Back to the Beaver Pond

It was a truly lovely evening for the last week of summer: clear, cool, with a gentle breeze. So back to the nearest beaver pond I went hoping for a few photos of the resident beavers. The pond is about a quarter acre in size, but with connections to much larger wetlands.

These beavers are “bank beavers” that haven’t built a lodge of sticks and mud as do most beavers that inhabit ponds or lakes. Instead they dwell in a large, possibly intricate, burrow in the bank of the pond. Why these beavers, who have been here for a number of years, have never constructed a lodge is a mystery to me.

After I’d sat by the edge of the pond for about 45 minutes, a male wood duck in “eclipse plumage”, approached –

He saw me, realized something was amiss and swam away.

It wasn’t long before the first beaver appeared –

And then there were two –

They patrolled the pond before going through the oversized culvert that gives them access to a much larger pond/wetland complex –

They left, the sun was setting, and it was time for me to leave as well.

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Twenty-two hours later, on a very similar evening, I was back at the beaver pond. Once again the first thing I saw were wood ducks, including a male standing on the branches of a fallen tree –

But I was after beavers and from the place I chose to sit the wood ducks were no longer within view. As I waited, a female common spreadwing damselfly was nearby laying eggs on a blade of grass –

The first beaver, an adult, appeared shortly after I arrived; 40 minutes earlier than the night before –

It went through the culvert and I sat waiting; wood ducks soon made an appearance. First a lone male and soon two females –

Then came another beaver, a yearling, followed by another adult –

A few minutes later the prize of the evening popped to the pond’s surface, this year’s beaver kit with frizzy hair similar to that often seen on human teenagers –

All the beavers apparently swam through the culvert to the larger wetland.

Beaver lodges or bank burrows are usually occupied by a pair of breeding adults that mate for life, the one-year old yearlings that will leave the colony in late winter, and the current year’s kits.

As a solid bank of clouds began obscuring the sun, the final beaver of the evening appeared, another yearling which also swam through the culvert to the larger wetland. The light had really dimmed, so it was time to pack up and head for home.