These particular ones looked to be abandoned (very gray sticks and twigs in the dams, largely silted up, etc.), but I’ve fished others that were active. I’ve never actually seen a beaver when fishing (they’re nocturnal, and I don’t fish around dawn or dusk much). Huh, I didn’t know they attack people. Crazy. I guess that’s another potential use for the bear spray!
Yeah, likely a very low probability of being attacked by a beaver unless doing something really stupid. Unprovoked attacks are rare but on the rise with the rise of beaver populations leading to more encounters between human and dam builders.
In most reports of attacks the beaver were rabid. But not all of them. As a general rule people say, like black bears, they usually run away when they see you. But I always say, the word “usually” has a different meaning from the word “always”. They may be mostly nocturnal but often when I’ve seen them they were out swimming round in mid afternoon.
I looked up the report about the two sisters being attacked, which was 7 years ago in Lake Anna, Va. Near Spotsylvania. Turns out the beaver was rabid, which I did not recall reading in the report I saw when it first happened. Maybe that was only reported later.
Last year a girl and her father kayaking in Penn. were attacked by a rabid beaver. And a couple of more cases from a couple of years earlier near Asheville, NC, in two different events people were attacked by rabid beavers. Though it wasn’t clear to me if both attacks may have been by the same critter, as both attacks happened on Beaver Lake.
There are reports of people getting to near an active den during daylight hours that have triggered a beaver to emerge, where generally they will smack their tails on the water as a warning to stay back.
On a Washington Flyfishing blog was a report from several years ago of a fisherman in Russia dying from blood lose from a beaver bite. But it seems he picked up a baby beaver prompting momma beaver to attack. Bad idea. (maybe it was a true story, or not)
From the dumb category, two men in Ore. walked across a beaver dam at night, and were attacked for their poor judgement.
https://kutv.com/news/offbeat/beaver-attacks-2-oregon-men-who-climbed-on-top-of-dam
A few years ago a beaver built a dam just downstream of my brother-in-laws home. Which was kind of cool at first. But as its dam got bigger the water started flooding his property. I heard someone from DNR killed it. But I don’t know if that was report was true. I do know I saw an underwater trap set for it that had a DNR sticker on the anchor stake. Pity they couldn’t have trapped it in a cage and driven him or them to a location were they were more welcome to live. Spring floods soon destroyed the dam once the maintenance crew was gone.
Anyway, I can see beaver ponds creating nice deep pools of cool water on small streams that fish would be attracted to - to chill out during hot summer temperatures. Probably good fishing catching spots.
Interesting stuff. I read a really great book last year about beavers called Eager: The Surprising, Secret Life of Beavers and Why They Matter. Basically it talks about how great beavers are for the world because they provide habitat for tons of other creatures, improve groundwater levels, etc. It also covers why people dislike beavers (they can cause flooding, property damage, etc.), how they can be dealt with without killing them, what’s being done to restore beaver habitat, and so on. A surprisingly delightful and interesting book. I got it from my local library.
But yes, beaver ponds are excellent places to fish! You’re all but guaranteed some bites.
Looks like an interesting recently published book. Chelsea Green Publishing prints several interesting books. Two years ago I read another book they published. “Pawpaw: In search of America’s forgotten fruit.” Haven’t eaten a pawpaw for years, had a small pawpaw tree in the yard at one house I living in when I was a teenager. But there is a grove of them on the mountain east of my house that I haven’t walked to for years & the last time I hiked there the trees had no fruit, killed by a late spring frost I guess. Anyway, I see there are several books and a dvd about beavers on Amazon.
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(I’m posting two videos here today because I forgot to post last week’s.)
^ This video covers my best day of fishing ever. A gorgeous creek, lots of native fish, and even a bear sighting! (Direct YouTube link)
^ This video covers my first real time fishing a lake with a tenkara rod. (Direct YouTube link)
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^ I nearly had to bust out the climbing gear and rappel down into this canyon to fish the creek, but I managed to find a non-technical way down. Turned out to be an absolutely gorgeous little creek and a pleasure to fish.
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I’m a trout and small mountain stream kind of guy, but in this week’s video I took the tenkara rods to a local warm water pond to catch blugeill, bass, and perch. Had fun!
Golden trout, anyone?
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In this week’s video I head to Yellowstone and catch a new-to-me fish species. Beauties!
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Caught a PB number of fish in this video! What a perfect little tenkara stream in Yellowstone National Park.
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I tried and failed to catch grayling in some small Yellowstone creeks. So I instead headed up to a small grayling-filled mountain lake (a pond, really) in the Central Idaho mountains.
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Fun video. You can get grayling over at Smith and Morehouse and the SM creek above it regularly in Utah if you want another fun spot that is easily accessible. They call Grayling the hot dog of the mountains, easy to catch, but doesn’t taste that great 
@cc121 That spot has been on my list for a while, but I haven’t gotten around to it yet!
This week’s video is catching some rainbows and bull trout (first ones I’ve ever caught) in a perfect little mountain stream in central Idaho.
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In this week’s video I caught several species of tropical/warm-water fish (including several goldfish) in a hot spring in the Idaho desert. Not exactly traditional tenkara, but it was still a lot of fun!
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Lol cool video. I laughed at the “another Goldie”. Weird area. Thanks for posting!
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Very nice video. Love that size of stream. (one with bows and bull trout)
@dpnoll That’s my perfect size of tenkara stream, too!
In this week’s video I test out a new rod for the first time (Dragontail Mizuchi), fish three new creeks, and catch two new-to-me subspecies of cutthroat trout, all in northern Utah.
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Great video Tristan! Always enjoy your enthusiasm!