A Beaver Colony.

Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1800, 19 January 1884, Page 2 (Supplement)

A Beaver Colony.

Thm beaver is one of the animals which constantly advancing civilization is gradually exterminating. In earlier times the beaver was found almost everywhere, even in the southern regions of Europe, but at present they are only found in large numbers in the northern part of America, also in southern Siberia, and on tho shores of rivers flowing into the Caspian Sea, The beaver (Castor) belongs to tho race of mammals of the order of rodents. These animals furnish the beaver fat, an animal substance which is secreted by them in glands or pouches, and the pelt also is valuable. In earlier times the fur of the beaver was used for the finest hats. The products of the American beaver are

not so valuable aa the Russian, yet tlie American beaver trade, especially of the great Hudson's Bay Company, is a remarkably profitable industry. Beavers are especially interesting, for of all the mammals they show the most mechanical imtinct in building their habitations, and the American beavers have the reputation o£ being by far the most ingenious builders in the whole family. They are remarkably shy, and labor only in the night, so that it is very diiiieult to surprise these architects at their labor and find out the secrets of their method of construction. The individual dwellings consist of rounded hills, which are composed of pieces of wood, stone, and mud, and are divided in the inside into two apartments, an upper dry room and a lower one filled wjth water. The single habitations arc united by a solid dam, for which whole trees arc used as the building material. The beaveis gnaw with their poweiful teeth the trees standing close by the shore, near to the ground, and when they have gnawed the trunk nearly through they so direct it by a peculiar trick that, as the' tree falls into the water, the stream carries the trunk downward, and it is brought into the right position. In early times tra\elleis, who were not punctilious in regard to the tiuth, and who gave free rein to their fancy, told wonderful stories in regatd to the skill of these architects, and though many of these stories have been bhown to be false by observation and research, yet it still remains a fact that the beavers are really the most ingenious builders I to he found iv the whole animal kingdom. — Flow Urn die Welt.