From 1939 until 1955, beavers were live-trapped throughout Missouri in areas with a large population and released in desirable localities. This program helped to re-establish this species in most counties of the state and to restore this valuable furbearer in sufficient numbers to permit an annual trapping season. Habitat and home. In Missouri, beavers live in and along streams, rivers, marshes and small lakes. For their home in running water, they usually excavate a tunnel and den in a high bank, but in quiet water like lakes, marshes or backwater, they frequently construct a large, bulky lodge of tree limbs or other debris.
Beavers are well-known for their engineering skills, particularly in building dams.
Paths from feeding grounds to water become well worn and at the water's edge, may end in mud slides. When felling a tree, the beaver generally cuts the first notch at a convenient height and makes a second one about three inches below the first. The bark and wood between the notches are cut out chip by chip until the tree snaps and falls. The beaver cannot direct the angle at which the tree falls. In spring and fall, about half of their food consists of woody vegetation and half of non-woody vegetation.