Battling With Our National Rodent and His Righteous Defenders
by Charles Herriot
 
My war with the beavers started peaceably enough. "Shoo beavers,
shoo," I admonished as they built their first dam at the edge of our
property and started plundering an adjacent poplar stand. As the waters
backed up behind their dam I tried to exercise Biblical restraint,
"parting the waters like Moses" by clawing their dam apart night
after night. The beavers, heretics that they were, were unmoved by my
efforts and moved in their own reinforcements. Their single dam became two
dams and their simple lodge became a monstrous pile in the midst of a
growing lake.
 
Unfortunately, the floodwaters were starting to kill valuable wood and
specifically, to encroach on a plantation of 5,000 white pine trees which I
had started from seedlings as a teenager. Knowing that our present system
of laws carried severe penalties for harming Canada's national rodent, I
made the mistake of calling the Ministry of Natural Resources for
permission to deal with the beavers.
 
A whole vanful of MNR Great Minds showed up at the farm for a hip-wadered
tour of the expanding beaver swamp. They wanted to be sure that all
available attempts at accommodating had been made with the beavers. By the
way they talked in studied bureaucrateze, I had a sense that I would be
compelled to go to binding arbitration with the beavers with a result that
I would be asked to do their dam repairs while they enjoyed Statutory
Holidays. "Our mandate is protect and preserve wild life,"
offered one unapologetic MNR factotum.
 
"What about trees?," I asked, "Aren't they a kind of wild
life worthy of protection?" The beavers are ruining my tree
plantation. I tried to appeal to the MNR's sense of their own
self-preservation by mentioning that every year, I filled out the entire
forty two page, "Private Woodlot Management Plan" and sent it in
triplicate to the MNR - providing, I assume, thousands of man hours of
employment to otherwise useless members of society.
 
"Just fence in your trees," suggested one MNR cretin who didn't
understand the concept that the danger to the trees was drowning, not being
chewed apart. After weeks of correspondence - mostly one way from me to
MNR, I was visited by another high level delegation of MNR geniuses who
finally allowed that I could "cull" the beavers but only if I got
a licensed trapper to do the work.
 
Of course, licensed trappers are something of a rarity in this part of the
world. In fact, non-existent. So I filled out another fifteen forms in
triplicate and applied to become a licensed trapper. Down to Huntsville I
went for my approved "All the donuts you can eat, Officially Approved
Trapper Licensing School" course. I learned that legally trapping
beavers involved picking that brief seasonal time slot dictated by the
phase of the moon, the hemorrhoid status of the local MNR feudal baron, and
a sincere promise not to humiliate any beavers in my trapping endeavors. I
had to return to Huntsville with an armful of connibear traps to have them
all etched with my Official Trapper Permit number.
 
Upon setting the traps, and calling for the requisite MNR Official Trapper
Inspection, I ran into trouble. Apparently, I made the mistake of setting
the traps in the water. "This just won't do. It won't do at all,"
said the MNR lordling. "You see here, you see? You've got these traps
in the water. What if the beavers drown?"
 
Okay, try to imagine being floored by a rhetorical question like this while
you are hip deep in a swamp. "Drown?", I asked feebly.
 
"Ayep," said the MNR arsecreeper, "Drown." The way he
pronounced "drown" it almost sounded like a Pentecostal preacher
who pauses to give pregnant meaning before uttering the word
"sin." "Can't have that now can we?" the MNR potentate
demanded.
 
"Why?", I asked, already wincing because I'd already speculated
about fourteen insane reasons why an MNR cretin would worry about a
drowning beaver.
 
"Inhumane isn't it?", said the MNR mouthbreather in one of those
kindergarten voices used to address idiots, other teachers and small
children. "Lemmee see your Trapper's License." With bold strokes,
the MNR chucklehead wrote: "SUSPENDED" on my license, gathered up
my traps, and drove off.
 
I would have quietly acceded the war to the beavers had not one of the
local police sergeants phoned me one evening. "We see that you're a
licensed trapper and we have a beaver problem out at the hydro
sub-station." At first I was flattered, thinking that I must be in an
all-important "Trapper's database." Probably the kind of database
that police would want to access before storming into my house. They'd want
to know, for example, that "the suspect is armed and dangerous - known
to possess rabbit snare wire and connibear traps - use caution, or
alternatively, shoot first." I had to concede that I was a mere relic
of my former licensed trapper glory and that I had been busted down in rank
to the sort of person who could probably only carry REALLY BIG guns and
work for a police force. I was, apparently, not of suitable character and
stability to be a trapper.
 
After explaining all about my sad decline as a licensed trapper, the police
sergeant allowed that it "was the dumbest thing he'd ever heard."
This proved conclusively that he'd never had any previous dealings with MNR
where the insane and the ludicrous becomes a sort of Guiness Book of
Records challenge for them on a daily basis. He offered to deal with my
beaver problem. Feeling already criminalized by my trapper's license
disaster, I agreed. The next night, the police sergeant and two of his
friends from a police force whose initials are remarkably similar to OPP,
arrived with an impressive array of armaments.
 
I am pleased to report that no beavers were inhumanely drowned as the
police blazed away, first with their side arms, and next with their
pump-action shotguns, and finally with a semi-automatic M16 variant. Alas,
the score was Police: 0, Beavers 1. (One officer cut his finger on the
ammunition clip.) No beavers received a scratch.
 
My war with the beavers was losing momentum when I read an MNR brochure
that advised me that I could obtain "a problem animal relocation
permit." I filled out all the requisite forms, hoping that I wouldn't
have to return to Huntsville for a "Animal Relocation Course"
where my name and mugshot were surely up on the lunchroom walls by now.
 
I got my permit giving me the right to "relocate problem
animals." That's just what I did. I relocated them. Trouble was, the
neighbours complained the next morning about the loud explosions they'd
heard on my property the night before. It only took a day for the MNR to
arrive in force and look very, very, very unhappy at the perfectly drained
swamp punctuated by 4 meter craters where the beaver dams and houses used
to be.
 
"Wanna tell me what happened here?" asked the lead MNR
investigative sleuth in his Colombo voice.
 
"I relocated the beavers." I offered, trying to be helpful.
"I have a permit," I added to insure that they understood that I
wasn't a criminal beaver relocator or anything.
 
"Where did you relocate them to?", asked the MNR Mensa candidate.
 
"Up," I answered, pointing at the sky.
 
"Whaddya mean, Up?" asked the MNR weenie.
 
"Just like I said, " I answered. "Says right here I am
allowed to relocate the beavers. I did. Says on the permit I can move them
away from the area where they are causing damage. I did that too. I
relocated them up there," I said while again pointing at the sky.
"They're in beaver heaven now, I'm sure."
 
Anyway, we sat and argued for most of the morning whether my use of 14
sticks of dynamite and blowing the beavers all to hell was really in the
spirit intended by a relocating permit but luckily they couldn't find any
usable shreds of beaver upon which to build a violation charge so they let
me off with the kind of tongue lashing that only an MNR hydrophobic can
give. His drooling screeching almost re-flooded the damned swamp. The MNR
guy warned me that if I ever applied for a hunting license I'd have
difficulty because, he threatened, "we won't forget this."
 
The best part of the encounter was when we got back to where we parked the
vehicles. The MNR truck was hopelessly sunk to the axles in swamp muck.
When the MNR guys asked me to hook up a chain to my truck and get them
dislodged I said: "No way. This is a trick. You'n me both know that I
don't have a permit to relocate assholes." I drove off and left them
there.
 
 
Regards,
 
Roger

--- D'Bridge 3.05