I inhabit an area that is adjacent to a wetland that can vary from a pond to a bog. In the last few days an unseasonably heavy pre-Thanksgiving snowfall was melted off by substantial rainfall. When this happened I could hear the stream that feeds the puddle flowing pretty heavily and I noticed the level of the puddle was rising pretty significantly. Well, what of it? Winter is coming and that will put a stop to most of the flow.
After that the puddle will solidify and stop being a concern until Spring. But Camera girl has the vision of a hawk or eagle or something. And she saw something interesting.
Now I wish I had bought that Sigma 600mm zoom. I assume soon my basement will be underwater and the beaver will be cohabiting with us and borrowing my stuff. There’s never an end to the indignities of living in New England. This undocumented migrant probably has all kinds of protected status, doesn’t pay taxes and for all I know is a trans-gender study major at the local state college all on my dime. I’ll keep everyone updated on the horror.
Sic the EPD on the beaver, tell them that the beaver is modifying wetlands without permits.
Unless the dam actually raises the water level into my area, I’m going to be on good relations with the beaver family. It’s the coyotes, fishers and owls that I have a bone to pick with. Their night time serenades leave a lot to be desired as music.
He could be an insurgent in the Honorable Resistance. One of those ungovernable deplorable’s, setting up a guerrilla base of operations to start 4th Generation war against the New England Fabien’s.
Look at those steely eyes and the beaver fur uniform.
I hope to bring him over to the alt-rodent.
Heh.
Good deal.
Though watch out, you know CNN will probably call them racist “The Mad Hatters”, get them classified with the Southern Propaganda Lie Center as domestic terrorist group with assault teeth, or accused of appropriating one of feminism’s third hole genders.
You have the makings of some cool ecology there. If theres enough oxygen in your brook, at least for the first 3 years after your beavers build a damn system, Brook Trout fishing is spectacular. Talking orange salmon meat tasty lunkers. After that unless theres a good amount of moving oxygenated in flow the ponds get too stagnant.
I wouldn’t even dignify this water as a brook. Except when there’s a good rain it’s more like a seepage. But it’ll be fun to watch the beavers. I hope the coyotes can’t reach him. They’re pretty big.
You might have a spring there too. Over time enough hydraulic pressure from heavy rains could erode out a new leak path, or it takes a secondary course. There’s a lot of underground “rivers” in the northeast. Walden pond is fed by one from traced up into NH, I heard when I was younger growing up in NH its so deep to explore divers required decompression dives. Critters know their environment, what better natural hydraulic engineers than Beavers and Muskrats. I discovered one on a small farm I had in North Sandwich NH, hand dug a small trench across it,… Read more »
Interesting. I’ll have to look for the lodge. The water rose a significant amount in the last week. I’ll put up some photos when I have a chance to investigate.
Your lucky. I have a creek on my land, a series of beaver damns would create a great resource they way it lays.
Its great to see beavers make a comeback. They have such a profound effect on their area of operations, drastically changing that environment. Cant think of another animal with the same capability.
The damn systems can be phenomenal works of hydraulic engineering.
In the short term it may cause some critters to have to relocate their burrows though.
[…] Rodents of Unusual Size and the De-Swampification of My Puddle […]
If the beavers stay to build ponds you will get a lot of critters from coons to minks dining on the aquatic life. Blue Herons, Wood Ducks, even Otters will drop by if there’s good fish to feed them. And everyone in the forrest uses the dams to cross over the brooks.
I went to check out the situation. He has set up a small lodge but it isn’t at the outlet of the pond so far. He’s taken down some small trees and he eats the bark off of the trunks and branches. He moves around pretty freely but retreated when he saw me. We get a pretty good cross section of those species you listed except I’ve never seen an otter around. In addition we have coyotes, fox, bobcat and fishers. The only thing I haven’t seen is bear. But they are in the area. Which predator is the beaver… Read more »
A lodge is a good sign. They like a bank with undercut feature or where they can carve out a shute. Your little guy will cut the tender branches up and store them under the ice for when your pond freezes. Once the hole in the ice they try to keep open freezes up closed the bark of those branches will be most of their food supply. Open water is their means of defense. Otters will come thru occasionally hunting for fish, clams, crawdads and amphibian’s hibernating in the mud. They have wicked keen eye sight. If your lucky enough… Read more »
Excellent information. You should let me put some of these comments into a post. You could have a guest post column on country life. It’s interesting stuff.
You see any signs of them knawing on trees? Put up a couple Wood Duck nest box’s. They love them over open water, so you got to do it before it floods or from a canoe or plain old wade it. In the Boy Scouts we put up a couple in NewIpswich NH along the Souhegan River, if you know the area, beginning from the flood control below Gibson’s Four Corners northwards. Lived on the River Rd till our house burnt down. Best Brook trout fishing I ever experienced. My grandad, who raised me caught a US record native Brooky… Read more »
He took down some saplings so far. So far the only ducks I’ve seen are some mallards that show up in the early spring and hatch out ducklings. Great Blue Herons drop in from time to time and spook really easily. Haven’t gotten a photo of one on this pond yet.
By the way, you’ve got a lot of interesting natural history knowledge. I’ve got to talk you into contributing some articles here on those subjects. If you’re interested let me know. I’ll set up a folder of your stuff.