I am learning as well with trap shy beaver. If you are using 330's they need to be under water especially in deeper runs with dive sticks on the surface. Otherwise foothold traps or snares. Steel needs to be under water and sets need to be as natural as they can be. I found out with dam break sets the break needs to be small.

Quit breaking the dam. Pull all your traps and leave them be for a week or two. Then slip back in there and make one or two blind sets without a lot of disturbance. Footholds on drowners at dam crossovers (not breaks) if they are square shy, which it sounds like these are. Or deep submerged 330s where they are already diving under something, if a place like that is available.

Im going to do something I don't do very often, and that is to disagree with swamp and the others saying to use trays. If that beaver is being careful and looking for anything unnatural, a tray is a big underwater horizontal square. Especially in front of a dam break.

If it appears to be avoiding dam breaks, I would do as others have said, back out for a few days at least. Then come back with whatever biggest legal foothold you have and really look things over - treading lightly and being sneaky - to find where it is entering and leaving the water. From there, hopefully you know the routine - blind set. No lure, no bait, minimum disturbance of any kind - you are putting that trap where the beaver is already planning to go tonight. And not just any blind set, carefully and solidly bed the trap with the minimum possible disturbance to the set area and conceal it with whatever blends well with the bottom type. If you have to, bring a sifter and a pan cover - I almost never have to do that because I have soft mud and leaves most places, but the point is to make that trap disappear but still work properly like you would a coyote trap on dry land. If the water gets too muddy to see if the trap is well concealed, give it 15 minutes to settle so you can be sure. And no rods or shiny cables - use a chain or darkened cable for the slide rig, I like the chain because I can lightly press it into the mud and conceal it easily.

Educated beavers are one of the things that keep me in demand. I get the call after the guys who try all the high volume fur trapping methods get the “easy” ones. My methods are not intended to get a lot of beavers, they are designed to get the last beaver - the one that is looking for anything out of place and highly aware of any sign of danger. And I charge as much for that beaver as would have to remove the whole colony.

Thats my advice.

Wicked light and a gun!

lol……I had good ole “Trapper Ben” who used to trap for the big city tell me that one evening as he drove by one of my jobs. I told him I don’t have time and my traps will hunt all night. Also told him that a lot of my private jobs are after the moonlight dam break hunters have “cleaned” em out.
Dave’s tray system is pretty crazy and labour intensive, but it’s bloody effective for any beaver. It cost a small fortune to get the DVD to my place up here, but well worth the cost. I don’t use his system often, but it’s a super tool to have in your bag of tricks.

Shakey, it's got to get BAD before i baby sit a beaver dam at night but sometimes it's the best method. We have jungle terrain here so there isn't any walking around and finding the perfect spot, lot of times it's a beaver dam and that's it, deep water and tangled up vegetation on both sides making it impossible to explore any further upstream.

Night shoots go either really really well or really really bad, lol.

I used to sit at night to kill beaver when I was young and bug resistant. If the beaver is eating or fixing the dam he can be caught. I agree with shaky let the traps do the work for you.

David doesn't sell the trays. Im not sure where the "fortune to get one to your place" comes from.

Can u buy a few pieces boards, saw them and screw them together in Canada?

This will work ^^^^^

But, in the original post there is a pic of the beaver NOT avoiding a dam break.

The dam holding up water levels around the lodge or bank den is the one to set. Beaver that are spooked will stop maintaining outlying dams they don't need.

Yessir!

True...too hard to tell you specially

I like to use drowning rods with a CDR7.5 set in front of a dam break. I camo the trap if the water is clear to hide it and make it blend in with the bottom. The CDR has enough power to come up out of the bottom through almost anything it's covered with. I'm a big believer in hiding the trap at most of my beaver foothold sets.

I was referring to getting the DVD across the border to my door........lol. Looks like I didn't reference that in my post.

Gotcha.

Unless you just want the DVD.....my pics are posted.

Find where the beaver is getting material to fix the dam break and catch it there.
There is likely a haulout or channel. Use underwater footholds only.

The other issue i have is the land owner.......he'll get a wild hair and smash all the dams down, then constantly ask me why i haven't gotten anything. Even when my traps are up he'll just come down and rip through with his chainsaw. He's just worried about the culvert and road washing away. It's hard to convince him to stop, when it's his property.

Tell his sorry (This word is unacceptable on Trapperman) ..that you need that water level to drown the beavers...

If he doesn't like that...then pick up...and as Shakey would say...

Move down the line ...