The Beav

[jeeperman]

Imagine that...it's not a bird! lol I was sitting and watching some buffleheads and out of the corner of my eye I see the mallards scury out of the way. Here comes this guy not 10-15 feet to my left, I stayed as still and quite as I could as he past.

[Momo]

LOL! Good shot... where was this taken? I NEVER see them out in the daylight. I'm wondering if this is a juvenile.

[jeeperman]

Darren, there is a series of ponds and a creek in Canyon Park 5mun from my front door. The Green Herons nest there if you can find them. I could not. Lol but I will.

[Donald]

Again, you've nailed that beautifully. We can almost see every hair of his fur. And your 'moment of capture' is perfect with that light falling onto the side of the head.

One question - Dis it need an ever-so-slight clockwise rotation? Or is that to do with the angle at which you were shooting?

[jeeperman]

Thank you Donald. Yes, it was the angle in which I was positioned. I did think about straightening it but it flattened the scene to much.

[Dizzy]

Nice shot of the beaver Paul...

That does look like a "kit", or young beaver, so mom and dad won't be too far away
unless "junior" has already been booted from the pond.

Beaver are frequently out in the daytime, and generally closer to morning or
late evening is the best times to catch them cruising around their ponds and
doing "clean-up" work to keep the dam in good shape.

The key to finding one in an evening is to be very stealthy as you find a good
observing spot along the edge of the pond, and then just wait for the critters
to come out. Look for freshly chewed sticks (the ends of the gnawed
branches will still be white), and also for their "slides" where they re-enter the
water after cutting branches back in the bush.

Mike

[jeeperman]

Ok have a querry now! I stopped in again today on the way home and captured a few of this same {maybe} type animal. Yesterday I could not see his tail. Today I caught a smaller animal by half and it is a nutria! Todays animal looks exactly like yesterdays except the large white wiskers {and no it was not an otter} Today I got a look at the tail and it is not flat on this guy but round like a rat. I am going to have to study the two closely. If yesterdays turns out to be a nutria as well, I had no idea the grew to 3ft sans the tale.

[jeeperman]

So...after looking online at Nutria and Beavers there are two decerning differences. Nutria are between 17-25 inches head and body. Bevers are 23-39 inches head and body. The other is the tail...Nutria is a rat like fur covered tail and the Beavers flat and wide. Since I know both to exist in this water and that I know todays was a nutria {tail confirmation} I can only conclude that the one in the photos here was Beaver due to it being closer to 36 inches than the largest 25 inches of the nutria.

[rtbaum]

Just a thought, could be the smaller was in fact a muskrat

[jeeperman]

The muskrat is another that is nearly identical but is limited to 20 inches including tail. Both were larger than that. I will later post the smaller from today under Nutria. It is amazing how similar these breeds are in appearance. The one other difference with the Muskrat is the ear is lighter colored and appears fully covered in fur. The others are surrounded by fur but appear black and more smooth.

[Momo]

Hmmm... interesting. All of the beavers I have seen only come out at night right after the sun goes down. Also, I have never seen a beaver swim with its back out of the water and especially in a hump towards the back end. (like in the photo above) I'm guessing this is a nutria. I Googled some photos and I see they swim with their back out of the water. If you do the same search for a beaver swimming, you will see that, for the most part, they keep their body underwater.

Of course, the telltale giveaway is the tail slap. I always get the tail slap when they're nearby.

[jeeperman]

I have looked and saw the same thing, the only thing that threw me off was the size of the first one. If a nutria it is bigger than it is supposed to be. Maybe my judgement was off a few inches but it was certainly bigger than the guy I am about to post. Looking at them in the face you can not tell a difference, sure wish I saw the first ones tail. The more I look the more I am thinking extra large nutria.

[rtbaum]

I just saw your other post, I will be "expletive deleted", that sure does look like a nutria! I cannot believe that they have gotten as far north as Oregon. I will trade you our Asian Carp.

[jeeperman]

Randy I am actually in Washington, even further north. They have been here for a few years. In some spots they seem to be getting them under control...in most it is quite the opposite.

[Dizzy]

Paul,

Hope this will help others in distinguishing between Beaver and Nutria. I
cropped the heads from both your pics and combined them. Muskrat are
easy to spot as they have a somewhat triangular shaped, hairless tail
that they use as a rudder when swimming.



Randy: I live about 125 mi. N of Paul, right on the Skagit River and at the base of
the North Cascades. Spent nearly 20 years as a trapper in this area, and although
I will no longer take the life of any critter unless there is no option, I've taken hundreds
of beaver and muskrat and can easily see the difference. Just look at their faces and
it's easy to see how the nutria's whiskers are much more prominent, and the fur is not
nearly as smooth as the beavers (beaver create an oil they use to waterproof their
fur).

Darren: Beaver will live almost anywhere they can find running water, or even in a
landlocked pond providing it is large enough. We used to routinely take nuisance
beaver and put them into the larger local rivers (Skagit, Nooksack, etc.). Rivers
are FULL of beaver, and if you watch for their feeding areas (piles of sticks and
branches with the bark gnawed off) you'll see them most frequently in the early
morning and later evening, BUT, I've seen beaver at all times of the day, especially
if they feel safe in the watershed they live in.

[jeeperman]

Thanks for that Mike. I am glad that is sorted. I started to doubt my own argument. I hope they get a handle on these nutria before there are no more Beaver.

[rtbaum]

My oops, Paul, I do agree that it is a nutria. It just boggles my mind that they have become established in Washington. The last I knew they were a problem in Louisiana. Do you know how they were introduced?

[jeeperman]

Not sure how they were introduced here, I am sure it had something to do with the reason in the rest of the country. The fur trade. Appearently the lower layer of fur is quite nice to make clothing with.

[Dizzy]

Randy,

The Nutria have vastly expanded the area they inhabit in the past 10 years, and are now into Washington, British Columbia and other Provinces as well.

Bit of history: Nutria were first introduced in WA. about the early 1940's, as they were
then considered as "The poor man's Mink", and although there were limited fur farms
with them (in Wa.), there was a huge population of them in the South, and that is
where the real issue started. Fur prices dropped to rock-bottom, and the fur farmers
just opened the pens rather than destroy them. Since that time they have migrated
and propagated through every body of water they could find, moving North. I don't know
of any western states that don't have an eradication program, and when I quit working
as a nuisance trapper the word was that they were to be "terminated" on-sight.

This site explains how they have been able to expand their range so rapidly:

http://www.nwrc.usgs.gov/special/nutria/namerica.htm

[jamn4ex]

anyways Great shot Paul!