Winter Life for the North American Beaver

The above video is a series of short clips taken this winter of an animal extremely well adapted to cold New England Winters. Despite average night-time temperatures of -15 F°, this beaver left it's lodge to forage and was never bothered by the cold. Peak activity was from 1-3am and not one clip was recorded during daylight hours. This is a two minute condensed version from 4+ hours of footage during a one week filming period.

Young Beaver on the Dam

Beaver crossing from Peter Abdu on Vimeo.

Here's a quick video I shot last week while filming the north American Beaver (Castor canadensis). The more time I spend in the woods the more I've gravitated to beaver ponds. I've come to sincerely appreciate these ecosystem engineers and it's always easy to find a great set of tracks in the mud.

If you turn the volume up you will notice a chirp near the end of the clip (~14 seconds). Also note that at the end of the clip the beavers were trying to move the camera. I have 10 minutes worth of video in which multiple beavers try to work the camera free. Beavers certainly are determined and well adapted mammals, but ultimately it was the curiosity of a black bear cub that did this camera in.

A Beaver under the Ice

I'm moving towards the video world for the best method of capturing animal ecology and thought I would release a few clips from the first night my camera was deployed. While the final system is relatively simple, it's taken hundreds of hours of research, experimenting, and building to get to this point. I still have a bit of work to do to get this system exactly how I want it, but I finally have built the technology that will allow me to film wildlife, day or night, and record it at the highest possible quality. This beaver walks right over the microphone while dragging food back under the ice:

Beaver1 from Peter Abdu on Vimeo.

Despite all activity occurring at night, this beaver was completely relaxed and even curious.

Beaver2 from Peter Abdu on Vimeo.