Species Spotlight: Eurasian Beaver
Species spotlight:
Beavers don’t give a dam—they build them. These furry little engineers are nature’s overachievers, turning trickling streams into fortress-grade ponds. Read on to find out what they smell like and how they saved the Czech government €1.2 million.
Names & Nicknames: Eurasian beaver, European beaver
Size: A pretty hefty chonker, one of the largest rodents only behind the capybara and their North American beaver cousins, these critters can reach up to a metre in length and weigh between 11 and 30kg. That’s kinda like stuffing five bowling balls into your gym duffel bag, covering it with fur, and adding a 25-50cm tail on the back.
Smell: Eurasian beavers have a distinct, musky, vanilla-like smell due to a chemical called castoreum that they excrete from castor sacs near the base of their tails. They use this smelly secretion to mark their territories. They can smell a secretion left by another beaver and tell all sorts of things, such as age, sex, and even how healthy the other beaver is. But unfortunately, their smelly bottoms were almost their greatest downfall. By the 16th century, beavers were on the brink of extinction, largely due to overhunting for this castoreum used in various products such as medicine and perfume. So if anyone offers you any Eau de beaver, maybe kindly decline.
Communication: Chatting through odours, such as their castoreum deposits to mark their territories (see smell section for more smelly details), but they are also partial to a much more entertaining tail slap. An adult beaver may give the water a big ol' slap with their tail to warn their family of impending danger.
Favourite Hangout: Good healthy woodlands with plenty of trees they can munch on for food and to make their dams. They also need good freshwater habitats like rivers, streams, and lakes. But if the water source isn't quite right, that’s no problem for beavers! They use their strong teeth to get to work gnawing down trees and branches to build a dam to create the perfect still pond to live in. They can then work on their next construction project, a ‘lodge’ made of sticks and mud that they can shelter in and raise kids.
Favourite Snack: DAMMM they love veggies. Okay, sorry that was bad, but they do love snacking on tasty greens. During the summer months, when it’s warmer, they will munch on aquatic plants, pond weeds, grass, and leaves, and when winter comes a’knocking, they switch to more woody sustenance, such as bark, twigs, and roots, preferably from willow, aspen, and birch trees.
Toilet Humour: Eurasian beavers certainly aren't afraid of leftovers. When the meal is good the first time, why not try it for a second time? By a second time I mean after it has come out the other end, yes beavers are partial to a bit of caecotrophy, a fancy term for eating their own poop to make sure they get any nutrients they missed. Yummy.
Love Language: Eurasian beavers certainly do like the water, so much so that they even mate in there. A male will swim up to his floating partner, and then they can start getting frisky. Eurasian beaver couples form strong bonds, usually staying together for their entire lives. However, where they were thought to be completely monogamous, recent research is suggesting that beaver marriage may not always be as faithful as it seems…
If you see them: Mind your own DAM business. Sorry these puns really need to stop. Butt seriously we know they are adorable, but they are still wild animals, so please keep your distance and watch from afar to avoid disturbing them.
Red Flags: Historically, Eurasian beavers were mostly threatened by overhunting for their fur, meat, and castoreum (see smell section). Fortunately for our furry friends, hunting is now banned and their numbers have sprung back. However, they still may be at risk from habitat loss, water pollution, road accidents, competition with introduced North American beavers, and occasional illegal hunting.
Epic Journeys: Eurasian beavers were once almost extinct and were only found in small pockets of Europe. Numbers have since bounced back, and several beaver populations have been reintroduced with a helping hand from some humans. However, beavers can also take things into their own hands and have naturally spread further and further across their habitat as their population has increased. When it comes time for a beaver to go off and start its own DAMilly (last one…), it will usually travel 5-10 but sometimes even 80 kilometres to find its own patch and slowly but surely, Eurasian beavers are returning to habitats they have always belonged in!
Glow-up: Eurasian beaver parents give birth to 2-3 babies known as kits, usually in May or June. These kits are born into lodges, protective structures built by the parents that keep the family safe. They can swim after just a few hours of being born and are ready to leave the nest after a few months. Although they are now able to fend for themselves, they will often stick with their parents for a couple of years until they are ready to go off and start their own families.
Facts: If you need something done right, do it yourself. That is the attitude some particularly eager Eurasian beavers took in Czechia in early 2025. Officials had first drafted plans to build a dam to shield the Klabava river in 2018. It would have likely cost £1 million of taxpayers' money and was delayed for years, until some beavers took it into their own hands and completed it themselves! This dam created an area protecting a population of critically endangered crayfish, and created a nature-rich wetland twice as large as originally planned! Go beavers go!
Who are they in the friendship group: Hardworker, family-oriented, and works as a structural engineer.
Name:
Eurasian Beaver
Habitat:
Woodlands around freshwater sources such as streams, rivers, and lakes across a lot of Europe and parts of Asia, specifically in Russia, China, and Mongolia.
Diet:
Herbivores feeding on plant matter such as aquatic plants, pond weeds, grass, leaves, bark, twigs, and roots.
Size:
80-100cm length plus a 25-50cm tail. 11-30kg in weight.
Behaviour:
Crepuscular (active at dawn and dusk)/Nocturnal, and social, living in family groups.
Predators:
Several predators, including wolves, lynx, wolverines, red foxes, and birds of prey.
Lifespan:
7-8 years
Threats:
Historically, their main threat was overhunting, but present threats include habitat loss, water pollution, road accidents, competition with introduced North American beavers, and occasional illegal hunting.
Conservation status:
Least concern
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Where to from here?
Need more? Listen to the Animal Sensemaker Podcast
Episode 28 highlights our hero, the beaver. Listen here.
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