HISTORY OF THE ADIRONDACK BEAVER. 405 



Herkimer and Hamilton counties. Formerly, they had been distributed 

 in all parts of the region, though very sparsely since 1820. 



In i860. I put their number at fifty. There were probably not more 

 than seven or eight families, and they were strung out along the Raquette 

 and St. Regis Rivers and in the veil-watered area immediately northwest 

 of the Upper Saranac Lake (Township 20, Franklin county). There may 

 have been a few stragglers in other places. 



When Watson's History of Essex County was published, in 1869, this 

 statement appeared: ' The beaver was found in great abundance through- 

 out the region, by the first occupants. They no longer exist, it is believed, 

 in the territory of Essex county."* 



Township Twenty becomes Center of Abundance 



In 1870, I should say, there were thirty beavers, consisting of three 

 or four families and a few lone individuals. The center of abundance was 

 now in Township 20, a section of unbroken forest, approximating seven 

 miles square, peculiarly adapted to their needs and mode of life, and so 

 thickly overspread with ponds and lakelets, rivers, creeks and marshes, 

 that almost one-half of the entire area is under water. From that time, 

 until the recent effort to restock the region was begun, there were scarcely 

 an}- other portions of the woods in which fresh beaver signs were seen. 

 Exceptions occurred at rare intervals, indicating that stragglers from 

 Franklin county did occasionally visit other parts of the wilderness. 



In 1880, we can put the total number down at twenty-five; in 1885, 

 at twenty. They were practically confined to Township 20, and already 

 the native hunters and trappers in other parts of Northern New York had 

 reached the conclusion that the beaver was absolutely extinct in the State. 



Mr. D. W. Riddle, the superintendent of the Saranac Innj who came 

 first to that locality in 1879, informs me that when he arrived there were 

 one or two families located on a small inlet of St. Regis Pond and on the 

 outlet of the same. There was a good sized dam on the outlet of Little 



* As quoted by Merriam. 



t The Saranac Inn, a noted woodland hotel, is located at the head of Upper Saranac Lake, almost 

 in the center of Township 20. 

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