11 Beaver Facts That Will Make You Totally Fall in Love With These Creatures

And thank goodness...they used to be 8-feet long and 200 pounds. That sounds terrifying! 

They are monogamous creatures! D'awwww! 

This myth started in ancient Egypt, but didn't hold much weight...beavers' testicles are inside their bodies, so it would be a pretty unlikely feat for them to bite them off. 

Englad had gone centuries without a beaver sighting, but recently one was discovered by a scientist there. 

This one can be chalked up to evolution. Beavers may seem like goofy little land creatures, but they have a lot of fascinating little features that allow them to do extremely well in aquatic environments, like valves in their nose and ears. 

When they're in the water, beavers use their enormous tail to make loud sounds against the water if danger is coming, sort of Paul Revering for the benefit of the other beavers. On land, they use it to prop themselves up and balance in certain positions. 

This is one of the reasons they build dams. The dam stops water from flowing and increases the depth of the water right in front of the dam. Since beavers store food at the bottom of a body of water for the winter, they have a lot riding on the fact that the area won't freeze over!

OK, that was a corny joke, but we're serious! In Alberta, there was a beaver dam that was 850 meters deep! This currently holds the record. 

If you're going to chop down trees with your teeth, they better pack a serious punch! And that's where iron enamel comes in. It's the secret superpower behind the teeth...and it also contributes to their pumpkin-like coloring! 

Castoreum is a chemical compound that is found in beaver poo, and it smells pretty strongly of vanilla. It is actually used as a flavor and is FDA-approved. This has got to be the best-smelling poo that we know of. 

1948 was a scary time for beavers in Idaho. :( New citizens of the state were not loving the beavers there, and The Idaho Department of Fish and Game actually became concerned enough that they wanted to transport the beavers to some place that was protected. In order to do this, they used parachutes that hadn't been built for World War II but didn't end up getting used, and flew the beavers there!