SOME EXPERIENCES WITH BEAVERS

Ted Thaxton and I had been very good friends for some time, and he and his wife invited us to go up to their cabin in the mountains above Mirror Lake one weekend. They had a comfortable cabin in a beautiful area. There was a small stream nearby and some small lakes not too far away. I walked a small stream nearby and some small lakes not too far away. I walked over to some beaver ponds that had been built in some of these lakes. This sight brought back many memories about beavers and as I sit here in March of 1979, I am 75 years old, but as these memories come back to me I think I would like to share them with my grandchildren. It’s a novel way they build their homes out in the middle of the lake, and they build them good! As they build their dams in the creek which causes the pond or small lake to form, first they drive pieces of limbs of trees deep into the mud out in the middle of the stream. This is the beginning of their home. Then they weave smaller limbs in between and pad mud all over and all around their work. The center of their home is water and they enter this from tunnels they build from sticks and mud is built really solid and tight. This is above water and is where they sleep and raise their young. It is also where they store food for winter. I have drawn a picture to show you how this was done. Their home looks rough on the outside, but is quite an engineering feat on the inside, as are their dams.

I am reminded of some of my experiences with beavers. During the depression I had to trap to bring in some extra money so we could pay our expenses since we couldn’t get much for our crops. One day I found a great big hole under the river bank. I thought it was probably a beaver’s so I set a trap for it because I really needed the money I could get for its skin. The hole ran up under a large tree, in amongst the roots, so you see they don’t always build in the middle of a pond. I went back in a day or so and I had the beaver and I noted that he really had a good home.

One time in 1963, I was fishing on the upper Provo River with some friends from Bountiful. I was going from one point to another on the river. There was a little pond of water in my path too wide to step over, so I stepped in it. I soon found myself in mucky water over my head. I put my fishing rod across from one side to the other and I got myself out. Then I had to go swimming to wash myself off. I had fallen into an old beaver tunnel about 500 feet from the river’s edge. They are quite the engineers and builders in their line of work.

Thinking of these things has conjured up another memory. We had a dog that was really hard on coyotes. One morning when I was driving into town I saw a coyotes and thinking he was alone I set Tip on him. It turned out that there was two coyotes and when Tip would chase one the other would chase Tip. It was several days before Tip came home. I don’t know what happened. He never told me, but I’ll bet he really gave them a chase, especially if he got close enough to get a hold of one.

To be continued…

They had a nice big house and they made us very comfortable. We enjoyed seeing the baby for the first time. Little Janiel was such a pretty little girl, too. She seemed to like her Grandpa as did the others. Lorrain was a bit shy and didn’t talk very much. I noted that Kurt was really growing and getting really smart. We enjoyed watching the children unwrap their toys and the dinner was really good. We had brought along a lot of warm clothes expecting to freeze, but it wasn’t so bad.

Our ticket was good on the bus as well as the train, so we came home that way and it didn’t take nearly so long.

To be continued…

Before we leave 1966 I want to tell you about an experience of mine that happened back in October. There was a big harvest moon out one evening when I got to go on my first airplane ride. Estella’s friend Virginia Roberts, had a nephew living in Salt Lake who flew planes. One evening he took us to Provo, landing the plane and then flew back. On the way back, when we were flying over the mountains he let me take the controls for a while. It was really a thrill and that big moon looked closer to earth than we had ever seen it before. It appeared, suddenly, just above the turn of the mountain, as we were going down.

Things went pretty smoothly in our lives for a while, then in October 1967 Chad called us and said that Virginia had a brain tumor and that they were to operate on her the next morning. Grace helped Estella get ready and then she drove us to the airport. It was in the night and it took only 45 minutes for that jet to get her to Boise where Archie met her. She got to the hospital in time to talk to Virginia the next morning before they took her to surgery. They had already cut off her hair and Estella gathered it up and saved it.

Virginia was operated on the morning of 17 October 1967. It was a bad time for all of us because they found that the tumor was malignant. She came through the surgery fine and went to Harold’s home to convalesce because they were taking care of her baby, Cory. Estella stayed for a while, then came home. Virginia took cobalt treatments for quite a while.

I think we spent Thanksgiving with Dwain and Margie. We enjoyed little Darrell. He has always seemed like a child who had deep thoughts and would accomplish much in this world.

Ralph had been wanting us to come to Montana to see them so we decided to go up for Christmas. Since Estella had enjoyed riding on the train in the past we decided to go that way. I had been working really hard and we were rushing around getting ready when we noticed that our old toilet had run over and water was clear out into the hall and the next room. We both worked like troopers getting the water cleaned up and I suppose all that stooping was what caused me to get a terrible nosebleed. I am kind of subject to them anyway. Grace came over and we got the bleeding stopped just before train time. Grace took us to the depot and we had just gotten on the train when my nose started to bleed again. Fortunately, we had brought some towels. A strange man took me to charge and accompanied me to the men’s room and soon got it stopped again. Altogether I had lost a lot of blood.

The train took us to Logan and switched our car off where we sat trying to sleep in the reclining seats for a good part of the night. Finally we started and arrived in Great Falls the next day. We went on to Havre and stayed with Bert and Verda for a couple of days. They had bought a nice little home and had been a real help to Aleene and the kids while Ralph was in Guam on duty. We finally got to Glasgow where Ralph met us. Kristine had come in with him and she sat on my lap and talked up a storm all the way back to their home. She gave her Grandpa a few kisses, too.

To be continued…