Thanks for posting the pictures, Kaugie125. They clued me in to something that I saw today I probably would have missed if I hadn't looked at your pictures last night.
I was hanging out today in a pretty urban environment (i.e., a stream bank along the Camden-Burlington county line along a pretty busy road) and saw several trees that looked a lot like one of the tree shots that you posted the other day.
You folks on this forum are knowledgeable about this stuff. I have attached some cell phone shots I took of three trees and shavings at the bottom of one of the trees (they're also in my photo gallery). Do you think that one or more beavers have been involved? If so, it would be pretty surprising to me for beaver to be thriving along a road that's evidently got an average daily traffic count of 24,400 vehicles.
I've seen the handiwork of beavers up close before, but it was way out in the sticks in Aroostook County, Maine, and there was a whole family involved and a very obvious lodge location or two. I didn't see any obvious lodge today.
Dave