Month: December 2010

A Beaver Year In Review

heidi08 Uncategorized January 1, 2011

2010 was a busy year for the Martinez Beavers and their supporters. It’s no stretch of the imagination to say that the network of beaver support spread into a much tighter weave around the country and around the world. Here’s a review of some of our best memories. Click on the story to link to more information.

January 2010:

Worth A Dam helps Burrowing Owls in Pittsburgh

New Species Snipe is photographed at secondary dam.

Trees painted with sand at primary dam.

Lodge under water from flooding

Worth A Dam Logo released.

New Species Fish identified from Green Heron photo

Wood duck boxes installed by eagle scout Mitchel at the secondary dams.

Historic Range of Beaver in California becomes a topic of research.

February 2010:

Worth A Dam spreads its wings at Flyway Festival

Wikipedia page on Flow Devices launched

Historic Prevalence of Beaver Research Group launched

Juvenile Otter uses flow pipe as a “water slide”.

March 2010:

Former editor of gazette, now School of journalism grad student at UCB launches beaver film.

Beavers at Olympic Closing ceremony discussed in Gazette.

Beaver tiles installed at Escobar bridge.

Worth A Dam presents at Moraga Rotary Club.

Chamber of Commerce adds beavers to postcards.

Date announced for new Beaver Festival.

April 2010:

Worth A Dam makes a great impression at John Muir Birthday Earth Day.

Research into early trapping habits discusses “Music to Kill beavers by“.

Libby Corliss designs new map for Martinez Beaver Viewing

May 2010:

Beaver Festival 2010 Approved by city

Worth A Dam at Wild Bird Store exhibition

First viewing of Mike Callahan’s Beaver Solutions Video

Bat population makes itself known at beaver dam.

Two Year Old Comes back

June 2010:

Worth A Dam Presents at Close to Home in Oakland.

Two new kits spotted at Primary Dam

Three Kits spotted

Mom’s condition worsens

Mom beaver dies

Two-year old adopts kits

Dad returns and cares for kits

July 2010:

Kit crosses dam for first time

Metal Sculptures donated by local artist

City agrees to hang sculptures

August 2010:

1000th post on website

Beaver Festival III

Worth A Dam at John Muir Mountain Day Camp

John Muir Laws sketches for Bay Nature at Beaver Dam

September 2010:

Beaver Mural displayed at District School Board

Worth A Dam sends foreign correspondent to Latvia

Beaver Sculptures installed at Escobar Bridge

Martinez Beavers in Bay Nature

Worth A Dam invited to present at Valley of the Moon lecture in Sonoma

October 2010:

Worth A Dam connects with Tahoe beaver advocates

Scott Artis upgrades Worth A Dam Website

Mike Callahan wins JMA business conservation award.

Worth A Dam invited to present at State of the beaver conference in Oregon

November 2010:

Worth A Dam gives first beaver management scholarship to Kings Beach, Tahoe.

Worth A Dam presents at Santa Clara Creeks Conference

Worth A Dam consults with Guadelupe River Parks Conservancy

December 2010:

Worth A Dam convinces NPS site to eliminate mistaken nutria photo.

Worth A Dam hosts field trip for 60 3rd graders.

Hooded Mergansers at Beaver Dam

Worth A Dam asked to present at CA State Parks Conference in Yosemite

Wow. When I write it out that way it looks like a lot. Throw in a daily post and three letters to various editors a week and I guess that explains why I rarely have free time anymore. It’s been a helluva year, y’all. We will miss mom until my fingers cease to type, but lets stick around to see what comes next.

Always an Adventure

heidi08 Friends of Martinez Beavers December 31, 2010

Leave it to Ian By: Cindy Lamb

Ian Timothy, 16, videotapes episodes of Beaver Creek in an attic studio set up at his family’s home. (Photo: brianbohannon.com)

You can almost smell the clay. A putty-like beaver leaps into the thick, blue waves of a stream. Other malleable creatures – a baritone, wide-mouth bass and a sidekick duck – look on, while a banjo plunks along in the background. My olfactory senses take me far from my old canisters of Play-Doh and into a forest floor of pine needles, tooth-marked limbs, cascading water, and mud … not to mention singing animals who buy home improvement products online. Where am I? Beaver Creek.

What a fantastic introduction to our old friend Ian Timothy of Kentucky whose now all of 16. This article is better press than most of us will get in our lifetime, and you can tell its just the beginning for this rising star who loves nature and has a persistent patience that must be awesome to behold. It apparently hooked the author of the article, who will be appearing as the voice of Twig’s ‘mom’ in the next episode.

