The World of the Beaver

By: Leonard Lee Rue III

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Synopsis: "According to a Cherokee legend," writes Leonard Lee Rue in The World of the Beaver, "it was the Great Spirit, with the help of gigantic beavers, who created the earth. The earth had been covered with water until the Great Spirit sent the beavers diving down beneath the surface to dredge up mud from the bottom to form land masses." Although the beaver is not, nowadays, as big as his legendary ancestors, he continues to be enormously helpful to man and beast. Here Leonard Lee Rue reveals the world and way of life of the good -natured, industrious American beaver and follows him through a full year of his ordinary activities. How does a beaver fell a tree? What does he eat? Is he polygamous or monogamous? How does he build a dam? What does the inside of his lodge look like? Who has been his most deadly enemy in America? The author-whose interest in beavers has caused him to go swimming with them and, on one occasion, led to his becoming stuck in the passage to a lodge-answers all these questions and many others. The informal narrative and the author's remarkable photographs make this really first-rate reading for the nature student and for the ordinary reader. "As intent as man seems to be on destroying the earth," writes Leonard Lee Rue in conclusion, "the Creator may again have to call upon the beavers to help patch things up. The earth's future couldn't be in better paws."