Three otters
You never know what you will see when you visit Nygren Wetland Preserve.
Photographer James McDowell arrived at Nygren Wetland Preserve on the morning of Thu., Sept. 24 around 7 AM. From the wildlife overlook parking lot he walked east, he said, “in a clock-wise direction (towards the rising sun). I noticed an unusual wake on the water below and then I observed three otters swimming below. They basically swam in a clockwise manner as well and continued to appear and disappear every couple of minutes. I saw (what I thought was) an otter at Nygren on June 23, 2026 (which was actually a mink). It came out of the grass and walked across the path in front of me. You can see the tail of a fish sticking out of the mouth of the otter in one of the photos. It is exciting to know that there is, in fact, a group of otters at Nygren. It is a great place to see many different animal species.”
Muskrat
James also shared that this past March 29th he saw a muskrat and on March 30th he saw a beaver swimming in the same lagoon he had seen the muskrat the day before. When he first saw the muskrat he got excited thinking it was a beaver. So it was extra exciting for him the next day when he did see a beaver! It swam in circles for more than 10 minutes and came very close to where James was standing. Then he noticed a path close to where he stood, which appeared to have been made by an animal as it moved from the lagoon to another body of water next to it. He said, “the ground was clearly eroded and vegetation pressed down by some animal moving back and forth.” He thought the beaver might have been waiting for him to leave so he could “exit the lagoon and take the path to the other side.”
On Tue., Sept. 29 James visited Nygren Wetland and photographed a Coopers Hawk and a Cape May Warbler.
Thank you to James for sharing your experiences and photos of animals at Nygren Wetland Preserve!
Mink
Otter with fish
Beaver
Beaver swimming
Cape May Warbler
Cooper’s Hawk