Family Reunion

heidi08 Recent Sightings February 28, 2009

Last night’s trip to the dam was nearly a huge disappointment. Since they had been coming out earlier to do repairs we went eagerly at 7:00 to see what could be seen. For what seemed like an eternity we saw only intoxicated Bertola’s diners coming out and talking loudly about urgent things. A muskrat slinked by, followed by an actual rat, but no signs of beavers until 8:00 pm.

Then a single cheerful kit emerged. He nibbled on a few treats, then set himself to work with mud repairing the dam. We had the light so you could see him underwater carrying mudballs atop his front paws and under his chin. (If you want to see how this is done check out the virtual tour footage at 1:40 from Moses which shows mom carrying mud in this way to the lodge.) After a few deep dives he began to get the idea of a beaver “shortcut”.

He started taking mud off the other side of the dam, and carrying it to the gap side! Then of course he started moving sticks. You just know he was saying to himself, “I don’t know why you guys are going all the way over there to get materials, there’s a big pile right here!”

We were still chuckling about that when suddenly it was like a champagne cork popped and all the beavers poured out of the lodge. Honestly, we haven’t seen such a beaver explosion since late summer. There were so many doing so much it was hard to count who was who. All three kits, and then a very large adult slipping over the dam, and then a pretty large adult right near us. At first I thought it was a yearling, but when it turned around we recognized her tail.

Photo: Cheryl Reynolds

MOM! Ahhhh beautiful tail notch of our matriarch! If the beaver near us was mom, the larger one that slinked over the dam could only be Dad. Mom sat there right beside us with a sea of beaver activity all around and munched on her treat as if the last six months had not even happened. It was astounding. Of course she has been seen from time to time, but not by us since October and Sheetpile madness. Last night both eyes looked perfectly healthy, and she looked perfectly astute, digging in between the sticks to find the tasty bits. I wished I could ask her, how have you been? Is the new lodge working out? I’m sorry about your kit. Do you hate that sheetpile as much as we do? I thought of this scene

Then, on through the afternoon, hour after hour…
Till he found them at last! On the three millionth flower!
“My friends!” cried the elephant. “Tell me! Do tell!
Are you safe? Are you sound? Are you whole? Are you well?”

Horton Hears a Who: Dr. Seuss

She did not answer, but she looked all of those things. Two of the kits came to whine about whatever she was doing, and then she did something that made our eyes glow.She walked to the bank and reached up to get a mouthful/armful of hay and swam with it back to the lodge.

Beaver bedding!

Now I have read that beavers bring leaves and grass into the lodge for bedding, and that they actually change it more often than humans did in the middle ages. Still this motion seemed so determined it was impossible not to think of nesting behavior. We felt fairly certain that mom beaver was pregnant. The footage we saw last year of them mating was early January, so mom might be a month along. Beaver gestation is 105-107 days, so May is about right although we don’t seem to spot offspring until June.

It’s a funny thing. We were so happy to see mom again that we floated home, but she seemed to take the great pleasure of seeing us again entirely in stride.

Tree Trimming

heidi08 Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers February 27, 2009

I got an email from beaver friend GH yesterday saying that our beavers had done a little nibbling behind starbucks. Would the city be upset and should the remaining trees be wrapped? We went down this morning to have a look. A tree was felled and mostly chewed on the patch beside the Sharkey building. Another up above ward street. Ahhh the chitter chatter of little teeth in the night.

I don’t think there’s an alarm call. These are scrubby arroyo willow that will coppice and sprout new growth. It was felled onto the bank so it didn’t even block flow. We are currently working with the city engineer on a new tree planting plan for this spring. Stop by and check out how those discerning beavers nibbled around Arroyo and ignored the black willow. Research says the are supposed to eat both, but the beavers are clearly unfamiliar with the data, because they consistently avoid one and chomp the other.

This morning we saw a very hard-working kit “mudding” the dam. He would dive underwater, and carry a mudball with a visible murky trail, and then add it to the dam. He was looking much more adept and clearly enjoying himself. The Mr. and Mrs. Mallard who have adopted the viewing platform waddled close to see if we had any bread to share, and a beautiful egret flew by overhead.

Not bad for sheetpile creek.

By the way, did you see the moon last night? An amazing sliver crescent with a ghostly backdrop of earthshine behind it. It looked for all the world that we were living on a planet in a vast solar system. Who knew?

