of the bark that they could reach,
I have seen where beaver have girdled several large sweet gum trees in a swamp without any evidence of an attempt to fell them. It was as though they were doing some selective culling to promote the regrowth of what they favored over sweet gum. I don't give beavers credit for that level of intelligence, but if their ancestors for eons did that as habit, I could understand how that trait would give them an upper hand over beavers who didn't pass that trait on.

I say beavah. I walked by a half dozen trees today on my place that is exactly like that. Mine are beavah 100% sure about that. Big cotton woods they do to same thing and looks identical to your pics.

Wonder what did this

Around here that would be beaver for sure, but we don’t have porcupines. That appears to be a hackberry tree, and beaver do like the hackberry. The beavers will also often just remove the bark like that. One old timer told me they do that to kill the tree so the preferred shrubbery can get more sunlight around the water edge. Not having dealt with porkys before, it would seem likely that they prefer similar trees to beavers, but just a guess. Also I always thought porkys tended to eat bark up higher off the ground?

I appreciate all the input guys.

Would anyone care to guess the odds of it returning to the same tree (whether it be beaver or porcupine)?
Next time I'm at the property I'll move a camera to be close to that tree. If it comes back, I'll get video. But I'm trying to decide what traps to set. From what I've read, a salt soaked cloth in a box trap is good for porcupine. Would a duke 550 or 650 work for beaver?

If there is water close by the beavah will be back. If it was on a crick and water has dried up it most likely won't.

I would probably just try to snare whatever it is, personally.

Beaver don't tend to return to a tree. If they get spooked off it, they go start on another later..

Looks like that beaver is long gone I’d be moving on from damage that old and not even recognize able you might be chasing a ghost.

Not beaver damage. Ive seen that here in places where there are horss, goats or sheep.

Another vote for porcupines.

Those who thought beaver appear to be correct. 300 yards away from the first damage, I found more. Its chewing every hackberry. My wife named it Earl, because Earl has to die.

Looks to be big too, anytime I see bark ripped upward like that it's usually piggy.

well go get it,

I'm working on that. I don't have traps big enough to work well on beaver (duke 550 & 650), and I really don't want to spend much getting beaver traps because I may never use them again.

I think I'll pick up a dozen snares Scheels. That seems like the best way to go.

What ever that beaver/beavers got into, removing it/them may only be good till spring. Whenther this year or next, or year after, you will get more. Especially if there are more hackberrys, willow , cat tails, lily pads, or combinations of them

Another vote for porcupine from me.

I hear ya, but still:
I've owned the property 4 years and this is the first time we've seen beaver. There is some very old beaver damage (I found 2 chewed trees), and an acre or two of trees in the creek bottom are long dead. The state forester said he thought they were drowned decades ago. Put all that together and I think a beaver dammed up the creek long ago and killed the trees, and mostly (hopefully) have not been around since.

so I'm hoping this does not become an annual event. But I agree it will most likely be a recurring problem.

When I bought it, the property was about 90-95% osage orange with the balance being eastern red cedar (dozens), hackberry (dozens), cottonwood (1 or 2), willow (3-4), and mullbery (5-8). So there are other hackberries but there might not be many close to water. So far it has left the willows alone.

I'm planning on putting a snare at every spot that looks like where it might leave the creek. And I'll make some caster mounds too. Its a small (maybe 1/8th acre) pond then a few hundred yards of creek upstreem of the pond. The creek starts at 4+ feet deep and a few hundred yards upstream is down to a trickle through a thick patch of reeds.

We'll see...

Make a set like this in the pond. They work great. https://trapperman.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/13186/beaver-leaning-stick-snare-set#Post13186

they like cottonwood saplings also

I don’t do pictures. But, go to facebook and look up Billingsley baits and lures. He has several snaring videos that will help you get the beaver(s) that are giving you grief. For the record, his trapping and snaring methods result in live beavers, meaning you have to check the snares everyday. I use his methods and can attest to they’re effectiveness.

I looked around on this site some and elsewhere, then just made it up as a went a long. some of these are probably hopeless, but I put out all 12 snares, so maybe something will work.


I'd welcome your comments on what might work and what likely won't.

I was wondering about disabling the swivel with how I mounted some of them. I saw some saying the swivel is crucial, and I also saw people saying the swiven a tthe end of snare is almost worthless because they'll quickly get around a branch or something and disable the swiven anyway. I'm curious what you all think on that.

I boiled the snares in water & baking soda last night.

I didn't realize until today that pest also took out some willows. I had been trying to avoid roaming around everywhere because of deer season so I was slow to see what all its done. There's floating cat tails too, cut off at the base.

One snare at the pond, that's a straight 5+ foot drop (because I've been digging out the pond)


Creek 1:


Creek 2:


Creek 3:


Creek 4:


Creek 5:


Creek 6:


Creek 7:


Creek 8:


Spring 1:


Spring 2:


Spring 3:

Only time will tell...hope you get em!

Thanks John. I checked the cameras a few minutes ago and got excited for a second but it’s just a grinner.

I do not think most of those will catch a beaver... unless you're very lucky. Pond 1 looks as though it could, but with that piece of wire on the left, I'm not sure the snare will close at all, let alone quickly enough. Look at the link I posted yesterday, and convert a few of your sets to that one and you should catch him. Do you have a castor based lure?

