Fresh fronts inside
What is this? Observation and best guess by A. Wanden
The elusive mountain beaver. Thank you for the id.
This little mountain beaver was collecting brush, stuffing it's face and carrying it back into a possible nest under a log. Came back and forth several times gathering more material in it's mouth.
I thought this one looked odd so I looked it up. This was the only thing that I felt matched it. I think it was living in a fallen tree next to the trail. It would run down to where a bunch of plants were growing, grab a big mouthful, run back up the hill, come back and repeat. It didn’t seem to mind me being there so long as I was quiet. I probably watched it for a good 10-15 minutes. Eventually I moved along down the trail, and I found the opening of the hollow tree, filled with the plants it was collecting, which is what the final picture shows.
Carpenter Mountain trail, HJ Andrews Experimental Forest, Willamette National Forest, Oregon, USA. West Cascades ecoregion. mixed conifer forest.
Watched it run back to burrow, away from burrow, and then back again, but happened too fast and only got this blurry photo the third time.