This morning glimpsed three duckling broods in the scrape, our older set of two, a mom with four, and a sleeping clump of uncountable numbers.
Two egrets fed on the bank and a greedy cormorant gulped fish between the first and second dams.
The year I started watching the beavers there were two families of phoebe flycatchers at the dam that produced 2-3 offspring each. Now those offspring have offspring and you see phoebe families every 20 feet. This morning babies were getting fed in aerial transactions that, while not worthy of Travis, were nevertheless amusing to watch.
The dams are both full past brimming, and water is flowing over the tops. There doesn’t appear to be any ruptures, just more water than they are used to dealing with, so there is runoff while they readjust. At exactly 7:00 am we saw mom come up over the secondary dam with a branch from the recently downed willow at the corp yard, drag it over the two dams and back into her lodge. There was an brief but exciting cormorant-beaver battle and then it was time for bed.
Planning a visit to the first farmer’s market of the year on sunday? Stop by the ESA grand opening parking lot launch. There will be children’s activities and food as well as opportunities to help them meet their mural fundraising goal. Worth A Dam will be there to support the kids who have supported us.
Come say hi, enter the “baby pool” to guess how many kits mom will have and check out our brand new 2009 tshirt.
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