Looks like our beavers just looked up the word “busy” in the dictionary and decided to give it a try! The smallest kit/yearling was working like a ranch hand this am and apparently yesterday morning as well, reeding and mudding the secondary dam. He continues his fine tradition of basket weaving that no other 
Martinez beaver has ever mastered. It is true we have seen dad pull tules to staunch a breach in the dam, but Dad always combined them traditionally with actual sticks. Not so Reed Jr. He happier to build with reeds than with anything else and that works out because there are a lot of them.
This morning his languid sibling came slipping over the secondary dam appreciatively and decided to help a little. Sharon Brown of Beavers:Wetlands & WIldlife said once that male kits tend to be smaller than females, and I’ve always had the notion that our two jumbo bookends are sisters, and Reed Jr, who followed GQ everywhere and built his first little reed dam at 6 months, is a boy. In the absence of any other data I think its as good a theory as any, and would explain his slightly different attitude towards construction and feeding. Still, to any beaver work should be irresistible, they just need one to start the chain and everyone should get motivated. Apparently this has happened, and lord knows not a moment too soon if the temperature is any indication of what’s to come. The secondary dam is actually holding back water! Both of them went to bed in the bank hole by the footbridge looking more like actual beavers than I have seen since March. Go Beavers!
