Pet beaver book
July 4, 2022 9:58 PM Subscribe
I once read a book about a family who adopted a beaver. It was probably published between 1970-1990 and had candid family photos of the beaver swimming in their bathtub. What was it?
A family adopted an orphaned baby beaver.
It had a cute name that I can’t remember, maybe Flipper or something similar.
It liked to swim in their tub and mess up the house. I think they also had a kiddie pool for it.
It seemed like an incredibly amusing and also high maintenance pet
The photos were home candids, so the beaver was hard to see, it often just looked like a large brown oval in a white bathtub
It was a soft cover, bound with staples or sewing (no spine), and small, maybe 6x10 inches and only about 30 pages.
It looked self-published (as did many books then)
I think the cover was white or light blue, with a photo of the beaver in a rectangle in the centre. On the cover, the beaver had its nose up so its teeth were really prominent. The cover wasn’t colourful - I think it was a dark beaver on a whitish / pale blue background, maybe the bathroom again.
May have been Canadian or American.
May have been sold in zoos, possibly the Toronto zoo.
This is such a long shot, but… what was this book? Anyone?
Thanks!
A family adopted an orphaned baby beaver.
It had a cute name that I can’t remember, maybe Flipper or something similar.
It liked to swim in their tub and mess up the house. I think they also had a kiddie pool for it.
It seemed like an incredibly amusing and also high maintenance pet
The photos were home candids, so the beaver was hard to see, it often just looked like a large brown oval in a white bathtub
It was a soft cover, bound with staples or sewing (no spine), and small, maybe 6x10 inches and only about 30 pages.
It looked self-published (as did many books then)
I think the cover was white or light blue, with a photo of the beaver in a rectangle in the centre. On the cover, the beaver had its nose up so its teeth were really prominent. The cover wasn’t colourful - I think it was a dark beaver on a whitish / pale blue background, maybe the bathroom again.
May have been Canadian or American.
May have been sold in zoos, possibly the Toronto zoo.
This is such a long shot, but… what was this book? Anyone?
Thanks!
Could the animal have been an otter instead?
This is a similar story to 'Ring of Bright Water' where a guy living in London gets a pet otter and moves to Scotland, partly because of the antics the otter gets up to in his flat! There are scenes with the otter in the bathtub, and lots of critter mayhem as it becomes evident that it needs more wild space. The movie was released in 1969, and was based on a memoir written in 1960.
The cover in this link also looks similar to the nose-up pose you describe.
Ring Of Bright Water cover still
TW for the ending of the film, which is out-of-sync with the comedic tone of the majority of the movie.
posted by jolenex4 at 6:41 AM on July 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
This is a similar story to 'Ring of Bright Water' where a guy living in London gets a pet otter and moves to Scotland, partly because of the antics the otter gets up to in his flat! There are scenes with the otter in the bathtub, and lots of critter mayhem as it becomes evident that it needs more wild space. The movie was released in 1969, and was based on a memoir written in 1960.
The cover in this link also looks similar to the nose-up pose you describe.
Ring Of Bright Water cover still
TW for the ending of the film, which is out-of-sync with the comedic tone of the majority of the movie.
posted by jolenex4 at 6:41 AM on July 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Also: The otter in the movie/book above was nicknamed 'Mij' (short for Mijbil). So possible cute nickname there.
posted by jolenex4 at 6:46 AM on July 5, 2022
posted by jolenex4 at 6:46 AM on July 5, 2022
Best answer: I could swear I remember that book, but no luck. Do you think it could have been a very small press run, available at zoos only, about Bucky? The timeline fits.
posted by maudlin at 7:28 AM on July 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by maudlin at 7:28 AM on July 5, 2022 [2 favorites]
Was it maybe a Capybara instead? There’s a Bill Peet book like that:
http://www.billpeet.net/pages/capy.htm
posted by misterdaniel at 10:07 PM on July 5, 2022
http://www.billpeet.net/pages/capy.htm
posted by misterdaniel at 10:07 PM on July 5, 2022
Response by poster: It was definitely a beaver - I have the confidence of having been the type of child who absolutely knew the difference between a leopard and a cheetah, etc - and it may have been Bucky, although that name doesn’t seem quite right. But the other details do seem right - central Canada (Manitoba or Alberta) feels right, and it was definitely a small press, and very likely we did get it at the gift shop of the Toronto Zoo. So it might have been Bucky- a lot of those details match! Thanks!
posted by nouvelle-personne at 4:07 PM on July 6, 2022
posted by nouvelle-personne at 4:07 PM on July 6, 2022
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posted by nouvelle-personne at 6:17 AM on July 5, 2022