The Chief Engineer

by Henry Abbott

Bige's fighting blood was now thoroughly "het up" and he said "I'll fix them pesky beavers." A lot of men were at work building a "tote road" for a lumber camp over the other side of the mountain about three miles from our camp. Bige went over to call on them, and he came back with four sticks of dynamite and some fuse. These we connected and placed on top of the dam. We covered the dynamite with mud, lighted the fuse, jumped into our boat and rowed as fast as possible down toward the pond. When a hundred yards away, the explosion occurred. With a terrific roar that beaver dam was shot toward the sky and toward every point of the compass, and the water above the dam came rushing through a gap twenty feet wide. A later examination proved, that the dam had been torn out clear to the bottom of the river. Our hand-made breaks had extended only to the surface of the water below the dam.

That night a hurry up wireless call went out, and before morning twenty-three beavers were at work rebuilding the dam, with the Chief Engineer in command. We figured that delegations must have come from a colony two miles up the river, probably some from Mud Pond, others from Pine Brook and Raquette River. Certainly, there were not, living on our pond, as many beavers as we saw at work that night. By the next morning the dam had been rebuilt to the water level, and the second morning it was completely restored with water flowing over the top. A curious fact we noted, was, that while both banks of the river were strewn with fragments of the old dam, not a single piece of this tainted and dangerous material was used. New trees and bushes were cut and carried greater distances for the rebuilding.

At this stage of the war, Bige and I surrendered. We were hopelessly outnumbered and outclassed by the beavers. They worked while we were asleep. We now got busy and cut out a new trail around the swamp and the flooded area to connect with the old trail. This makes the walk fully a half mile longer than before the dam was built.

The Chief Engineer had lived at Cherry Pond ten years. He had brought out a new family of from four to seven individuals every spring. All of these had been housed and fed for two or three years, when they were old enough to emigrate and set up in business and housekeeping on their own. During these ten years a large quantity of bark had been consumed and poplar, the favorite food of beaver, had practically all been cut off. Along the shores and on the islands no more was to be found. It was, therefore, necessary to seek new sources of food supply.

Beyond the swamp, to the northeast of the river mouth, there was a grove of poplar trees, covering several acres. It was nearly a half mile to this grove, but not too far for the courage of our Chief, who now set his gang of youngsters at work digging a canal. This canal had an average width of three feet and it was two and a half feet deep. It was made quite crooked through the swamp, winding around and between clumps of alders and larger trees. Smaller trees were dug up and roots which crossed the path of the canal were cut off as clean as if chopped with an axe.

Water in the canal through the swamp maintained practically the level of the pond. There was a gradual rise of ground beyond the swamp and here a series of dams or locks were built. Each dam raised the level of water from two to three feet. There were thirteen of these levels varying in length from fifty, to two hundred and fifty feet. Water from a spring brook was diverted into the canal and flowed over each dam. The beavers towed their lumber through this canal and dragged it over the several dams, each of which seemed to be especially constructed to facilitate this operation. The length of this canal we estimated to be twenty-five hundred feet.

Beavers appear to prefer the bark of smaller trees, but they do not hesitate to cut down a large one when necessary. In such case they carry away the branches only. A poplar tree eighteen inches in diameter was cut on the shore of our pond and felled into the water. The branches that remained above the surface were cut off and carried to the storage pile. Those that were under water were left and were cut off under the ice during the following winter.

Beavers are generally peaceable. They have many admirable traits. Individuals of one colony will assist those of another in strenuous operations much as pioneer humans helped each other in building log cabins, in barn raisings, etc. Many tales are told. One, of a family whose house had been destroyed, being taken into another's house and the two families living together all winter. Another story relates how a mother beaver was killed, when another immediately adopted the five orphans and brought them up with her own children. We have recorded above, instances where the Chief Engineer was contributing his remarkable skill and experience toward solving the problems of his friends in widely separated parts of the forest. And we believe he did not insist upon union rules in regard to wage, hours of labor, or minimum output.