The other day, wildlife photographer Dennis Jackson went out on a fishing excursion with a friend in Ontario, Canada. As he and his friend sat in their boat, they noticed something unusual in the water.
“I look across the bay and I see something white swimming in the water,” Jackson told The Dodo. “And I’m like, ‘What the heck is that?’”
Jackson went through a mental checklist of who the white animal could be. It was too small to be a swan and didn’t look like a seagull. As he and his friend approached the mysterious creature, they realized something shocking. It was a beaver … with white fur.
“We had shivers run down our spine, because it’s just something that you don’t ever think you’re going to see,” Jackson said.
Although Jackson is a wildlife photographer, he hadn’t packed his cameras for his fishing trip, but he managed to take a few photos with his phone.
“It swam toward us, and then it swam the other direction, and it was just all around,” Jackson said. “We were just excited.”
After a little while, the white beaver disappeared. Jackson resolved to return to the area with his photography gear to try to document the animal he’d seen.
Luckily, when Jackson returned, the white beaver was still there. He quickly captured some photos and videos of the animal swimming around. Jackson noted that the beaver’s unusual coloring did not seem to affect how the animal behaved or how they were treated by other beavers.
Jackson wasn’t sure whether the beaver was albino or leucistic, a different genetic condition which indicates a partial loss of pigmentation. Jackson consulted with Canadian naturalist Michael Runtz, who concluded that the beaver is leucistic due to his dark eyes and feet.
“[Runtz] said … in all of his years [being] a professor at Carleton University, he’s never seen a white animal that large,” Jackson said.
Hearing that even a wildlife expert like Runtz was amazed by the beaver made Jackson feel even more lucky to have seen such a special animal. Jackson has been careful to keep the beaver safe by not sharing the marsh’s location with the public.
In Ontario, where Jackson lives, he sees beavers all the time. But getting to witness such a unique-looking beaver has given him a renewed appreciation for the ubiquitous animals.
“It kind of inspired me to be more curious,” Jackson said.
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