Upon visiting the attic, I see that the whole set for Beaver Creek is just sitting there on … a door? “It was the door to this room,” Joel confesses, “And we were about to get rid of it when Ian thought it would be a great work table.” So, a door on top of two sawhorses opened itself to a world it never thought possible. Across its 50-year-old frame is the lay of the land for Twigs and friends. Blue water, green trees, brown critters … Ian approaches with the four-inch Twigs character and delivers him into my sweaty, fanatical palm. Soon, a display case of dentures and lips are presented. “This shape is a vowel, this one a consonant,” Ian points out from the array of individual mouth parts.

How entirely appropriate that Ian’s work station is a door. Clearly his clay photographs are magical portals that open up “doors” to as many new realms as he can imagine. And he can imagine a lot. I love seeing the space where ‘Twig’ comes to life and I love that a charismatic young man in Kentucky (I won’t say ‘of all places’ because we have never had a ‘who’s killing beavers now’ entry from the state) champions beavers as the heroes of his epic tale (tail?).

Ian works with dad Joel Timothy in Joel’s basement recording studio, where voices, music and sound effects are added to the production of Beaver Creek. (Photo: brianbohannon.com)

“Ian has always loved nature and animals. For a few years he would ask to go to the zoo almost every day,” Joel {his Dad} recalls. “On many occasions he would go directly to a certain animal, observe it in detail and then say, ‘Okay, we can go home now.’”

A few years later, requests for a video camera were granted on Christmas. “He learned very quickly that the camera could shoot video one frame at a time,” Joel continues. “First, there were amusing little animations of a clay ball rolling across the floor; then there was a piece he called ‘Chuck The Worm,’ in which a clay worm crawls toward a clay apple, chews a hole in the apple and then comes out on the other side. From there, the evolution gets a bit hazy to me. It seems like I blinked and Ian was building a set and starting to create Beaver Creek.”

What a great kid! What a great Dad! What a great description! ‘Blink’ is a fantastic way to describe the necessary and mysterious development that happens with leaps and bounds just beyond the parent’s loving field of vision. Ian grew (and is still growing) into his art. It’s exciting to see it unfold and is obviously exciting to observe up close.

Videotaping Beaver Creek is labor intensive and tedious, and on an average school day, Ian is able to produce only two to four seconds of animation, with each episode taking three to four months to produce. “I usually try to work a few hours after school,” he says. (Photo: brianbohannon.com)

I can’t really remember how I met Ian. I think he sent the first episode of Beaver Creek what seems to be a million years ago. I know I heard from him again when he won the science award for the beaver film. Last year he made a special compilation of all his episodes for the silent auction which was a hit. This year he whispered that Twig might get some new characters and I am excited to see what comes next.

Before the winter thaw, Beaver Creek Episode Six will be released into the mainstream. It is the story of Twigs and Drake going to help Twigs’ parents. Twigs’ dad is played by Will Cary, Twigs’ brother is played by Max Harrington, and the storekeeper is played by Mike Cook. The part of Twigs’ mother is played by yours truly, Cindy Lamb. My entire three lines will provide me with the opportunity to add “castor canadensis” to my studio resume.

Go read the whole article for an uplifting New Years Eve. One more piece of good news: last years bridge tile project was listed in the Tiimes as one of the ‘bright spots’ of 2010. As I recall we were the best ‘Citywide rebranding effort’ of 2009, the best ‘Urban wildlife viewing of 2008’ and the ‘most Unexpected news story’ of 2007. Nice work.

Trapped by Bureaucracy

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere December 30, 2010

The rascally ‘escaped’ Scottish beavers continue to divide the wildlife community. Scottish National Heritage (Independent monitors of the official beaver trial) was responsible for the original idea. But trapping the free beavers is rapidly becoming one of those decisions that no one wants to be associated with. Scottish Wildlife Trust (who’s running the beaver trial) has been trying very hard not to offer an opinion, but several of its workers are open opposed to it and see the wisdom in studying and observing the free colonies as well as the million dollar colonies. The buck is being passed all around and now that they have caught the first beaver they are dangerously close to admitting that there probably isn’t space for all the others in zoos and they might need to be killed.

River Ericht beavers doing well at Edinburgh Zoo

ERIC the Ericht Beaver is “doing well” according to keepers at Edinburgh Zoo but there is confusion as to the future of his relatives with a prominent environmentalist disputing Scottish Natural Heritage’s claim to be capturing and rehoming the outlawed species. SNH has stated that the only acceptable introduction is one sanctioned by Government. Leaving these animals in the wild, it says, “would mean choosing to ignore well-established wildlife legislation… not something SNH, or any other Government organisation, can do”.

