I don't know how this relates to Reptire Designs....but Fuggit!
This past sunny Sunday morning, I was driving up Highway 87, on my way to band practice at Bruce and Sue Saunders' house, off Lutterlow Rd. when I saw this great big heap of brown fur to the right of the road. Now that is fairly common around here, probably everywhere where there are lots of woods, with occaisonal roads, sadly.
What was unussual, was that this lump of fur had great big monsterous flat tail sticking out.
To be completely honest with you, my first reaction was, "is that a Platypus?!!!" Of course, I quickly discerned that, no it was much more likely a beaver (as of course, these are in plentiful supply in these parts, and their distant cousin the platypus, lives, well, on the other side of the globe).
Still, of all of the poor slain animals I have encountered over the years (and I do pay attention), never once in my 30+ years have I seen a beaver.
What's more, I thought that I saw this lump of fur move....
So I turned around and pulled over.
What I found kind of blew me away...
It was a beaver all right, but this was one Big Mother...I would say just shy of a yard long from nose to tail tip. I'm not sure where she had been struck. She seemed to be completely intact. But she was bleeding from her mouth and nose a little.
When I layed my hand on here back, she was Very warm to the touch...steamy, I think she must have just been hit.
Her feet... we're just incredible..I've never seen anything like it really. They were webbed, like a duck's, but with soft fur on the tops....
With these great mittens of hers, I pulled her off the pavement, and tried to figure out what to do...
What TO do? Another car pulled off, and in sympathy, tried to help me answer this question.
Not really much to do. The beaver seemed pretty clearly gone, though so recently so.
I thought to call my friend Sarah Haggerty, who works for Piedmont Wildlife, and left a message with my friend Josh Zaslow, looking for her number.
After the woman left, a rumaged around in my trunk, for a plastic bag or something. And lo and behold, I found the big plastic tarp I use for a camping ground cloth.
So this I brought over to the old girl, and slid her on to it.
I then grabbed both ends, hoisted her up, and lowered her onto the canvas tarp I keep in my back seat for hauling tires..,and OFF I went to band practice....!
Well, it just so happens that Bruce and Sue's neighbor is my friend, Perrin Heartway, a skilled local vetrinarian!..
So I dropped by, and asked his new son, Cedar, "where's your Papa?" and Cedar pointed there! (after I'd found him). So Perrin agreed to take a look at him, out of his own curiosity, which is really why I wanted to show it to him.
Perrin was able to sex it though, and also observed that the beaver's leg had been broken.
Bruce called Mr. Honeycutt, a local Taxidermist, who gave me some good advice about preserving this creatures qualities, for the sake of education. He agreed that, while he had too many beaver's already to put it too much use, that a beaver is a marvelous creature, and an educational resource not to be wasted!
So, I was pretty much left to my own to find a way to cool this body down with in the next 2 hours....
I happened to know that there at Blue Heron Farm, they have a meat freezer where they keep their delinquint cows, so I went running across the farm field, to ask Ray or Hannah about this. On the way, I ran into Jean, who was excited to the beaver, as I thought she might be.
When I got to Ray's and described the strange thing I had found, he was indeed curious.
I then mentioned that we had about 2 hours to cool this thing down or loose it forever, could we use the meat freezor, if there was space.
To this Ray responded, that they had just filled the freezor with a (presumably delinguent) pig.
But, instead, he said, bless his odd ball heart, lets see what kind of room we have in the freezer here in the house.. and he went to rearranging the tator tots and bacon, or what ever he had, clearing a shelf/tomb of the perfect proportions for out gainly friend.
So we conviened around the big beaver, and spent some quality time with her. Murray came too, and Soren, and Ray's daughter. We held her in our arms, cradled her like a baby, passed her around a little.
Its funny, along with her smell, a very woody, resinous, musty odor, a part of her rubbed off on all of us, and as I knew that would happen, I carried a part of her into our band practice, where I got royally drunk, on both the case of NewCastles I had brought, and her beaver perfume.
