A pair of beavers which we believed to be the hard luck animals above mentioned, we now found were beginning operations on a new dam about a quarter of a mile down the river, and the Chief Engineer worked with them and seemed to be directing the job. We watched the progress of this enterprise for many days and found it most interesting.
At the spot selected, the river was about a hundred and twenty feet wide and five feet deep in the middle. The current was not very swift and a lot of mud had settled on the gravelly bottom. Saplings and bushy alders, many of them fifteen to twenty feet long, were used for a foundation. They were always placed with the butt ends up stream and stones on the bushy ends held them firmly anchored on the bottom. All sorts of materials were worked into this dam; much of it was carried, dragged or floated long distances. The sticks and brush were interwoven in a very ingenious manner, the chinks were filled with sod, stones and mud. The entire structure was firmly braced by heavy sticks resting against the lower slope of the dam with one end of each stick stuck in the ground at the bottom of the river.
This dam at first was built up to two feet above the normal level of the river and water flowed over the top of the dam; but the river banks were low at this place and water also flowed over the banks — on one side into a slough and on the other side into a swamp.
The second phase of this hydro-engineering feat was now begun. It consisted of wing dams two feet high on top of the river bank and parallel to the stream. These were carried up on the north side of the river a distance of three hundred and fifty feet and on the south side about two hundred feet. The dam across the river was also made two feet higher. The dam now, in the middle of the river, was five feet high under water and four feet above the surface, making it nine feet in the highest part and with the two wings, six hundred and seventy feet long.
We had visited the scene of operations at least twice every day during the building and had casually discussed the probable difficulty in reaching the old trail up the river, but had not considered the matter seriously. One day Bige and I dragged our boat up over the dam and rowed up the river. Above the end of the wing dam the forest was flooded five hundred or more feet on each side of the river, and if we wished to follow the old trail we should have to wade through water at least as far as that; for it was impossible to push the boat through the woods, between the trees and bushes.
It was all very well and very interesting to watch the operations of the beaver, but this was carrying a joke too far. The beavers were now interfering with our business. The beavers are, of course, protected by law, but here were hundreds of fine spruce, hemlock, pine and balsam trees being drowned in our presence. The trees would die; they were valuable; they belonged to the State and we were both of us tax-payers. This thing must be stopped at once.
We rowed back to the dam and spent three hours tearing a hole three feet wide through the middle of it. We watched the water run out through the break and then returned to camp.
The next morning we found the dam had been repaired during the night and the water was flowing over its top as usual. Two guests arrived at our camp that morning. They were interested in the story of the dam and spent all of the afternoon in making another opening to let the water out; but again the beavers had the dam repaired before the following morning. The Doctor had by now settled in his camp at the western end of the pond. He came across with his two husky boys and they broke a hole through the dam for the third time; and the third time the beavers repaired the breach during the night.