A beaver’s work is never done

(PS If you read my last post, about porcupines, it included a tree whose bark and cambium had been chewed off. A Maine Master Naturalist whom I greatly respect has just told me she thinks I got this wrong, and it is actually beaver after all! It is now under deep snow, so we can’t check, but be skeptical of my earlier claims!)

The beavers are definitely around, but playing hard to get. They have built a new lodge, inconveniently on the opposite shore of the pond, where I can only reach it when the stream’s water level is low enough to cross. These photos show it growing, from November 14 to December 17:

No sooner were they settling in for the winter, than the weather gods turned their normal winter world upside down. We had six inches of rain in 24 hours, and everything flooded. Their beautiful dam, seen here in May:

was overwhelmed by the flood waters:

When the water subsided, much of the dam was gone:

But a few days later, they started to rebuild, rather haphazardly:

Indefatigable.

PS The big rain storm may have badly damaged their new lodge. I can’t reach it to look while the stream is so high, but last year’s lodge, a particularly impressive one, but which they had not repaired in preparation for this winter, has suddenly shown signs of fresh occupation. New mud, and new hemlock branches. So they have may have moved back in.