Canadian Beaver Skull Replica measures 5.5 inches. Canadian Beaver Skull Replica is museum quality polyurethane cast. Made in USA. 2-part skull (separate cranium & jaw). Known as Castor canadensis. Our precise skull can be used as a teaching tool, museum skull exhibit, home decor skull, or office decor skull.
The Canadian Beaver is one of two extant beaver species. It is native to North America and introduced to Patagonia in South America and some European countries.
In the United States and Canada, the species is often referred to simply as a beaver, though this causes some confusion because another distantly related rodent, Aplodontia rufa, is often called the Mountain Beaver.
Other vernacular names, including American beaver and Canadian beaver, distinguish this species from the other extant beaver species.
The Canadian Beaver is the largest rodent in North America. Adults usually weigh from 24 to 71 lb., with 44 lb. being typical.
In the Northwest Territory, adults weighed a median of 45 lb. The head-and-body length of adult North American beavers is 29 to 35 in. with the tail adding a further 7.9 to 13.8 in.
The Canadian Beaver are semiaquatic. The beaver has many traits suited to this lifestyle. It has a large, flat, paddle-shaped tail and large, webbed hind feet. The front paws are smaller, with claws.
The forepaws are highly dextrous, and are used both for digging, and to fold individual leaves into their mouth and to rotate small, pencil-sized stems as they gnaw off bark.
The Canadian Beaver eyes are covered by a nictitating membrane which allows them to see under water. The nostrils and ears are sealed while submerged. A thick layer of fat under its skin insulates the beaver from its cold water environment.
The Canadian Beaver fur consists of long, coarse outer hairs and short, fine inner hairs. The fur has a range of colors, but usually is dark brown.
Scent glands near the genitals secrete an oily substance known as castoreum, which they use to waterproof their fur.
The Canadian Beaver is a herbivorous generalists with sophisticated foraging preferences. Beavers consume a mix of herbaceous and woody plants, which varies considerably in both composition and species diversity by region and season.
Canadian Beavers prefer aspen and other poplars, but also take birch, maple, willow, alder, black cherry, red oak, beech, ash, hornbeam, and occasionally pine and spruce. They also eat cattails, water lilies, and other aquatic vegetation.
The first fossil records of C. canadensis are 10 to 12 million years old in Germany, and they are thought to have migrated to North America across the Bering Strait.
The oldest fossil record of beavers in North America are of two beaver teeth near Dayville, Oregon, and are 7 million years old.
The beaver possesses continuously growing incisors, and is a hindgut fermenter whose cecum, populated by symbiotic bacteria, helps to digest plant-based material.
These traits are not unique to Canadian Beavers, and are in fact present among all rodents. Nonetheless, the beaver is remarkably specialized for the efficient digestion of its lignocellulose-heavy diet.
