Mountain Beaver Close Encounters! I get quite a few contacts from folks who have come across a mountain beaver in their area for the first time and usually don't know what they have just seen. I'm including a few of the most recent contacts I've received and please note that a couple of these really were "close encounters"! p.s. let me know if you have a tale to share too.... -----> 10/23/02 What a great website! My brother-in-law was recently doing a good deed for some neighbors who live along Schooner Creek near Lincoln City, OR, and had to crawl under their old house. Armed with a flashlight and a screwdriver, he came face-to-face with a long-dead and petrified "Boomer" as Mountain Beaver are commonly called here. (I confirmed this with the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Department.) In my search on line for information about Boomers, I found nothing. ÊGuessing Nutria, I found information that led me to make inquiries to OFWD, and they told me about Mountain Beaver. I have also heard these critters referred to here as Land Beavers. I guess their range is extending farther South that commonly believed. Have you ever heard the moniker "Boomer" before for these animals? Hi Dale, it's okay to use the story I sent earlier on your close encounters section. The information I got from the OR Fish & Wildlife guy was that the range of Mountain Beaver was essentially Washington and Oregon from the coast to the Western slopes of the Cascades, with a little incursion into adjacent areas of B.C and Northern California. Your site and others I read talk about the different populations such as the Point Arena and the ones observed in Mono County. I guess they may be subspecies, though, while the Oregon population is the simple aplodontia rufa, without any other Latin words appended.Ê I find it all extremely interesting.Ê Thanks for confirming the "boomer" handle. Jim Stovall, Neotsu, OR -----> I took this picture 10/21 on the bank of the Skykomish river near Monroe WA. I was told it is a groundhog, but was wondering if it is. It appeared to be about 15 or 16 in. long and didn't go far from its burrow. The color is dark grey. It was darting in and out of a large hole and grabbing weeds and leaves (it really liked the dandelions). Today I think I saw a smaller one. Thanks for any info you can give me. Thanks for responding to my inquiry. The picture you sent sure looks like what I saw, but I didn't see it on the Olympic Penn. We are currently parked in our RV in an RV park on the banks of the Skykomish River just SE of Monroe WA in Snohomish Co. - about 30+ mile NE of Seattle. Quite a ways from the Olympic Penn. I took the pictures(walking) (peeking) out of my window- The burrow he came out of is about 8 to 10" and only about 10 foot from the back of our RV. Do you think it really is a Mountain Beaver even though we're not any where near the Penn.? Feel free to use the photos. I took several, but those are the best (not bad considering I took them thru the window.) I didn't want to go outside - I didn't want to scare him. I'm sure I saw a smaller one yesterday - running near the trailer next to us - again in broad daylight. I read some of your website after I emailed you and will look at it some more later. After reading about them, I realized it probably was sort of unusual to be able to see it that closely during the day. They sound as mean as possums - guess I won't go poking around in his burrow-I'll just keep the camera handy.Ê Earlier the same day, I was lucky enough to spot a huge bald eagle at the top of a huge cedar tree - I got some great photos of him too. We see them fishing here in the river quite often. It's an interesting place to stay. Randy and Peggy -----> Hi Dale, I found your website on these little guys the most useful in identifying what I saw in my backyard. I live in Redmond, Washington about a mile from the first Microsoft campus.ÊÊI also live about a mile from a very large (don't know the acreage) natural park that is by Lake Sammamish. This subdivision has a sizable green belt area so my backyard is natural with huge Western Red Cedar and Western Hemlocks. The green beltÊis a steep ravine with lots of very loose soil, nettles, brackenÊfern and salal. A stream runs through it also. We have barred owls, coyote, deer, frogs, pileated woodpeckers and a great assortment of other birds. I was pruning some salal in my yard when I heard lots of rustling in a nearby salal loaded with berries. I thought spotted towhee since they make considerable noise in the bushes, then no maybe a squirrel, but that didn't fit either. Much to my surprise I watched this critter climb a rotten stump that has a salal plant growing out of it. I had never seen anything like it. I like to identify everything, so I know the birds and animals that visit. I couldn't figure out what this was. It rummaged around in the salal eating berries like they were going out of style! It sort of climbed, half fell back to the ground and was coming toward me through the salal when a frog croaked and scared it. It didn't go far before all was quiet. I saw mountain beaver in my Pacific Northwest books, but the drawings were not good and the descriptions were not great either. It wasn't until I found your website with the great pictures that I confirmed that this was what I saw.ÊTheÊpicture of the baby looked exactlyÊlike what IÊsaw. ÊWhat fun to see this little guy and so cute! Happy mountain beaver research and thanks for the info! Susan (8/17/02) -----> Dale - Here is another Mt. Beaver story from Redmond, Wa. I was only able to make a positive ID by reading your Web page, the information you present there left little doubt (after reading the Close Encounter posting by Dan Plute I am now certain of my 'encounter'...as you will see my situation is very similar). I was spray painting some furniture in my garage one evening after dark. My dad, who was helping me, noticed a large rodent slowly walking down my front steps and pointed it out to me. I walked out of my garage and approached the critter just as it had reached the driveway...it looked back at me and then continued slowly on down the driveway. I continued to follow. When the little guy reached the middle of the street in front of my house I stopped on the sidewalk and I stood there trying to figure out what I was looking at. Well, about this time the critter decided he had had enough of my attention so he turned around and hissed at me (which surprised