Industrious Beaver

Beaver has a special place in Canadian History. Its fur trade and trading posts propelled the colonial westward expansion. The whole Hudson Bay drainage basin was under the commercial monopoly of fur trading Hudson Bay Company from 1670 to 1870. Its trade even spawned a few wars during that period. 

Extensive hunting nearly drove it towards extinction by the late 19th century.  Thankfully, anti-fur campaigns and protection efforts after that helped to reverse some of that damage. Nowadays these industrious creatures are free to build dams and lodges, without literally trying to save their skin all the time.

For its invaluable contribution to Canadian History, Beaver was recognized as a national symbol in 1975. Thus it appears on a number of coat of arms, monograms, buildings, and also on the five-cent coins.

Here it is happily resting over the front doors of the Canada Revenue Agency building at 1 Front Street, Toronto after centuries of hard work for the Canadian exchequer.