Winter Interrupted

While out beating the brush in the back of the 6 acre field looking for a missing calf the other day, I came across evidence of beaver in the area. We know they are around because of the many, many piles of sticks we find that have the bark chewed off but do not know where or how they survive since the landscape is not conducive for habitat. The smaller streams around our farm are not meandering and have steep banks, the river is quite swift and subject to wide swings of water levels, we don’t see a much lodge or dam building from beaver, yet somehow they are here.

During the winter time, we do see some larger trees being chewed on. A couple of years ago I had an old apple tree several hundred feet from the river that the beavers were nibbling on. After painting the bottom three feet of the tree with house paint they left the tree alone. (Mike still gives me a bad time about it because he says they leave it alone because I used pink paint rather than white paint like most people use. What can I say? I had pink paint left over from some craft project so I used pink paint…)

Anyway, while I was out in the brushy area along the riparian zone, I saw a good sized tree that the beaver had been working on to fall. The beaver had almost chewed through the base when he got interrupted. Our winter has been very mild and the river levels have not had super wild swings of levels as in some years so it is a mystery why this winter chore got abandoned before it was completed.

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I am so pleased to announce that MaryJane Nordgren has made her new book available to the public! Click here for your copy of Nandria’s War.