Right here in River-City

heidi08 Creek Seekers Poetry Contest May 27, 2009

2009 River of Words Youth Poetry & Art Contest
Creek Seeker Grand Prize

Misunderstood

In a sacred place, a creek is alive,
Shallow, murky, moving water.
A water-strider walks along the water.
“Look closely, follow our movements,” the green water whispers.
A misplaced turtle bobs up and down, swimming gracefully.
Its striped shell and red head floats near the surface and then disappears.
Ripples spread over and over again, like a never-ending secret.
A wilted tulip drifts by.
Water springs out creating unforgettable ripples.

And if you look closely, you can see the copper glow of pennies, the
creek hopelessly misunderstood for a fountain. Dead leaves drift upon the
water.

The turtle observes this silently.

While the only spectator in the creek is Abe Lincoln’s copper face.

Caroline María Woods-Mejía, age 12
Berkeley, California
Poetry Inside Out
Teacher: John Oliver Simon

Tickets √

Lunches √

Beaver Video √

Projector √

Screen √

Speakers √

Presents for contest winners √

Tables for lunch in no-name park √

Thank you tshirt for Armando’s √

Losing my mind√

Flurry

heidi08 Beaver News, Creek Seekers Poetry Contest, Educational, Environmental, kits May 26, 2009

After the thrill of good news that we were the proud guardians of four baby beavers in Alhambra creek Once Again, there was a lot of work to be done. Linda rolled up her metaphorical sleeves and started chatting beavers with the media, which I’m sure you heard a little something about. Cheryl has been devotedly at the dam site trying to capture photos of our elusive quartet, and I have been avidly making and launching video, updating the website (In the past 24 hours we’ve had 2000 page views and web traffic from all over) and returning emails to folks who saw the story, and wanted to be involved.

Photo: Cheryl Reynolds 2008

This beloved picture is from last years brood, and I just received a copy of its appearance in the teacher’s edition of the Califonia Education and the Environment Initiative, “surviving and thriving” science curriculum which will be distributed to every 1st grade teacher in the state. Looking at this picture you can see why Cheryl should be given ample opportunity to be photographing the next generation. (So if you want to help out, go have drinks at Left Bank and tip her enormously so she can have more free time!)

Some wrote to complain that beavers should be exterminated and no city should have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on sheetpile “to protect them”. ARGGGHHH!!!! I don’t even react to the beavers-are-rodents-kill-them arguments anymore, but the sheetpile mythology makes makes my teeth hurt. Lets try this once more. The sheetpile wall was not built to protect the beavers. In fact, beaver supporters took the city to court to stop it, spent a great deal of money and time to fight it, and lost. The sheetpile wall was not even built to protect the bank, because historical photographs show us that there is another sheetpile wall directly behind it.

The sheetpile wall was built to protect the city’s relationship with a very important property owner. Period. Next question. Allow me to welcome any new visitors curious about this issue by inviting you to look at this video.

[youtube:http://youtube.com/watch?v=rQefxDQemaA]

In the middle of this very busy beaver drama, we are trying to get ready for Wednesday’s creek seekers express visit. Martinez is hosting 50 visitors who will arrive on Amtrak, eat lunch and tour the habitat, and then come to Armando’s for a talk on the watershed by Igor Skaredoff, and a talk on the beavers by me. I’m still madly trying to add last minute footage to the powerpoints, and make arrangements for whose picking up lunches, drinks, and reminding the city to turn off the sprinklers. i’m fairly certain I have the basic talking points down pat, but there will be media and significant environmental players in attendance, so I want to make sure my beaver pitch is tuned to its most convincing

Congratulations also to Chuck who is the winner of our “baby pool”. Along with 9 others he guessed that mom would have four kits, and his name was drawn at random. He will be getting a Worth A Dam tshirt and the envy of all his neighbors. If you’d like a tshirt of your very own, drop us a line or come see us June 7th at the REI environmental fair.

Once we just get through wednesday then we can worry about the following week, when we have tree planting, a beaver class and REI to keep us busy….

Creek Cove Hides Baby Beavers

News10.net – ‎14 hours ago‎

Four new beaver kits were spotted in a downtown Martinez creek, bringing the colony to a total of nine beavers, a spokeswoman for the beaver advocacy group …

Four More Baby Beavers Spotted In Martinez Creek

CBS 5 – ‎15 hours ago‎

Read more in our Privacy Policy A baby beaver, like the ones found in Martinez. AP Four new beaver kits have been spotted in Alhambra creek in downtown …

KCBS

Four Beaver Kits Spotted in Martinez Creek

KCBS – ‎15 hours ago‎

MARTINEZ, Calif. (KCBS) — Four new beaver kits have been spotted in Alhambra creek in downtown Martinez, bringing the colony to a total of nine beavers, …

