FAMINE IN BEAVER-LAND 209 



The work of harvesting winter supplies was 

 still further hindered. 



But beavers never give up. To obtain as- 

 pens which were to supply them with winter 

 food they finally dug a tunnel. They began this 

 on the bottom of the pond near the shore and 

 dug outward toward the aspen grove. The 

 tunnel was about two feet under the surface 

 for fifteen feet. From this point it inclined 

 upward and came out under a pine tree, close 

 to the aspens. In only the last few feet, where 

 the digging was through frozen ground, was there 

 difficult digging of this tunnel. Apparently 

 the thick carpet of fallen leaves and the deep 

 snow checked the frost and the earth had not 

 frozen deeply. 



From the end of this tunnel the beavers 

 cleared a dragway about eighteen inches wide 

 to the aspen grove. In doing this they cut 

 through three or four large logs and tunnelled 

 under a number of others. Then aspens were 

 felled, cut in short sections, dragged to the 

 end of the tunnel, pushed through this out into 

 the pond beneath the ice, and finally piled on 

 the bottom of the pond close to the house. 



Solid snowdrifts formed in the grove while 

 this slow work of transportation was going on. 

 A few aspens were cut from the top of a five- 

 foot snowdrift. The following summer these 



