487 
November, 1922 
the presence of many beaver trappers, 
however, I found such game to be both 
wild and wai'y; for the beaver trapper 
lives off the land. The trapper and the 
prospector believes, and he is right, that 
game is for their use and that domestic 
animals are for the use of the man of 
The trap is submerged 
between the stakes 
the settlements and the 
cities. Consequently, 
the trapper knows no 
game laws and kills as 
his necessities require. 
The city hunter kills 
for trophies of the trip, 
but the trapper kills 
for food. The one kills 
for show, the other 
kills for use. The In- 
dian at such remote 
places as Liard Post 
fails to obey regula- 
tions prohibiting the 
killing of beaver. He 
brings them to market abandoned 
in spite of a prohibi- 
tory law; for they se- 
cure for him food, blankets and traps. 
The provincial government was practi- 
cally under necessity of buying the In- 
dian’s catch during the closed season, 
and this it did, paying ten dollars for a 
large skin and five dollars for a small 
one. They were worth much more, but 
to pay their value would increase the 
Indian’s catch without any appreciable 
benefit to him, for invariably the Indian 
wastes his surplus funds. 
UR permanent camp was on the 
shore of a glacial torrent; a wild 
stream that wound its course through a 
valley, one to two miles in width. The 
valley floor was of boulders and sand, 
ground from the mountains by the ir- 
resistible power of the hardest ice. In 
flood time the torrent cuts new channels 
at the bends, and the old ones become 
sloughs containing tamed waters. When 
the wind blows, great clouds of stinging 
sands sweep over the valley like driving 
sheets of rain in a summer storm. Cot- 
tonwood and willows line the sloughs 
and grow in extensive, but scattered flats 
throughout the valley. The inner bark 
of these trees is the food of the beaver. 
To trap beaver successfully, the trap- 
per must understand the nature and the 
ways of this cunning animal. In such 
knowledge my companion was expert, 
and consequently successful. During the 
season of 1921-22, he caught more beaver 
than did any other trapper within a 
radius of a hundred miles of his cabin. 
No hunting is more interesting than that 
of the trapper. He must match his wits 
against the cunning and the wary. Per- 
force he is a naturalist. The trapper’s 
thoughts each morning are woven about 
his luck for the day; the pot of gold at 
the end of his rainbow. Hope, the hope 
of the capture of that which brings the 
daily bread, springs eternal on the trap 
line. 
Beavers live either on the banks of 
streams and feed upon the bark of trees 
beaver dam, showing break made by the 
impounding stream 
and brush along their shores or they live 
in lodges that they build in ponds, and 
feed along its shores and upon the brush 
growing in the ponds. The ponds are 
the result of beaver-built dams extending 
across running water; the height of the 
dam governs the water level of the pond. 
An abondoned and drained beaver 
pond afforded much information, for 
there the beaver’s floor plans were laid 
before me. This dam was about nine 
feet in height and seventy-five feet in 
length. The side that faced the pond 
was of mud, while the side that faced 
the stream was of sticks. The dam was 
bow-shaped, curving with the flow of the 
water. The area of the pond comprised 
from twelve to fifteen acres with little 
canals radiating through it. It is upon 
these that the beaver carries the branch- 
es and twigs that he uses for food, for 
lodge building, and for dam repairs. 
The canals also afford sufficient depth 
of water to enable the beaver to sub- 
merge and take refuge from such 
enemies as wolverines, wolves and bears. 
Each canal was as smooth as though cut 
with a spade, and free from projecting 
roots and other forms of obstruction. 
There are no snaggy bends in the canals 
upon which the beaver plies his bark. 
There were two old lodges, both of which 
had been dug into by bears or wolves. 
This pond had been abandoned because 
all the food had been cut from it, or had 
been killed by the formation of the pond. 
The standing trees were dry with roots 
well rotted. The silt deposited during 
the life of the pond was a black, rich 
looking loam, undoubtedly fruitful for 
such hardy vegetables as will grow in 
this climate. From this object lesson, 
well could I learn the value of beaver to 
mankind. Here was a spot made useful 
for man by the patient toil of this little 
animal. The beaver had bestowed his 
labor on a piece of thin land, covered 
with useless willows, alders and cotton- 
woods. He had destroyed such growth 
so thoroughly that no 
great amount of labor 
was required to fell 
and burn the standing 
trees and grub out 
their roots. By the 
same process has the 
beaver made many a 
rich meadow and field 
upon which the flocks 
and crops of man now 
flourish. No one can 
say, with any assur- 
ance of accuracy, that 
this old, abandoned 
beaver pond in north- 
ern British Columbia is 
useless because people 
do not dwell there. 
The trap is set in the water at the 
beaver slide 
Should some extensive deposit of min- 
eral be discovered in that region, this 
pond will be utilized as a garden spot 
to aid in feeding those who develop the 
mine. As such, it will be precious in- 
deed. Should man not use it, again will 
{CoHiimicd on page 510) 
