Jack the Young Trapper: An Eastern Boy's Fur Hunting in the Rocky Mountains

by George Bird Grinnell

"Yes," said Jack; "'adapt themselves to their environment,' as Uncle George says."

"Yes, I reckon that's it," replied Hugh. "But those words are a trifle too long for me to understand. Now," Hugh went on, "this room that the bank beaver lives in is quite a big one, maybe four feet or so across, with a sort of bench or shelf all round it, where the beaver sit and sleep, and, of course, with the water in the middle, where the tunnel that they have dug comes up into the room. Usually there's a growth of willows or other brush on the ground above it, and quite a thickness of earth, so that there's no danger of any animal that walks around on the ground putting his foot through into the room. Of course, these holes are usually dug so that the mouths of them are always under water and so that the water always stands as near as possible at the same level, but if a big flood comes along, these bank beavers sometimes get drowned out, and have to leave their homes and sit around on the bank and in the brush waiting for the water to go down. I remember once, quite a number of years ago, making a big killing of beaver at a time like that."

"Where was that, Hugh?" asked Jack.

"I'd been hunting through the winter," said Hugh, "supplying meat to some of the forts along the Missouri River near where Bismarck is now; Fort Stephenson, Fort Lincoln, and sometimes Fort Rice. I would kill my meat and then pack it in to the posts. Game was plenty at the heads of all the streams running into the Missouri, and it was no trick at all to get what meat I wanted. There were no buffalo, but plenty of elk, deer, and antelope. I was pretty lucky about my hunting and got meat when the Indians couldn't, and two or three times that winter I came pretty near having a row with them. They had a notion that I had some sort of medicine that brought the game to me and kept it away from them, and some of the village Gros Ventres said they were going to kill me if I didn't leave the country, but, of course, that was just their talk, and I stayed there and kept on hunting."

"I wish you'd tell me about that, too, Hugh," said Jack.

"Well, I can only tell you about one thing at a time. I thought you wanted to hear about how I got those beaver."

"All right," replied Jack, "tell me about that first, and then about the Indians."

"Well," Hugh continued, "I was up quite a way on the Little Missouri, not anywhere near the head, of course, but about forty miles from the mouth, when there came a big rain and a warm spell, and all the snow melted at once, and pretty nearly the whole bottom of the river filled up. The beaver on that creek are all bank beaver. There are no houses at all, except maybe a few on some little creeks that run into the river. The weather got so bad and rainy that I started down to go to Berthold, and as I traveled down the river about the first things that I began to see were beaver sitting around on the banks and on driftwood, stupid and confused, and not knowing enough to jump into the water when I came along. Of course, I began to kill them, shooting them through the head, and I soon saw that I had a big job on my hands, and that I could kill more in half a day than I could skin in two or three days. Besides that, I had been out some time and was short of ammunition. What I did was to kill in the morning what beaver I could skin in the rest of the day, and for two or three days I was kept mighty busy, and working hard late into the night. Then the river went down and the beaver disappeared, all going back into their holes again, I suppose. I made quite a bit of money on that trip, and if I had had a man with me to skin all the time I could have got twice as many as I did, maybe three times as many. I think if I'd had a helper I could have killed one hundred and twenty-five beaver without trying very hard. I've often thought if a man could go down the Little Missouri in a boat at such a time, and with one of these little pea rifles, he could get an awful lot of fur."

"But I don't understand, Hugh," inquired Jack, "how the beaver let you come right up to them and shoot them."

"Well," said Hugh, "of course I didn't walk right up to them, making plenty of noise; I went as quietly as I could and shot as carefully as I could, but the beaver seemed to have lost their wits. They weren't shy and watchful, as beaver 'most always are. They just sat there in the rain and looked miserable."