If beavers read the paper they could have seen 7 articles in three months about the woeful folk in Hopkinton tearing their expensively-treated hair out because beavers were ruining their beautiful riverside home and realize their own fate was looking grim. They would be able to sling their belongings over their shoulder, bid goodbye to the old haunts, and travel in a mass exodus to friendlier climes. Enos Mills (In Beaver World) wrote about once seeing a long line of beavers make a migration in hopes of finding a better home. Several colonies together moving en mass – I wouldn’t swear it was true but I wouldn’t dare say it was fiction either.
But the Hopkinton beavers had no such warning. And the landowners and property developer finally got what they wanted all along. Remember, on your next trip to Massachusetts, to never, ever spend a single dime in Hopkinton and shake the dust from your sandals when you leave.
Beavers removed near Hopkinton development
A trapper hired to stem flooding at Legacy Farms caught 42 beavers last month, he said Tuesday.
Malcolm Speicher, who this winter also trapped for homeowners off North and South Mill streets, said he spent 15 days on the south side of 730-acre East Main Street housing development.
Beavers can endanger homes, buildings and septic systems if their dams cause flooding.
“We just kept going and going and going, and we just kept finding and finding and finding,” Speicher said.
I could pointedly ask why reporters generously use the words “caught” and “removed” instead of the words “KILLED” and “SLAUGHTERED”, but big kill stories upset me. I have little sarcasm left. They remind me of the horror I felt, way back in the beginning of all this, to read that Elk Grove in CA (which to this day has anti-beaver propaganda on their public works site) trapped 53 beavers after their big beaver bruhaha. I’m shocked as much by the futility as by the cruelty of it. Never mind that one of their city council wrote me about flow devices and had a great conversation with Mike on the phone. Never mind that they are 30 minutes away from the answer. They wanted dead beavers and they got them. Of course, since trapping is a short-term solution, Hopkinton is going to be whining about beaver problems again before you know it. In the mean time, let’s all hate them very, very much, okay?
I suddenly have a very strong need to hear Carl Sandburg’s voice reading this…
