Apparently the full Beaver Moon we just had was also a Blue Moon, because it is the fourth full moon in a season.I wish I had known, I always like to do something once in a blue moon! I just know it was traffic stopping rising up behind Mt. Diablo on my way home. It is of course traditionally the reminder for all good sportsmen and landowners to head out and set their traps before the great freeze. Sniff. I like to imagine it as something kinder, maybe the bright light that allows beavers to gather their winter food in the dark, or a reminder to us that the holiday season is upon us and it’s time to get “busy as a – ‘.
The good news is that it allowed Jon to see dad and a kit coming down stream under the tile bridge this morning with branches. We’re happy for the sighting because we had not spotted our father beaver since September 8th. We’ve been trying vainly to figure out the family structure and wondering if the loss of mom from the colony will mean it separates or drifts apart. Dad and GQ seem to be living pretty separate lives, which suggests to me that GQ is a male. The kits seem to have divided up between the two, although they all interact every night and seem to get along fine. It’s hard to know what the loss of a matriarch means for a colony, but I’m sure no one has observed it more closely than Martinez, so we’ll keep watching.
At the very least the sighting means that our beavers are feeding upstream, which is good because there’s plenty of habitat springing back to life around starbucks. The graphic above is from the Atlantic Monthly, but I thought I’d make my own.
