The independent-reporter. [volume] (Skowhegan, Me.) 1909-1955, 1916-10-26

orally. the beaver is admired but he
| has plenty OF enemies, and among
them are the despoiled lumberman
the Indian and the fur hunters, red
and white. The fur hunters Kill
| him for the price OF his silky pelt
the Indian for his flesh, the eating
of which. they believe, will pro-
long human life indefinitely.
An old hunter who has spent many
hours in watching beaver at work
gives them credit for astonishing in
telligence and remarkable engineer
+ ing skill, combined with tireless en-
fergy This hunter says that, unless
| frightened, the animals will prose
cute their building operations in the
presence of human beings. But
although he gives the beaver ere
dit for energy and ingenuity. this
observer declares that some writer's
attribute to them powers they do
not possess. For example, he says
that the beaver cannot, as many
have been led to think. make a stick
or a log lie at the bottom of a pond
without weighing it with mud or
stones and that even then the stick
Will sometimes get away from them
and rise to the surface They do
not use their tails as trowels. but
carry the mud that serves them as
mortar between their chin and
paws; nor can they always make
a tree fall in just the direction they
desire. However their convenience
lin this respect is served by the fact,
that trees that grow along the banks
of streams or ponds naturally lean
toward the water. Neither do beaver
he says. always remain in one place.
When the white birch, poplar, viii
low and other trees on the bark of
which they feed become scarce in
their immediate neighborhood, the
colony after tearing hole in their
dam, will disband and scatter to
new and more favorable localities
This always happens in the spring.
Coming upon the deserted works.
one will see that the now exposed
bottom of the pond is Uttered with
Isticks from which the bark has been
eaten and also notice the round
hole in each house near the bed of
the stream, that has served as a
door. Upstream. several holes in
the bank will be noticed. These
are used in places of refuge by the
, beaver when their village is attack
, ed and the houses destroyed. While
the dam IS intact, these holes are
under water, but tunnels from them
terminate beneath the roots Of large
trees. near the surface of the ground
affording a means of escape when
the fugitives are hard pressed. The
young beaver are born in these pas
sages and not, as some suppose, in
the partially suberged houses on
the dams.
AT the approach of autumn the
beaver usually migrate upstream
and construct at some convenient
spot a new dam and new houses. The
dam is built of logs, some as large
as six or eight inches in diameter
and of branches of all sizes and
, lengths down to brush and twigs, all
cleverly interviewer and cemented
with mud. 1t is said that these dams
are so ingeniously built that il a
break a foot square were to be made
in the top of the structure a flood
might pour through without making
the opening any larger.
The beaver houses sometimes
only two or three, sometimes as
many as twenty or thirty-are built
from the bottom Of the pond. in shOal
water and rise above the surface
so that as the old hunter says, the
beavers have a wet kitchen and a
dry parlor The houses are const-
ructed of sticks and brush, cemented
and plastered smoothly with mud.
In the late fall or early winter this
mud freezes as hard as flint, thus
affording the occupants protection
from wild animals and from the
cold winds
We're it not for the beavers keen
scent the species would have become
extinct in Maine long ago, for their
fur is very valuable and even in the
face of stringent laws. they have
been hunted by both white men and
/, Indians Poachers have made fort
unes by trapping beaver, and the
quest Of the velvety fur has led to
many fight when the Game War
dens have run down desperate
poacher 1t was for trapping bea-
yer that the notorious Pete La Fon-
taine was pursued by the most dar-
ing wardens of Maine through hun
dreds of miles of unbroken forest,
and finally captured, after being
shot and dangerously wounded by
, Warden Herbert Templeton.
, 1t is said that there are more
beaver in Maine today than at any
: previous time in fifty years, for they
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