This was a little bit of a surprise as I visit this pond frequently but this is the first time I have ever seen a beaver. There are no signs of a traditional lodge / dam but I do know they can sometimes burrow under the banks of a body of water.
As I walked along in the pre-dawn hours, I saw ripples in the calm water and figured there might be something of interest. Sure enough, a beaver was there but it soon departed the area with a couple slaps of its tail to let me know it didn’t appreciate me intruding on its morning.
However, I spotted a second beaver and it was far less skittish. There was very minimal light but I managed some decent captures of it. It seemed to be gnawing on a stick which was kind of fun to see.
For the shutterbugs interested, this was taken with my usual Canon EOS R5 and RF 100-500 at 500mm but also notably, at ISO 12800. The images were quite grainy despite my best efforts. I ran it through Topaz Labs PhotoAI and am pretty impressed with the results given the conditions.
