Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Trapping Beaver But Were Afraid To Ask: A New Year’s Pictorial

Hauling gear 

A beaver flowage

Checking the ice for bubble trails with a homemade Cree snow shovel. Shovel is also used to thump ice to test thickness and for occasional brotherly sparring

Difference in ice where muskrats have traveled (very thin ice shelf compared to 8″ – 10″ elsewhere) 

Ice crystals formed around breathing hole in lodge 

Using setting tongs to compress trap springs

Putting trap on a carriage to hold it in place 

Conibear killer trap on carriage. Conibears are basically giant rat traps. 

Placing trap over runway

Removing safety gripper