busy as a beaver

Idioms and Phrases

Also, busy as a bee . Hardworking, very industrious, as in With all her activities, Sue is always busy as a bee , or Bob's busy as a beaver trying to finish painting before it rains . The comparison to beavers dates from the late 1700s, the variant from the late 1300s. Also see eager beaver ; work like a beaver .

Example Sentences

“I am busy as a beaver,” says Parton, ever a master of the folksy bon mot, “and about as dammed up.”

From Los Angeles Times

Mary Anne Gibbon, who sits on the parish council and has belonged to Sacred Heart since 1980, said that the parish serves a largely low-income community and that Villalta is usually “busy as a beaver on roller skates” trying to help parishioners.

From Washington Post

“He’s like busy as a beaver – he’s assiduously working to extend the culture of the European right to America, and to make America a partner in this effort to derail democracy.”

From The Guardian

He must have been busy as a beaver during his fleeting school days.

From Literature

Busy as a beaver, he estimated his peak output at 350,000 words a year, occasionally resolved to ease off.

From Time Magazine Archive

Related Words

• bustling
• full
• hectic
• lively
• restless