James McKew

“An upset beaver is a terrible thing.”

One of the most profound quotes in history and I can’t remember exactly who said it but those seven words are the foundation for all wilderness experiences.

I had eyed the Grand Mesa for months with a sort-of fishing lust. Ogling the world’s tallest flat top mountain and knowing that a hundred alpine lakes were gorged with hungry trout and spread out over 500 square miles of easily accessible forested flatland. My fish-lust was held at bay by the late spring snowstorms that dropped white powder well into the second week of May and forced me to show considerable restraint in waiting to cast my line over ice covered waters; all that changed a couple days ago when I headed up after work.

I have a float tube that I purchased at Sportsman’s Warehouse a few years ago. By modern standards it would be considered a luxury liner. It is my second, the first was a hand-me-down, consisting of a tire inner-tube stuffed inside an ill-fitting nylon bag with two leg openings in the bottom, similar to an infant swing at the playground and twice as uncomfortable. I used it on several occasions in California, each time sinking in to my chin with only my eyes and the rod poking above water. My new float tube is shaped like a Zodiac raft and designed to sit high up out of the water. With an adjustable backrest and cargo pockets, it has the feel of riding a Lazy-Boy around the lake. Sometimes I hang a couple beers over the side as emergency rations, just in case I nod off and wake up stranded on some distant shore.

I’m not what you would consider a lake fisherman by-trade; I like the feeling of river water pressing on my knees as I navigate a stream bottom while more or less hunting for my fish. But two weekends ago we camped at Ridgeway State Park and after a non-productive morning on the Uncompahgre River; I spent the next two evenings slapping the reservoir trout in the head with dry flies until they took my offering. Altogether I caught seven fish between those two nights and felt great about it.

On this particular afternoon the June heat was melting the asphalt as I pulled out of Grand Junction. Up the steep road I raced, leaving behind the scorching valley as the highway winds through meadows and scrub oak, past farm houses and cabins until finally entering the north facing aspen groves of the mesa. It was everything I remembered from last fall, the mountainous terrain, the mirror-like water that meanders in and out of the tall trees and all of it draped in the fading warm glow of evening light. The smell of new growth filled the cool mountain air, pine sap mixed with the scent of lake water and a slight whiff of sweet campfire smoke.

I strapped on my flippers and gently eased the Lazy-Boy into the water. Down the shoreline from me was a pregnant woman walking alone and smoking. My first thought was that she drove all the way up here to puff-away and avoid the raised eyebrows of her neighbors. I felt that I had somehow foiled her plan as she disappeared around the bend but came back a few minutes later with a string of fish and a little kid in tow. Paddling out from the shore I caught sight of her husband further down the bank. My spirits rose at the sight of his exposed armpits under his white tank top, knowing that the three of them were bait casting for shore trout and successful to-boot.

Surely I’ll snag the big top-feeders with my clever exploits. My stomach filled with excited birds as I maneuvered the Lazy-Boy into deeper waters.

Silver bellied trout arched out of the water every ten minutes on the dot; one here, another there as if they were taking turns. I casted to their rise, my dry fly sailed overhead then floated like a down feather, before landing on the surface. Then I nestle down into my mini-yacht and let the deepening forest shadows draw me into a meditative state. Off to the west, the sun slowly passed through the tangled pine trees on the ridge, turning the watery reflections first yellow then orange. The evening skies filled with excited birds; horny male robins chased the females through the trees like fighter planes dog-fighting through the dense woods. Hidden birds sang back and forth from somewhere deep in the shadows, their repeating scale patterns and pure tones would make Beyonce envious. Up the hillside and well out of view, a pair of woodpeckers busied themselves with a drilling contest. The mechanical tapping echoed down the mountainside, filling the space between me and the vast forest that is just beyond the lake rim. I could have easily closed my eyes and floated for the next couple hours without wetting my fly.

Wish I had a beer right now …light beer please waitress, I’m on a diet.

From the edge of my vision, a thin ripple caught my eye, a small wake generated by a moving black dot. Muskrats out for an evening swim; small animals, the size of a large orange with gray-black fur. One passed within seventy feet of me with something in its mouth and climbed out on a log. It sniffed along the water-soaked log before slipping back into the glassy lake and paddling parallel to the shore. Before the night is over I will have seen at least five or six of them.

In my blissful state I decided to fin across the lake and get a close-up look at the remaining snow banks. Down in the shadowy pockets, the snow was still three feet thick in places and had faded to a shade of light grey. In some areas it hung out over the water, forming dangerously thin cornices for the unsuspecting hiker.

That’s when the incident happened.

On the far lake bank, I spied a big male beaver sitting quietly in the remaining sunlight nibbling on an aspen sapling and reading the evening news.

Cool …I’ve seen beavers in the wild before. First time on a camping trip when I was twelve with this ex-FBI agent, let’s call him Mr. Smith. He and I took a kayak up the Walker River spillway and waited patiently in the willows until dusk as the beaver slowly cruised back and forth in front of us.

Second time was in the Grand Tetons. A little beaver hauled out near the Snake River after dark and ate twigs to the delight of twenty camera toting tourists …wilderness porno for the masses.