Intelligent Designers

heidi08 Educational February 27, 2009

Isn’t this a lovely picture? Its from a very seminal work by Lewis Henry Morgan entitled “The American Beaver and His Works”. Morgan was a lawyer turned Iroquois-friend, turned anthropologist and was remarkable for his progressive thinking about cultures and intelligence. He used his study of beavers (he called them “mutes” so he must not of heard them talking…) to question the 1800’s generally accepted notion that animal behavior is based soley on instinct.

“I propose to submit, in a brief form, a series
of considerations or arguments based upon the
structural organization, and authenticated acts, of
the higher animals, tending to show: first, that
they possess a mental principle; secondly, that
the qualities which it manifests are essentially
the same as those displayed by the human mind;
and lastly, that the difference between these
qualities, and inferentially, between the
principles they respectively represent, is one of
degree and not of kind” (Morgan 1868: 252) .

By studying dams, lodges and canals and the way they adapted to specific habitats, Morgan was able to argue fairly effectively that beavers were using complex thinking that combined instinct with pragmatic appraisal and available resources. Beaver friend Bob Arnebeck discusses Morgan’s work here. This was no small feat, and Morgan recognized that it was a significant challenge to the idea that only humans could make these kinds of decisions.

I have to say it is fairly remarkable to me that a man more than a hundred years ago was already beginning to notice that beaver mythology had gotten out of hand. Do you know that some had written about a “slave beaver” who did the work for the colony, but didn’t enjoy its spoils and had a less lustrous coat? Hmm I wonder what in our culture could have made people think that?

“I cannot refrain from smiling when I read the accounts of different authors who have written on the economy of these animals, as there seem to be a contest between them who shall most exceed in fiction”. page 309.

Ahh a man after my own heart. For an overview, check out this weirdly contextual article from Irene Cheng of Cabinet Maginzine (?) it has a lovely description of his work which got me thinking. The link to the original text is on google books and is wholly searchable.

Oh and this morning Jon stopped to see our “mutes” finishing their dam repairs. A yearling picked up a final stick, put it in the gap of the primary dam, and then swam off to bed.

The American Beaver and His Works By Lewis Henry Morgan

The American Beaver and His Works By Lewis Henry Morgan

Got that? The “Slave beaver” builds dams by breaking sticks with its head, giving it a little worn patch, and the “Master beaver” takes it easy and spends his days eating fish. Just want to make sure you’re all paying attention.

Big Sky Beavers

heidi08 Beaver News, Video February 25, 2009

Yesterday our own wildlife VP, Cheryl Reynolds, sent me the link to this Terra episode on beavers. Click on the title to go watch the trailer or the entire thing, its ten minutes of nice photography and basic beaver benefit 101.

TERRA 213: Leave It to Beavers

9:51mins | 2006-05-01 | Produced by: Grue, Amanda

Beavers are often thought of as cute and perhaps even comical little critters. But have you ever stopped to think about their amazing engineering skill? What if we told you that beavers were helping the environment long before it became fashionable? Join filmmaker Amanda Grue as she shows us just how cool Beavers actually are!

Of course I marched straight out to research the researcher, who was not familiar to me. Dr. Eby Assisstant Professor of Aquatic Vertibrate Ecology at the University of Montana. I was very pleased with her willingness to examine beaver impact and consider their role in helping the environment, but I was surprised the newer research about impact on birds was not mentioned. Similarly unmentioned was the use of flow devices to control problematic behavior, which may be a director, rather than a researcher, omission. Finally I went looking for more information on her position on native fish and beavers, because I wasn’t sure how she accounted for the fact that we used to have a lot more of both. I found this paper which I’m still working through.

I will say I was especially intrigued by her interest in researching the social attitudes and impact of beavers…. Lisa! Have we ever got a story for you…

Baby needs new shoes…

heidi08 pictures February 24, 2009

A beaver friend mentioned an upcoming poker game recently and I had to go hunting for this picture, posted by Oceancity 11 and titled “Beavers playing poker at the National Zoo.” I’m actually pretty sure beavers would be horrible poker players. Aside from their unreliable counting skills, they are almost entirely sincere. A beaver dealt two queens would definitely brag to everyone at the table. Although their small eyes might make them somewhat hard to read at close quarters, its hard to imagine them bluffing at all.

(Leave the deceit to the humans, I guess).

I just really like this photo. These beavers have clearly chosen their audience and it isn’t bipedal: trapped in concrete with a sea of looking eyes, they look of course at each other instead. Their disinterest in humans is one of the things I appreciate most about them.

Still, its possible they’re not playing poker. It could also be a post World War II photo of generals dividing up Europe. Party leaders working on a new Southern Strategy? Or maybe evil master minds plotting for world domination…”Lets start with that refinery city named after a cocktail. Then we can fan out and take over from there.”