Beaver fossil named after Buc-ees

AUSTIN, Texas (KWTX) - There’s a new beaver in town!

A new species of an ancient beaver known as Buc-ee’s was rediscovered by researchers at The University of Texas in Austin.

The fossil collection was named the popular Texas-baed travel center known for its cartoon mascot. .

The beaver is called Anchitheriomys buceei, or “A. buceei” for short, and lived in Texas about 15 million years ago.

Steve May, a research associate at the UT Jackson School of Geosciences, said that the beaver’s Texas connection and a chance encounter with a Buc-ee’s billboard are what inspired the name.

While driving down a highway in 2020, May spotted a Buc-ee’s billboard that said “This is Beaver Country.” The phrase brought to mind the Texas beaver fossils he had been studying at UT’s Texas Vertebrate Paleontology Collections.

“I thought, ‘Yeah, it is beaver country, and it has been for millions of years,’” May said.

The UT collections includes A. buceei fossils from six Texas sites.