Movement characteristics of American beavers (Castor canadensis)

Physiological states and foraging behaviors may shape movement patterns of animals. Optimal foraging theory and what we term the deliberate movement hypothesis predict that, to reduce pre-dation risk, central place foragers should move faster with smaller turning angles the further they are from their central place. The complementary bimodal foraging trip hypothesis predicts that the distribution of foraging distances exhibited by central place foragers should be bimodal due to a trade-off between provisioning offspring and self-feeding. We used radio-telemetry to tes