Grease based Beaver Lure

Has anyone made a grease based beaver lure? Something that will stand up to a lot of rain/snow during unsettled spring weather. I’m aware of Lenon’s offering, which I haven’t used. I tried a lot of other commercial lures this spring and some of them couldn’t stand up to daily inclement weather.

No but I've used a piece of 3/4 inch × 5 inch long PVC electric conduit with castor in it, pushed in the bank at a slight downward angle to keep it from washing away with heavy downpours with good results

I've smeared it in a bottle cap and placed the cap so the underside was down when it was supposed to rain. Worked great.

Sac oil is pretty darn water proof and might be a better base than grease
Don't know nothing about beavers but most animals can smell so much better than us humans lures usually hold in there longer than we believe

Never had a problem with keeping the lure in position until a catch. Too much fluid in a lure would not be very durable in lots of rain. However on a good location most lures should last long enough to produce. Flooding can be another situation

Paul, I will say Backbreaker was one of the better ones for durability in my observations. Clint’s lures were good too.

I want to try something with Super Lube grease as the base. I’ve used that for a base with call lures and it’s worked tremendously.

As stated, sac oil is waterproof and is a good beaver attractant. Nothing is going to work in flood conditions.

I use super lube for a base as well. I was actually pondering the thought of mixing castor or sack oil into it not long ago. I like the visual of a glob of lure on a stick it keeps me from re-luring too often. I also like being able just to stir up the existing lure rather than apply more. I will run my Marten/Fisher line until snow drives me out without reapplying lure just stirring it up if it has the right base. Over 6 weeks some years if I am lucky.

People say vaseline "locks" in odor and wont release it.

Back in 2011 I made some cherry essence 'rat lure. Melted vaseline with cherry oil in it for the most part. I doped several hundred rat platforms in 2011-2012 with it.

Those platforms and traps are sitting in a corner of the barn, havent been used for 13 years now. You know what that corner of the barn still to this day reeks of? Cherries!

Maybe it does "lock" in odor. But it also seems to let plenty out as well, and its about as waterproof as it gets!

I've used vaseline quite a bit as a base for marten lure, I've come back to set traps the next year on the same tree and can see my smear of "vaseline lure", if I take a stick and give it a smear, it still has plenty enough odor for me to smell. So maybe it locks it in some, since there is still odor in there, but it surely lasts and is waterproof. I've been using a BTO/lanolin mix for a base that doesn't crust over like vaseline does in cold, dry weather, and adds its own underlying odors to the lure. It works pretty good, the combo doesn't get hard like lanolin does and at -25 is still like the consistency of peanut butter, and it is pretty waterproof, but it doesn't hold the odor until the next year like the vaseline base does.

I remember "Old Blackie" Carroll Black saying that when his petroleum based call lure.... MAGNUM crusted over....to just rub a stick into it and activate the odors.
Now some lure makers are making their call lures with a black color to absorb sun light ...which heats up lure and activates odors. MAYBE try a black colored lure container
instead of white with the beaver lure??

Being that most catches are made late in the day and over the night hours, I don't see the advantage of a small dab of black colored lure. Personally I wouldnt want to make a lure that would seal odors at some point. I want it working all the time until it has run its active life.

In most cooler and cold temps that slight bit of solar UV effect won't do much in my mind on a cold day. That small dab of lure would loose any advantage it had from the solar effect. And if you use the lure in a flat set or dirt hole set the lure will be below or at ground level.

Now a black bucket sitting out in the summer sun with material inside will certainly absorb more heat then a white bucket would. To warm water on a road trip that I used to wash up when needed and wash dishes. Worked fairly well on sunny days, not so much on cloudy days.

Bob,
I agree having a lure seal off is not ideal. But a lot of guys use a Vaseline base on homemade lures because it has other advantages, especially to the hobby lure maker. It is very accessible, easy to work with, easy to apply, and completely waterproof. It is also freezeproof, which is probably a big reason guys use it in marten and fisher lures.

The black lure Mike mentions I think is my Fisher Tree Call. The base changes viscosity at different temperatures. The black color only adds to that attribute is placed in the sun.

My goal was to make a lure that held the skunk odor and was in a constant state of flux to push the odor in a daily basis. It does not crust over in the cold but when it gets warmer the melting effect helps to release odor.

I’ve had a few trappers tell me they could still smell the lure in spring when applied back in December.