location: 800 feet west of Woodworth Lake, Fulton County, NY
I spent most of the day digging out a places for styrofoam sheets along the cabin's west foundation wall, starting at cabin's northwest corner (near the gas lines I'd fairly-carefully dug up and exposed). That first sheet went in very quickly, mostly because I dug the bare minimum of sand out of the way to open up a place for it and was able to get into and out of the trench without triggering a collapse. I then took a break by going down to the dock with a beer of some sort. I sat there for a little bit, noticing some human activity at the public dock. I then got in the kayak and paddled out to the beaver dam at the outflow of the lake. While I was there, I witnessed a fair amount of blue jay activity in the forest just downstream of the lake. And then I noticed that the beavers had built a second beaver dam below the one that sets the lake's level. This one just created a small C-shaped pond, and I was curious to come back and find out more about it later. But not while I was in the kayak. I paddled back to the dock, where I again found Neville waiting for me. I then noticed that Throckmorton the Loon was out near the northeast corner of the lake.
On the walk back to the cabin, Neville and I took a detour to the beaver dams at the lake's outflow, and I found that the new beaver dam had been built only four or five feet upstream from an existing stone causeway, which forms something of a dam and something of a footpath allowing humans to cross the outflow creek and get to a nearby Boy Scout campground on our parcel. I couldn't help myself and decided to add additional rocks to the somewhat-rudimentary beaver creation. I'm not sure why beavers would bother impounding such a small body of water adjacent to a much larger lake just upstream. Perhaps they were just responding to the sound of trickling water going through the stone causeway (which I also beefed up today). (The older beaver dam that sets the lake's height is noticeably silent, perhaps partly because the water now doesn't fall far to get into the new pond directly downstream and partly due to some PVC pipes the Boy Scouts routed through the dam to keep it from raising lake levels excessively.
Back at the cabin, I had enough day left to install a second sheet of styrofoam on the western foundation wall. This one went in even faster than the first one had. Both of these sheets were only a little over 82 inches in height, confirming that the footings are 13 or 14 inches shallower here than they had been on the eastern two-thirds of the foundation wall.
As usual, I celebrated that second installation later this evening by going down to the lake and paddling around in the kayak. Soon after I left the dock, my back was itching badly, and after snapping more photos of Throckmorton the Loon, I landed over at the public dock and rubbed my back enthusisastically against the rough bark of one of the trees there. I saw things were pretty tidy at the public dock, suggesting it's not suffering from a "tragedy of the commons" issue. But I also saw a large device intended for launching powerful fireworks that nobody has yet succeeded in burning up.
This evening I ate some of my twigggy old cannabis, and it was apparently enough to get me stoned in an agreeable way. I took a nice hot bath upstairs as it was kicking in and then later dragged myself downstairs and drank a few beers to "come down" a little.
The boathouse view today from our dock.
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People at the public dock today, viewed via telephoto lens from our dock.
The new beaver dam, the small pond it impounds upstream, and the stone hikers' causeway just downstream.
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Neville crossing on the new dam.
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