How to Make a Suitcase Beaver Trap

Beaver dams can back up drainage lines.

Beaver traps are essential for catching these wild animals before they reshape your land and property. Beaver feed on all sorts of wood and timber for food and building dams. In addition to dam building, beaver burrow holes and dig tunnels all over the landscape they inhabit. Constructing a suitcase trap, while not as effective as other traps -- conibear and snares, for example -- is a quick way to fashion a device that will stop a beaver in its tracks.

Things You'll Need

• Work gloves
• Safety glasses
• Old suitcase (for shaping purposes)
• Metal chain-link fence material
• Measuring tape
• Marker
• Wire cutters
• Pliers
• Heavy gauge wire
• 8 - 2-inch by 2-inch wood pieces, to lengths associated with suitcase lid and frame opening
• 4 - 1-3/8-inch corner brackets
• 2 - 4 inch spring hinges
• Drill
• 3/8-inch by 1-inch wood screws
• 2 - 8-inch wood sticks
• 6-10 - 6-inch poplar wood sticks
• Poplar oil

Instructions

1. Slide on work gloves and safety glasses to protect skin and eyes.

2. Cut and form chain-link fence material to the shape of an old suitcase. Use wire cutters to cut the chain-link fence pieces to form. Attach the fencing sides to each other with heavy gauge metal wire. Wrap wire around every second or third connection point link to ensure stability of the trap. Twist wires tight with pliers. Snip off residual wire with wire cutters or pliers. Build the trap around the actual suitcase and remove the suitcase once the body of the trap is constructed.

3. Measure and cut a trap lid -- the lid that will close over the opening of the trap -- to the dimensions of the trap opening. Use the chain-link fencing material to craft the lid.

4. Measure the length of each of the four sides of the opening on the trap. Cut the 2-inch by 2-inch wood pieces to suit these lengths. Connect all four corners of the frame with brackets and 3/8 inch screws. Fit the frame upright and inside of the trap so it is flush with the opening. Secure the frame into place by wrapping heavy gauge wire around the frame -- attaching the wood to the chain-link trap.

5. Repeat Step 4 to create and secure a 2-inch by 2-inch frame to the underside of the trap lid.

6. Connect the lid to the trap with spring hinges. Measure 2 inches in from the left edge of the lid and secure on half of the first hinge. Position the lid so the second half of the first hinge connects with the upper left corner of the trap frame -- so the lid opens upward. Repeat this step for the right side. Use high tension springs so the trap door will be difficult to push open.

7. Lay the trap in front of a beaver mound near a stream or river bed. Remove the bark from two 8-inch sticks. Shorten the sticks if necessary to suit the opening of the lid. Prop open each end of the lid with the two sticks. Coat fresh poplar sticks with poplar oil and drop them into the back of the trap. The trap will snap shut once the beaver is lured inside by the sticks and oil aroma. Contact your state Department of Wildlife Preservation for help with relocation of the trapped animal.

References

• University of Arkansas; Beaver Damage Prevention and Control Methods; Rebecca McPeake and Mike Pledger
• Bug Spray: Beaver Control

Resources

• I Dig Hardware: Spring Hinges
• Hardware Source: Spring Hinges