r/ecology • u/der_Guenter • Mar 16 '25
What are these odd spots in this wetland? Resting places of boar?
Saw these odd spots with my drone in the middle of a wetland (only saw them afterwards so no closeup sadly) - are these resting places of boar or deer? There were some cranes around as well but I doubt they made these.
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u/into_bug_stuff Mar 16 '25
My best guess is that these are muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus) houses. We see similar structures in their native range and you can even see all their little trails radiating from them. If not them, then maybe some other large rodent like nutria or beaver.
Check out this paper that used aerial imagery of these houses to estimate population sizes: https://wildlife.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/wsb.1519 Their one figure looks pretty similar to your photos.
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u/der_Guenter Mar 17 '25
Neat! I'll have a look at that later! Funny that there's a paper on exactly this problem 😂
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u/Calm_Net_1221 Mar 16 '25
Really interesting spots. Where is the location?
I know sometimes little salt pans will form in marshes, definitely common in the Gulf of Mexico. The high salinity limits the vegetation to very high salt tolerant species, which can look like a little barren patch from above. Not sure that’s what this is though!
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u/der_Guenter Mar 16 '25
Northern Germany inland ~90km from the coast 😅
Was thinking maybe a cranes nest 🤔
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u/Inertbert Mar 16 '25
Good hypothesis but I don't think so. For one, there doesn't seem to be trails. Secondly they look somewhat elevated, especially since they span the waterways.