me) and then with no further warning he just charged after me as fast as his little legs could carry him. So with the combination of surprise, adrenalin, paint thinner (which was on the bottoms of my Teva sandals), and the wet sidewalk (it was lightly raining) I attempted to run, but wound up on the ground. However with the thought of that little guy chomping down on my exposed toes I was up and running in no time. I ran about 10 yards down the walk and then looked back to see my buddy charging after me STILL at full speed. Now my dad, who was watching this whole thing from my drive (laughing hysterically) was able to get to the garage and grab a shovel and run to my defense. Once he had ran a little way down the walk (shovel in hand) the critter stopped (between us) hissed again and tore off after my dad (needless to say, it was now my turn to laugh). I think I will leave the end of the story to your imagination. I will say that your page made me aware of the uniqueness of this little creature, but if my kids ever come across one of these guys I bet we'd go through quite a few band-aids. Jeff Hancock (7/18/02) -----> Dale: Thank-you for posting such an informative web page(s) on Mountain Beaver. I live in Redmond Washington and by chance stumbled across a Mountain Beaver during the daylight and was fortunate enough to have quick access to a camera. It was pretty late in the evening and I went out back to the garage to check on a project. My drive at the garage is 40 feet wide and raw gravel. As I approached the garage I noticed the critter about 15 feet to my right, right in the middle of all that gravel. He took me by surprise as I had never seen one before. "Whoa critter" I said, "what the heck are you"? He just kept his head down and waddled his way right for me. When he got to within 5 feet I began to wonder if he was sick or something because he seemed so task oriented (here to there) and it was appear that I wasn't going to stop him. I leaned down to get a closer look and he looked up, hissed, and lunged at me a well as his tiny legs could. This was too odd to pass up so into the house I went for the camera. By the time I got back he had waddled his way into the greenery and as I tried to stick the camera in his face he again disapproved by hissing and lunging at me! I wondered who is this brave little guy that wants so badly to get from here to there that even a 6 foot human can't stay him from his course...... Here are the 3 snaps I took before the batteries went dead in my camera. You are welcome to do anything you like with them. Dan Plute (6/30/02) close up #1 close up #2 close up #3 -----> Hi: Thanks for putting up such a fantastic website - you helped me solve a mystery! I was downright giddy when I found out that this bizarre creature we saw two nights ago was your mountain beaver!! This was in the woods in Quilcene, WA around 1:00 a.m., looked to be about 2 pounds, seemed disoriented but now I understand it's because they're hard-of-seeing (is that a term?!). I can't tell you how excited I was to see a mammal that I couldn't remotely identify. "A tailless muskrat" was the closest I could come up with, but that was only for the sake of trying to describe it to someone. We just watched him for a few minutes, then let him go his way. that was so cool!!!!!! -Linda (6/30/02) -----> Hi Dale, I live in Brier, WA, a small town on the north end of Lake Washington, outside of Seattle. On Saturday morning, about 10:00 AM, I saw a small creature running up my driveway and thought that it was an escaped guinea pig; it was about the same size and overall configuration. I took my 2-1/2 year old daughter out to see it and managed to trap it under a plastic milk case. I had no idea what I had caught so I dragged my neighbor out and showed it to him and he told me that it was a baby mountain beaver. Since I had never heard of one of these I was sort of sceptical about it, figuring that this was a local name for a woodchuck or groundhog. I asked at work this morning and lo and behold, mountain beavers really do exist and it was suggested that I look on the web. Which obviously I did. Although we live in town and on the edge of a major metropolitan area, our town is small and quite rural We are fortunate to be able to rent 3 acres of overgrown forest and idle filbert orchard. There is a sort of wet land in front with what appears to be a year round stream and several small "lakelets", one cemented, one more natural. In the back, in the forest part, there was a pond this spring but it has dried up now. So it must be a good habitat for these little guys. I was thinking that it was flat, but actually there are gullys around so there must be good places for them to dig holes although I haven't seen any. Peter (7/1/02) -----> Hello, My wife Karen and I live on 2 1/2 acres in Sammamish, WA. Yesterday (06/28) she saw an unknown animal in her pumpkin patch. Upon doing a little research we came across your website and have positively identified it as a mountain beaver. This is the first one we have ever seen. Our area is rapidly building up but there are five 2 1/2 acre properties plus an undeveloped 10 acre parcel, that is heavilly wooded. Is he/she likely to eat my wife's pumpkins? If so, I would hate to be the mountain beaver! Regards, Chuck (6/29/02) -----> We had our first encounter with a mountain beaver the other night and got to see it first hand. Our dog heard it in our backyard and chased it into a clearing (at 3:00 a.m.). My husband went out to see what the dog had cornered and found a grey, husky little fury animal with a round face and short tale.It had long fingers with claws. My husband got the dog to leave it alone. We have the correct vegitation behind the house as you describe in your web page. We knew we had Mountain Beaver because of the holes in the ground in this area. We are at the base of Woolford mountain (Kalama, Wa.) where there is a hillside so filled with holes, we never rode the horses for fear of the them breaking a leg.I just thought you might be interested in this "close encounter" since you mentioned Mt. St Helens.We are within the 20 mile "red zone" of the blast area although not near the mountain. (6/25/02) -----> My girlfriend found a mt beaver in her yard, so I was out looking for a place for her to go let it loose. I will have her take it to Mt Rainer up in the woods, maybe in a logged off area. She lives in downtown Everett Washington. (7/2/02) -----> |Return Home|