MARTINEZ: FOUR BEAVER KITS SPOTTED IN ALHAMBRA CREEK

CBS 5 – ‎16 hours ago‎

Four new beaver kits have been spotted in Alhambra creek in downtown Martinez, bringing the colony to a total of nine beavers, a spokeswoman for the beaver …

Martinez Beaver Family Adds 4 Fuzzy Babies

NBC Bay Area – ‎16 hours ago‎

Four new beaver kits have been spotted in Alhambra creek in downtown Martinez, bringing the colony to a total of nine beavers, a spokeswoman for the beaver …

Baby beavers born near downtown Martinez

KGO-TV – ‎16 hours ago‎

A video from a beaver advocacy group Worth A Dam shows four new kits, or baby beavers, in Alhambra Creek. That brings to the total number of beavers living …

NEWS FLASH

heidi08 Beaver News, Creek Seekers Poetry Contest, kits May 30, 2009

Confirmed sighting of FOUR new kits near the lodge. Footage here from Moses Silva.Have a cigar, Martinez. It’s a beaver!

Christening Party at the beaver dam and everyone’s invited! Worth A Dam’s core gathered at the water last night to see if it was really true. We were treated to a beaver display of grand proportions, Mom, Dad, three yearlings and two very persistent muskrats. There were even two tail slaps by Dad, although we never figured out what he was warning about.

Stalwart and intrepid videographer, Moses Silva, sought us out bearing a camera brimming with news. In the wee hours of the morning he had donned waders and strode through the water to find four new kits in a cove near the beaver dam. He filmed them with a flashlight taped to his camera. They had obviously been left outside in a protected area to get used to their surroundings. Click on the video above to see what he saw.

The group was giddy and celebratory. After all the “sheet” these beavers have been through this year, we wondered if there would even be kits, or if there would only be a few. Instead there is photographic evidence that there are four chubby and healthy little fuzzballs. In the video you can see them practicing grooming and nuzzling each other. Their teeth are very prominent, possibly because they haven’t yet started gnawing much to wear them down.

For those of you keeping track at home, this brings our current colony total to 9: two adults, three yearlings, and four new kits. Somewhere out there are two dispersers trying to set up life on their own. That makes a total of 9 healthy offspring mom and dad have brought into the world, and I got to watch. The notion that this is the third time I’ve been here makes me a little misty-eyed.

What better way to welcome wednesday’s creek-seekers train journey than with brand new babies?

I thought our old city manager retired?

heidi08 City Reports May 24, 2009

[youtube:http://youtube.com/watch?v=FCVELy0U4Ro]

Memorial

heidi08 Beaver News, Environmental May 23, 2009

My all time favorite memorial weekend (so far) happened a couple years ago. We were in the sierras and took a drive up to the lake and were crowded with people who had driven up from the valley with their hopeful bathing suits and floaty devices. There were boats and picnics and beach towels at the ready. All of the sudden the towering broken mountain behind the lake shook her shoulders and called in massive cloud cover. There was a patter of rain, and then it started snowing heavily.

There were squeals and swear words and some claps of snow thunder. All the floaties and the swimsuits and the boats packed up and flew down to lower elevations. We were left there in the silence, with only a chorus of very confused frogs croaking at the falling lace. The weirdly sudden freeze snatched all the fallen water into heavy crystals and soon their were giant chandelier dangles at the ends of branches. It was truly a memorial.

Not to be outdone, last night brought a flurry of beaver activity to the dams. First there were conversations with strangers who wanted to know what the “cage-like thing was” in the water (OHHHHHHHH beloved interpretive sign, whence comest thou?) and then some very familiar beaver-fan faces. One kit (yearling, I must call them yearlings, sniff) was out by 8:00 pm and had developed a new habit of taking food into the hidey-hole on the other side of the creek. By 8:30 all three of them were in proud display, and mom came from time to time to get reeds for bedding.

Our yearlings are soo much bigger now, but there is one that’s still small. Maybe 45 lbs and 35 respectively? I did get a good look at mom’s right eye, which contines to look affected. Yesterday I sent cheryl’s photos to a beaver vet tech in New York who will be passing them along to the vet. One thing she wanted to know is if it was the same eye (yes) and if any of the other beavers were affected (no). It was nice to get great views of everyone last night, feeding, wrestling, and reaching for branches, so we could check all pairs.

The very badly bitten muskrat made an appearance and snagged a charity fennel bulb from the dam. Have you seen this little guy? A huge chunk was taken out of him and has since healed. I can’t imagine it was a beaver, because whatever it was he obviously got away from, and I that must mean it was something stuck on land and he managed to pull away and dive. It’s amazing he was able to survive. Last night we all held our breath at his fennel audacity, because of course two yearlings immediately started following him. He dove into the cove and they dove after him and we listened very closely but couldn’t hear cartoon scuffle noises, so I guess he did okay and the risk was worth it.

It was a delightful almost summer beaver evening. What better way to launch memorial day weekend than a visit the beaver dam? You never know what might happen.