If you know anything about the building behavior of beavers and their incredible ability to shape the ecosystems they live in, then you probably do not need any convincing that they are quite clever animals. When North American Beavers (Castor canadensis) go on to land to forage for food they must remain clever in how they do so given the many animals that want to eat them and the need to forage efficiently. To help solve these problems, beavers will use both their distance from the water (a way of evaluating how much energy they are spending to forage) and their perception of predator odors to guide their decision making as they go out looking for delicious woody treats.

Sketch by Megan McElligott (@MeganM_McE on twitter). Fact by Adrian Perez.

Source:

Salandre, J.A., Beil, R., Loehr, J.A. and Sundell, J., 2017. Foraging decisions of North American beaver (Castor canadensis) are shaped by energy constraints and predation risk. Mammal research, 62(3), pp.229-239.