Diario de joerich

Walking down South Creek trail this morning I heard a cricket. I cannot recall when was the last time I have heard a cricket.

Walking across the paved trail over Orchard Creek Walking along Oak Valley Drive I noticed some cattails being shaken. It wasn't the wind because it was just one single clump of cattails amongst the other cattails. I paused and watched for about 7 minutes. Every minute or so the cattails would shake and sometimes the water would ripple. Once there was a swirl in the water in the stream near the cattails and a large board shot to the surface in the stream - no idea what this was from but it must have been being carried by something underwater. At another time the water in the stream seemed to foam and there was a fair amount of ripples. Once I heard a small splash, like a fish, further in the cattails. I never saw anything on the surface. After doing a little research I learn that beaver can hold their breath for up to 15 minutes, so it is highly probable that this was a beaver.

I went back and took a couple of photos and added them to the observation. https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223092452

Beavers are amazing. Like I described in my last entry on June 16, I learned that beavers can stay submerged for up to 15 minutes. I had thought that they primarily swam on the surface, but this may not be true as then I witnessed them either eating or cutting cattails while totally submerged underwater. I saw this again on my walk yesterday.

On Tuesday I placed two camera traps just below a dam on South Creek just above where it joins Orchard Creek. While crossing the dam I was amazed to see two fairly large rocks, maybe six inches in maximum dimension, on top of the dam. Doing a little more research I find that beavers use rocks in their construction and that they are able to maneuver these rocks fairly easily, especially under water.

So I learned two things about beavers in the last week. Here are links.

Pictures of the rocks: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/223868946

And a YouTube video of beavers moving rocks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BQsV9S3eZA
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