Today it’s different, this is a big reddish-brown beaver and its little beady eyes are fixed me. The thing about beaver is that they’re not like deer, who when frightened will suddenly dart into the woods. Beaver are squat, pear-shaped animals, with little legs like a Pug and move with a deliberate and conservative silence. Beaver play a pretty big roll on the TV show Mountain Men. That older Montana trapper with the cowboy hat will slog for miles across the snowy marshland, towing a sled full of gear just to snare a few unsuspecting Castor canadensis. I’m not a trapper, never really consider it as a hobby or profession, still, I can appreciate the effort, especially from the comfort of my sofa. If I’m looking to get sweaty and worn out, it might as well be hunting elk or trout fishing.

The big red beaver sensed my presence, especially when I paddle in close enough to get a photo with my camera phone. It stopped chewing and slipped off the grassy bank and into the water, dog-paddling past the snowy shore. Then I spot a second and third beaver on the bank near a fallen tree trunk. Looks like the momma and baby, both eating.

Click, click, click …I work with all the paparazzi speed my pointy finger could muster.

The big beaver circled around to the west and slapped his tail with that big walloping sound of someone hurling a boulder into the water. At the same time the momma beaver waddled into the water in front of me and I think; perhaps I’ve crossed that invisible line between the casual observer and the asshole with a camera.

I’ve been the asshole before. Back in my wildlife-photographer days, I was stopped by a pistol-packing Smokey Bear in Yellowstone for being too close to a herd of elk during the rut. Lucky I didn’t get a ticket that time. In the Tetons I was trapped on a peninsula with a cow moose and her horny boyfriend who wasn’t impressed with my red jacket. That afternoon I was pretty sure I would need to swim across the swamp to keep from getting trampled. Then there was a time in Monterey Bay when I was practically assaulted by a hungry sea otter.

Right now, the momma beaver is torpedoing straight at me.

I kicked at the water with all gusto I could muster but she closed the gap like a Nazi U-boat on the hunt.

She slowed, veered to my left within thirty feet, then slapped her tail and dove only to reemerge twenty seconds later and slapped the water on my right side.

“Alright damn it!” I pulled back even further until I’m bobbing at least a couple hundred feet from where I first saw them. The water went glassy once again. I study the surface with apprehension and cast my fly in towards shore and wait for the world to calm down. I didn’t mean to piss off the beaver …it just happened.

By now the sun had dropped below the horizon, the slight breeze from an hour ago is gone and the water is a reflection of light green summer aspens that cover hillsides. A few more fish splashed nearby and a mosquito planted a needle into my wrist.

The float tube billowed up under me, the water pressure pushing my butt around.

“What the hell? Lost fish rising under me?” That’s my first thought. My second thought is that the damn beaver is trying to sink me …and that scared me a little. Big buck teeth taking a bite out of the tube or my dangling legs is enough to make me back peddle a little further towards my car.

The evening light faded quickly and still not a single strike on my line. The question of why I’m here never really crossed my mind. I don’t have to catch fish in order to have the best time of my life. Fishing is fishing, it’s not a competition. During times like this I try to remember that this so-called sport is often an excuse to take a walk along the river, or tonight, a paddle around the horn. This sort of thing refreshes my batteries from the stress of work and kids and frankly keeps me sane.

“Many men go fishing all their lives without knowing that it is not fishing they are after.” Henry David Thoreau.

Smart guy …obviously he knew the secret of men and water.

I finned back around a rocky point and into the leeward side of the tall pines.

A Coors can bobbed in the shallows. In my boredom I cast to it. The only trash I have seen since arriving and somehow feel the need to fixate on it, telling myself that it’s good practice as I swung my line overhead and aimed at the small dot of silver in the otherwise world of deep green and gray shadows. Isn’t it ironic that we humans will pick out the one single thing in all of nature that reminds us of ourselves? I lived in Moab for a season and in the evenings I hiked in the foothills around town, my eye would constantly seek out human shapes and faces in the stone walls. Here I’m doing the same thing …for a few minutes at least until a fatal error in my back-cast is rewarded with a tangle of fishing line so terrible that I had to cut out nine feet of microscopic filament and start from scratch.

Oh well, it kept my hands busy for another five minutes.

The sky turned an even deeper blue and a small gathering of clouds glowed pink in a final glorious gasp. I paddle towards shore. The night came quickly; black trees grew taller and more menacing with each passing minute.

Quietly worked on the muddy shore to pull off my fins and put on sandals, the stillness broken by an enormous splash not more than fifteen feet away. I flinched and spun around to see the backside of the damn beaver motoring past me. I’m pretty sure it’s the female and her little button eyes are smiling with a look that can only say, “Gotcha sucka …stay out of my hood.”

Now I’m pissed.

She followed me way-the-hell over here and taunted me which breaks all the known standards of animal-human interaction, unless of course this was a Stephen King novel.

In my shocked madness I launch counter-measures and hurled a quarter-sized rock out in front of her, striking the water off her bow. She slapped the water and dove under the dark surface.

Was the rock throwing childish? Yes.

Was I scared and angry? Absolutely; a large member of the rodent family was stalking me in near-darkness.