For well over 30 years, Audrey Tournay has rescued and raised beaver kits. She successfully did what wildlife biologists told her was impossible: she reintroduced them to the wild.
Tournay is founder of the Aspen Valley Wildlife Sanctuary, where orphaned or injured moose, raccoons, ravens, skunks, foxes, fawns, woodchucks, muskrats, wolves, a lynx -- even a full-grown adult lioness -- have come into her care. Yet Tournay has a soft spot for beavers. That soft spot has occasionally been her bathroom, a makeshift den behind her woodstove, or on her lap. Her hands-on interaction with many beavers has given her a special understanding of these often misunderstood wetland animals.
These wonderful, moving and often very funny stories reveal life with one of North America's most intelligent, innovative, and inventive wild creatures.