I am with yotetrapper. Not sure how you attached snares to support wires but, they don't look right. Especially creek 7 looks like there is a twig inside the snare that will slow down or halt the snares operation. Also might be angles etc but your snares look kind of egg shaped instead of round. G.

yotetrapper, I have this caster lure. So far I only put it on the set in the pond (in the mud mound). I'll remake some like the link you posted with lure on the stick. I'll put lure on the sets I remake like your link - should I put it on more than that? I was assuming I probably shouldn't put lure on all the sets but maybe I'm wrong.

There's maybe 70 yards of creek where all but the pond set are. The upstream end of it the creek tapers off to almost nothing in a big patch of reeds. Downstream of the 70y of activity there's creek holding water (mostly 3+ feet deep) for maybe 150 yards until the pond. Downstream of the pond the creek back to almost nothing.

Ghost8, the wire supports are not all the same, but what I tried to do is make a W shape and have the snare rest on the two bottom Vs in the W. In the pond set pic it may be more visible. That's what I was aiming for anyway. I'll fix creek 7.

Thanks for the help!

You can wrap the wire around the leader part of the snare so the loop is free. Like so...

To be honest, I see 2 or 3 snares that MIGHT have a chance. The snares that appear to be hanging above the water are extremely unlikely to connect, as are the ones hanging in places a beaver has to be agile to even approach the snare.
Think of a beaver on land as 30 or 40 pounds of waddling on very short legs with their heads down, not up in the air, sniffing. When you find large trees in awkward attitudes, (positions), with a few different chew marks only going just below the bark, a beaver is un-likely to return to that same exact approach spot, or even that tree. It was likely a "test chew", and the beaver didn't like either the tree, the awkward position it was in for chewing, or both.
Remember that a beaver's head and very short neck is sloped to its nose, and for a snare to connect successfully the snare has to be just right from the ground, (a few inches for land snaring), and tripped on contact, and it has to be very fast.
For surface water snares, the bottom of the snare needs to get under the beaver's chin. If you watch a beaver swimming around, part of its head is just under the surface, and the bottom of your snare should also be partially under the surface.
If the animal has places away from the water that it is cutting trees or willows, they sometimes create a trail, and those trails are prime spots for snaring.

The pics you posted it looks like the snares have a plastic "collar" . This is where your support wire should go. Went out and set a pole up in the garden hopefully it can clear things up. Not the best pics but snowing and 35 mph breeze. Also everybody has different ideas, but when it is set I gotta have the lock in the 1 to 2 oclock area.
Will try and get a couple actual line pics but with the cold coming back the water might get hard until spring. G.

Thanks Ghost!

Yes, that helps a lot. The weather turned very cold today, and I'm back at work tomorrow. So it will probably be Thursday before I have time remake them. I'll also pick up some heavier wire instead of using my rebar tie wire. When I redo them I'll repost pics.

Go to the "What was your first snare catch" thread. On the first page jabNE has a picture that is about a perfect example of about how I set up alot of my beaver snares. If the water is deep and they are swimming, I have the snare loop about half underwater. If the water is shallow the bottom of the snare will be just off the bottom. G.

I'm not sure how to apply pictures like that because the water frontage I have that looks like that is far from the beaver activity. The edges of my (very small) pond are like that, but there's no beaver sign there. I suspect the beaver comes to the pond, but apprently there isn't much there for it because it doesn't leave evidence of its presence. I put one snare at the pond (picture above), and I'll remake it like jabNE's picture when I get a chance.

Around 150 yards upstream from the pond is where all the beaver activity is. There's a 1-2 foot drop from the ground level to the water level almost everywhere in this area of creek. So that type of set at the water's edge doesn't work where I see beaver activity. There's some places where it looks like the beaver has a step up to climb up out of the creek, and several places where there's no step but I think he's going down into the creek (will it jump off the drop?).

Now that I think about there is at least one place in the active section of creek where the ground is low going into the creek. I can put a snare there set up like jabNE's photo.


I'm not trying to be argumentative here, I'm just trying to explain my understanding so y'all can straighten me out. I appreciate the input!

The height of the bank in relation to the water isn't important. The set design is what I am referring to. You just need a channel to sort of center the beavers approach. And the snare doesn't need to be set in the water. It can be anywhere in the channel. Just kind of dig it out with a tile spade slick up the mud with your boot or glove and put your castor lure past the snare. You are trying to make it look like a different beaver was in the area. Also you want to keep your snare at a 90 degree angle relative to the beavers approach.

Adc any chance of getting your trench digging tool video put up here?? Thanks ! G.

Does this look better?
Looking around for easily aquirable stiff #9 - #10 wire I ended up getting some fence stays (for stabalizing barbed wire between the posts).

I would find an area in the crick that is tight or has a bench or tree extending over it. Hang the snare 2\3 submerged in the water, smear some castor on the log or branch and he will circle till you get him. The other sets look to open look for choke points and funnels for snares, to much blocking with sticks will shy them away here

What about a log, partially submerged right in the middle of the creek? Its not tight, but it sticks up out of the water. I can put caster on it and he can circle it.

That will work I would hang a snare on either side. Make sure it's anchored well, hopefully if it's in the middle he will tire and drown. Best way to find beaver is taking forever nap