CHAPTER X 



REBUILDING A BEAVER COLONY 



IN PASSING the Meadow Beaver Colony one 

 July afternoon I saw an old beaver come 

 up out of the water with a ball of mud in 

 his forepaws. He jammed this mud into a 

 low spot in the dam. Tracks in the mud along 

 the top of this old dam, and a number of green 

 aspen sticks with the bark eaten off lying on the 

 side of the house, showed that a number of 

 beavers had been using this old house and pond 

 for several days. 



This was interesting because the place had been 

 abandoned fifteen years before and most of the 

 old beaver works were in ruins. One house, now a 

 mound overgrown with willows, retained its form. 

 The pond it was in had not filled with sediment. 



Did this repairing of the dam mean that this 

 old colony was to be resettled by beavers? 

 It probably did, for the beavers ever work for 

 a purpose and not just to be working. It was 

 mid-summer and all beavers who were not 

 making emergency repairs or extensive im- 

 provements were off on a summer vacation. 



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