It was a cold and rainy night. The Kuldīga municipality police were roaming the streets as usual looking for public disturbances, but their passenger on a weekend night was somewhat unexpected, with a rather large tail, police inspector Augusts Teteris told Skrunda Television.
It’s night, it’s raining, and you hardly see people in the streets of Kuldīga. So when the Kuldīga municipal police spotted a young man filming something, they stopped. It turned out that a beaver was slowly stalking deeper and deeper into the city. On closer inspection, the animal seemed confused, very tired and slow, showing no aggression.
“The plan was to walk him a little way to the park, but then the next thought kicked in – if he gets into the park, where will he go next? Then the decision was made to stop the beaver.
“As I have had experience with rodents before, because my mother owns a marmot farm in Jaunstuči, I have the skills to catch rodents. You have to grab it by the tail, it stands up and cannot try to bite you. So we grabbed him and put him in the vehicle’s holding compartment,” said Inspector Teteris of the Kuldīga Municipality Police, recounting the events of the rainy night.
Jānis Ozoliņš, a senior researcher at the State Forest Research Institute “Silava”, pointed out that a full beaver family has at least three generations – parents and their offspring. As the next generation is due in late April or early May, the two-year-olds tend to leave the family or are forced to do so because the other beavers become aggressive.
“Beavers inhabit a certain area. They are not usually wanderers by their behaviour. There is a limited amount of food in the area, and the middle generation is forced to leave in order to prevent food becoming scarce. The beaver walking the streets was most likely one of those that had to leave its family. That is why he looked tired, desperate and perhaps bold towards humans. Beavers don’t usually do that,” the researcher said.
Ozoliņš stressed that one should be careful when encountering a beaver in the city, as the animal can attack in self-defence and its sharp teeth can leave deep wounds, as once happened in Daugavpils. The municipal police also said that people should not try to move a beaver they encounter in the city. However, not many of these animals have been observed in Kuldīga. But this one will have a new home outside Kuldīga.
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