There was a toast to a lovely Lady of the Lake...
This past sunny Sunday morning, I was driving up Highway 87, on my way to band practice at Bruce and Sue Saunders' house, off Lutterlow Rd. when I saw this great big heap of brown fur to the right of the road. Now that is fairly common around here, probably everywhere where there are lots of woods, with occaisonal roads, sadly.
What was unussual, was that this lump of fur had great big monsterous flat tail sticking out.
To be completely honest with you, my first reaction was, "is that a Platypus?!!!" Of course, I quickly discerned that, no it was much more likely a beaver (as of course, these are in plentiful supply in these parts, and their distant cousin the platypus, lives, well, on the other side of the globe).
Still, of all of the poor slain animals I have encountered over the years (and I do pay attention), never once in my 30+ years have I seen a beaver.
What's more, I thought that I saw this lump of fur move....
So I turned around and pulled over.
What I found kind of blew me away...
It was a beaver all right, but this was one Big Mother...I would say just shy of a yard long from nose to tail tip. I'm not sure where she had been struck. She seemed to be completely intact. But she was bleeding from her mouth and nose a little.
When I layed my hand on here back, she was Very warm to the touch...steamy, I think she must have just been hit.
Her feet... we're just incredible..I've never seen anything like it really. They were webbed, like a duck's, but with soft fur on the tops....
With these great mittens of hers, I pulled her off the pavement, and tried to figure out what to do...
What TO do? Another car pulled off, and in sympathy, tried to help me answer this question.
Not really much to do. The beaver seemed pretty clearly gone, though so recently so.
I thought to call my friend Sarah Haggerty, who works for Piedmont Wildlife, and left a message with my friend Josh Zaslow, looking for her number.
After the woman left, a rumaged around in my trunk, for a plastic bag or something. And lo and behold, I found the big plastic tarp I use for a camping ground cloth.
So this I brought over to the old girl, and slid her on to it.
I then grabbed both ends, hoisted her up, and lowered her onto the canvas tarp I keep in my back seat for hauling tires..,and OFF I went to band practice....!
Well, it just so happens that Bruce and Sue's neighbor is my friend, Perrin Heartway, a skilled local vetrinarian!..
So I dropped by, and asked his new son, Cedar, "where's your Papa?" and Cedar pointed there! (after I'd found him). So Perrin agreed to take a look at him, out of his own curiosity, which is really why I wanted to show it to him.
Perrin was able to sex it though, and also observed that the beaver's leg had been broken.
Bruce called Mr. Honeycutt, a local Taxidermist, who gave me some good advice about preserving this creatures qualities, for the sake of education. He agreed that, while he had too many beaver's already to put it too much use, that a beaver is a marvelous creature, and an educational resource not to be wasted!
So, I was pretty much left to my own to find a way to cool this body down with in the next 2 hours....
I happened to know that there at Blue Heron Farm, they have a meat freezer where they keep their delinquint cows, so I went running across the farm field, to ask Ray or Hannah about this. On the way, I ran into Jean, who was excited to the beaver, as I thought she might be.
When I got to Ray's and described the strange thing I had found, he was indeed curious.
I then mentioned that we had about 2 hours to cool this thing down or loose it forever, could we use the meat freezor, if there was space.
To this Ray responded, that they had just filled the freezor with a (presumably delinguent) pig.
But, instead, he said, bless his odd ball heart, lets see what kind of room we have in the freezer here in the house.. and he went to rearranging the tator tots and bacon, or what ever he had, clearing a shelf/tomb of the perfect proportions for out gainly friend.
So we conviened around the big beaver, and spent some quality time with her. Murray came too, and Soren, and Ray's daughter. We held her in our arms, cradled her like a baby, passed her around a little.
Its funny, along with her smell, a very woody, resinous, musty odor, a part of her rubbed off on all of us, and as I knew that would happen, I carried a part of her into our band practice, where I got royally drunk, on both the case of NewCastles I had brought, and her beaver perfume.
There was a toast to a lovely Lady of the Lake...
