How many streets, creeks, towns, counties have the name “Beaver”? In the Midwest, it seems far more prevalent than “Beech Grove” or “Chestnut St”.
In the mid 1600’s, there was no studies in ecology and hydrology. The wilderness was to be conquered, not managed. The natural resource seemed endless, preservation was not a consideration.
So the environmental impact of the water in the characteristic beaver ponds is conjecture. But, modeling and observations of modern dams and the resultant marshes, wetlands and meadows gives us a basis to project the ecology of pre-17th century North America.
For more information, this website, http://www.beaverdam.info/, lays out in a more scientific way the current analysis of beaver affects on hydrology. (My thanks to Steven Grannes) There is a behavioral consistency in this rodent, which allows projections to be valid.
According to Mr. Grannes, each Midwest state, pre-whiteman, had 250,000 beaver dams! 1600th century French accounts report a beaver dam every 200’ in every creek in the Great Lakes drainage! Mr. Grannes reports later that North America had an estimated 6 million to 20 million beaver. Give the real time reports; Mr. Grannes is probably conservative in his calculations, or the French fur traders ‘promotional’.
(Here we go, campers!) If each of the 5 states in the “Old Northwest Territories”: Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin (yes, and a section of Minnesota) had 250,000 dams and each dam had 6 beaver, that’s 1.5 million beaver per state, or 7.5 million just in the USA side of the Great Lakes! This number makes the yearly harvest reports in Chapter 3 probable.
That is 7,000,000+, 30- 40 lb. rodents, all “busy as a beaver” impounding the Midwest creeks with 1.25 million+ ponds. What is this environmental reality?
