WAUCONDA – It took emergency crews close to an hour Monday night to safely extricate a Wauconda woman stuck in mud, according to the Wauconda Fire District.

A resident near Ridge Street and Route 176 found a woman yelling for help and trapped in a swamp-like area at around 10:30 p.m., Battalion Chief Kevin Pyne said. Authorities arrived and found a 57-year-old woman unable to remove herself from mud that was up to her armpits.

The woman was attempting to remove a beaver dam that was adjacent to her property when she became stuck, Pyne said. The swampy area near Route 176 and Ridge Street feeds under the roadway through a spillway into Bangs Lake.