Beavers were trapped out of Ohio by the mid-1800s and only worked their way back in during the 1930s, dispersing from populations in neighboring states. Every report mapped here, whether from Cuyahoga Valley National Park’s restored wetlands or the marshy fringe of Ottawa National Wildlife Refuge along Lake Erie, traces back to that recolonization rather than an unbroken native population. Mentor Marsh and Hocking Hills State Park round out the named sites, spanning the state from the Lake Erie shore to wooded southeastern valleys.
Reports climb through late winter and peak in March and April, a stretch that lines up with ice-out and the start of dispersal season, when young beavers leave their home pond to find territory of their own and become easier to spot moving overland or along waterways. That spring surge says more about when beavers are on the move than about how many live in any one place.
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