The Barre daily times. (Barre, Vt.) 1897-1959, 1908-10-26
WORK OF THE BEAVER
Feats Performed by This Indus
triOuS Little Worker.
A CLEVER HOUSE BUILDER.

He Is Capable Of Constructing a Dwell.
ing as Large, Though Net So High,
as q Small Haystaek, and He Can
Cut Down Big Trees With His Teeth.
Almost every one knows something
about the beaver and that II builds
dams and houses to dwell In, but very
few people have seen beavers in their
Wild state II is also fact that the
race OF industrious little workers is
rapidly disappearing. In the older dis.
tTicts beavers generally live In tho
banks of the streams they inhabit, and
the sight OF beaver house is uncom-
mon.
Where beavers do build houses, says
Forest and Stream, the structures diff.
fer greatly In size. shape and location.
Some are as large. though Of course
less high. than n small haystack; 9TH
ers are hardly more than six feet
through at the base. They may stand
either wholly on land or partly in the
water and partly on the bank or who'll
" In the water.
They are never placed in very deep
water, for a base must be built for the
house to stand on reaching up TO the
surface. since the chamber inhabited
by the occupants must be dry.
The shape Of those houses on the
shore approaches the conical. Those in
the water are more irregular, some
times only rounded, at others long and
rather Cat on top.
Within each house and connected
with the water by d concealed passage
through which the beavers pass to and
fro Is the chamber which Is the ami
mails dwelling place.
1t Is large enough to contain seven or
eight Of them and high enough so that
a beaver can conveniently sit up on his
launches. 1t is warm. dry and clean,
for the beaver is extremely neat In all
his habits.
The food OF the beaver consists
chiefly Of the green bark OF twigs and
young limbs Of various trees. Cotton.
wood bark Is preferred then comes
willow, then alder, but the bark of
almost any tree may be eaten.
have known them to eat pine and
white cedar The beaver often cuts
down trees Of very considerable size to
get at the smaller limbs, which they
eat.
/ have seen cottonwoods twenty
Inches in diameter so cut, and once on
Vancouver island found cedar two
and one-half feet through which they
had gnawed down.
The work Of cutting down a large
tree is done by single animal.
have seen the beaver engaged in the
operation, which is as follows: The
beaver sits up on his launches facing |
the tree and with its fore paws rest
ing against It. With its head turned |
on one side he cuts groove above |
and then one below and bites out the |
hin, taking 1t off in almost the same
way an axman would.
He thus saves himself the trouble
If gnawing all the wood up into fine
When the tree is felled the
whole community attack and cut up
he tender limbs, carrying them away
o the cache.
Unlike many of our gnawing ami
nails. the beaver does not sleep through
he winter. He remains active. often
abroad during the whole of
he cold weather He must, therefore.
nave food and large part Of the
and autumn is devoted to Sc
uring this food and depositIng It in
aches. This food consists of the
limbs and twigs Of the trees most pre-
erred by the beaver.
They are cut from one and half
o three feet long, stripped of their
caves and smaller twigs. carried to
he water and hoated to the cache,
where they are sunk. And here comes
very curious point.
These sticks are foated to the cache
nd are sunk by the beaver to the bot
ON Of the water, where they remain
Without any apparent anchorage They
re not stuck in the mud of the bot.
ON or held down by weights. II
GU lift one to the surface it viii
oat but you may move 1t about on
be bottom without its rising
have myself tried this with sticks
rom which the bark has been eaten.
ut have never done so with the green,
npeeled limbs before the beavers had
ken them into their houses. This
latter to me is a very mysterious one.
nd have never been able e get any