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CANALS, TRAILS, AND LANDING PLACES 87 
In studying some beaver work on a stream in Colorado 
where the food supply was small willows, which grew thickly 
over the bottom land, I was quite surprised to find several 
canals leading from various of the ponds out among the 
willows, being from fifty to nearly a hundred feet long. The 
beavers apparently found it advantageous to have water 
transportation even for willow brush. ‘Trails led from two 
of these canals across to another pond a short distance away, 
on a side channel from the creek, indicating that probably 
the canals were also used for traveling. 
On the South Fork of Elk Creek, not far from Yancey’s, 
was a canal leading northwesterly from the end of the lowest 
pond of the series, which was 104 feet long, 4 to 6 feet wide, 
and 27 inches deep. ‘The material dug from this was thrown 
up on the lower or northeasterly side. Two years later this 
canal was found to be abandoned. From another pond in 
the same group a ditch extended 48 feet. It was a foot wide, 
and the first 27 feet were 18 inches deep, while the remaining 
portion was merely a shallow run, at the end of which was a 
dam extending 20 feet in an easterly direction from the ditch. 
The pond formed by this dam was only about six feet wide, 
into which a mere trickle of water came, also a trail. The 
purpose of this dam was probably to collect and conserve 
whatever water drained or seeped in from above so that it 
might be conveyed by the canal to the pond below. In 
summer, at the time of my visit, there did not seem to be 
much tree cutting going on at this place. 
At another colony in the Yellowstone some of the smaller 
ponds of the series were connected by canals thirty to forty 
feet long, sixteen to eighteen inches wide, and eight to four- 
teen inches deep, leading from below the dam of one pond 
down to the next, and invariably there was a trail and slide 
over the dam into the canal, showing evidence of constant 
use in traveling back and forth, and probably for carrying 
logs. 
