Most effective way to get rid of beavers, and go...

trap.
Early mornings. A .22 and patience.
Duck Dynasty uses dynamite.

330 coni bear

Snares, conibears, footholds if you want to eradicate. Conibears are very powerful, so be careful. A lot of information on youtube or trapperman forums. They get educated fast, so once you start messing with them, you need to clear them out.

Remember that there can be 10 of them.

Here's things that worked at our place:
Traps
Tear up the dam and then wait til dark with something that has a night scope.
.30-06 in broad daylight.
12 guage with #4 steel shot from six feet away as one swam past while duck hunting.
Tear a hole in the top of the den, put in a 20 oz plastic soda bottle full of ANFO and set off from a distance.

I'd call around for an animal control trapper

We used to spotlight them a lot. They look like dogs swimming in the water at night.

I am guessing your desire to get rid of means the whole colony. A lot of fur trappers wanting pelts take some and leave the rest for the future. Trapping out a whole colony can be difficult. Go to the Sullivanline website and ask there.

http://sullivansline.com/forums/ubbthreads.php/ubb/cfrm

Western beaver isn't worth much. Most of us do it as ADC/nuisance control jobs. I'm usually finished clearing them out in under a week. Some times an educated beaver can prolong it though.

Killed beavers every year at my grandparents farm in North Dakota back in the 90's. I told everyone that my grandpa used dynamite when I was young, because he would light a fuse and we would drive down the road a good bit. I'm 35 now and he died in 2007 , but I inherited a lot of gunpowder and other supplies from him, so I assume he was making some type of explosive using gunpowder. We would drive back and shoot them with a 22.

Sometimes we would just hang around the pond and shoot on sight.


But my favorite was throwing an old giant anchor over the dam and using a tractor to drag the anchor out. We would shoot them when they came by to scope out the flowing water.

I’ve been using a connibear, but it’s 50/50 on success rate. They’ve gotten smart.

How is it 50/50? You got a sprung trap, or you placed 2 and only 1 connected? Brush traps in and try to break up the square shape. Don't keep moving the traps right away, let them work. If you only have 1 trap, you may be in for a long fight.

that 06 might be a bit light

Blow the dam and pick them off and trap as they come to repair it.

Wait for a clear moon lit night. Break the dam in the daylight and take care of them with #4 buckshot in the moonlight when they come to repair the dam.

I never knew so many ways ...

Cause it's texas -

Saw on the Austin news last night a beaver was found wandering the streets in a SW neighborhood. It’s now at a rehab facility. It’s a dang rodent.

In Austin they take care of their own.

I don't catch them every night. I'll catch about every other night with each trap. My general method has been cutting a hole in the dam and placing trap in front and I haven't been doing a good job brushing it in, but I have recently started brushing them and it seems to have a little more success. I also build a "fence" with smaller sticks so they can't get to the leak in the dam without going through the trap. A few times they've been able to skirt their way around and repair the dam using the trap a center piece in the rebuild.

That’s Austin

Thermal & a rifle

I found that its best to get 'em drunk first, your odds go way up

Pm