I discovered this Beaver activity sometime around mid-September.
This location is just just around a 100 yards/meters from the head of a small creek that flows through our neighborhood. Ultimately this creek continues on until it merges with the Trinity River a few miles/kilometers to the west.
Over the years a number of trees have grown up in the culvert that the creek flows through. Some had become quite tall. My first clue that there was something going on here was when I noticed that some of the larger trees had gone missing.
When I went to investigate, I found abundant evidence of Beaver activity. Several tree were downed. A pond was beginning to form. Reeds along the shore had been cleared. There was a dam, and a beaver lodge.
The Beaver can be reliably observed night after night at around 7:00pm. Most nights at this time he can be found sitting just outside the entrance of the lodge. He typically stays there for just a few minutes before entering the water and swimming off towards the dam.
Unfortunately, between the vegetation, and the poor lighting it is hard to get much more than a fleeting glimpse of him. It has been even harder to get a good photograph.
But, I continue to try. Currently, I have Scouting Cameras monitoring the site, and hope to get some candid photographs or video soon. Stay tuned!
We had a beaver pond behind our house for most of last year. The pond went dry during the drought, and we haven’t seen the beaver in a long time. Not sure exactly what happened to him.
What a great opportunity you have here. I’ll look forward to catching a glimpse of the beaver himself in your photos. I would love to see a beaver some day. When I was a kid, we’d come upon beaver ponds on walks in the woods. Not likely here in Manhattan, although a beaver was spotted just a few years ago up in the Bronx – after no beavers being seen in city limits for 200 years!!
This guy is always one step ahead of me! If I have my scouting cameras trained on his lodge, the signs of activity are around the tree he is trying to take down. If I point the cameras at the tree, then the lodge will be slathered with fresh mud the next morning! I am determined to get him photographed, though. My hope is that I will record the tree going down. We will see…