To See a Beaver Dam
On Saturday, April 14, 2001, my son Jeff and I took off on a hike into the hills south of town following what in the winter is the snowmobile trail that leads into the hills from near Citgo at the southeast of town. We headed towards an area in which I had previously seen signs of beaver activity. Our goal on this trip was to find the beavers' dam. Following are some pictures from that hike.
Jeff is standing in the trail on an ice shelf over about six inches of water. He didn't know it at the time. Just after I snapped this picture and powered down my camera, the ice broke apart beneath him. You should have seen the look of surprise on his face, and I wished I had kept the camera powered up just a bit longer. He kept his balance, jumped back out, and only got his feet wet. |
Jeff likes to play in the sand, so of course we had to stop and take a play-break in this convenient sand pile. You can see the trail in the background. |
Finally we arrived in beaver territory. I remembered this tree from a previous cross-country ski trip. There are dozens of "beaver stumps" in this area. |
The dam! One of them, anyway. Just downstream from this dam, the stream gets signifacantly wider than you see here. There must be another, larger dam downstream, but the snow was still knee deep in this part of the woods, so Jeff and I didn't pursue it. We got our feet pretty wet and cold just getting this far. |