So Eric is spending the new year alone in quarantine in some back bin of the Edinburgh Zoo and SNH is spending it likewise alone, busily scrubbing the logos off their vehicles and cocktail napkins to avoid worse press. Paul Ramsay, one of the beavers’ staunchest advocates and owner of the beaver-famous state house in Bamff is coming halfway around the world to attend the State of the Beaver conference to get more information and meet some like minds across the pond. I can’t wait to meet him. You are invited to send Eric some good cheer. Heck, have your 3rd grader or your grandson draw something for him and mail it off. I’m sure if the zoo gets BAGS of mail SNH will be so humiliated that they’ll magically think of a better idea.

In the mean time, the paper is interested in your opinion about what should happen, so go Vote Here tell them that trapping these hardy beavers is ridiculous and a waste of an excellent opportunity to observe the natural effects of reintroduction. And while you’re at it tell them that a single beaver alone without a colony is truly less than HALF A BEE-aver.

News of a Friends Fundraiser: Anne Mobley of White Rabbit sends this press release

Martinez Downtown Retailers Focus Group Raised $1,048 For the Martinez Early Childhood Center

The Downtown Retailers Focus Group had its Second Annual Downtown Christmas Party Fundraiser on Sunday, December 19 at the new Ferry Street Station and this year it was to benefit the Martinez Early Childhood Center (MECC). One Thousand Forty Eight Dollars ($1,048) was raised from the dinner and silent auction.

Big thanks to Tony LoForte of Zio Fraedo’s Restaurant in Pleasant Hill for providing the delicious main meal of Chicken Cordon Bleu, Hal Logan and Holly Burgess for salad and dessert, and the following for donating items for the silent auction: Joyce Cid, Eloise Cotton, Pat Corr, Worth A Dam (Heidi Perryman), Mary Ann Stites (Ambiance Boutique), White Rabbit Boutique, Karen Van Tyle (Wellness 101), Gay Gerlack, Liz Sandovalm & Marty Flores, Hal Logan, Catherine of Beauty Source, and Bill Edgers.

The Martinez Early Childhood Center has been offering quality child care and development since 1974 and serves low-income families with quality, full time child care and development. Parents must be working or in vocational training and are subject to fees according to their income and number of family members. The Center is concerned with meeting the needs of each individual child and their program offers enriched developmentally appropriate curriculum to prepare children for Kindergarten. The program is accredited by the National Association of the Education of Young Children

Worth A Dam donated a ‘his and hers’ tee shirt and bumper sticker to the auction. As a “My God, you live in a small town” aside, I started volunteering at MECC on July 3, 1979 when I was 13. I was hired as soon as I was legal and worked there every day after High School, every long hot summer and during undergraduate. My ten years experience at MECC got me into graduate school and planned much of my life. If the blond woman in the bus doorway looks familiar, it should. That’s Cassie Campbell, now the director, who wore the kilt to help the bagpiper with the children’s procession at the Beaver Festival two years ago. Her husband is the string base player in the Alhambra Valley Band that’s appeared every year. Cassie used to be the director of the infant-toddler program. The second Martinez Beaver story I ever read in the Gazette a million years ago was about her entire class inviting the mayor for a visit to see the beaver lodges children had made out of paper mache. They wore their beaver hats and paper tails, and sang him the beaver chant while thanking him for working hard to save the beavers. Mind you this was before Worth A Dam, before I was involved, and before the November 7, 2007 meeting. It was, I like to think, the beginning of the end for the ‘beaver kill campaign’.

Can’t you just imagine the look on his face?

heidi08 Uncategorized December 29, 2010

“The Road goes ever on and on

Down from the door where it began.

Now far ahead the Road has gone,

And I must follow, if I can,

Pursuing it with eager feet,

Until it joins some larger way

Where many paths and errands meet.

And whither then? I cannot say”

— J.R.R. Tolkien (The Fellowship of the Ring)

Yesterday was my official day off. For the past week I’ve been rushing around with Christmas chores, getting dinner for the parents or things ready for the new calendar year at the office. Soon there will be a Worth A Dam New Years dinner to get organized but yesterday was all my own. And I spent it languidly with my very favorite subject.

In the morning I got an email from a wildlife rehab woman in Illinois who had been contacted by another wildlife friend who had taken in an orphaned beaver at birth. She was looking for some help with socialization and long term placement and did I know anybody?

Gosh. Illinois. My only contacts there were the friends of the Lincoln Park beavers and one benevolent reporter, but I didn’t think they could help. I put out a general APB to all the beaver contacts in the country, and one to Canada for good luck. I figured someone might know someone that could help.

Leonard Houston (who has got to have plenty on his mind with the upcoming State of the beaver conference), nevertheless offered to ask a ‘friend’ in the Chicago area. I didn’t think much of it until last night, when I heard that his ‘friend’ was Donald Hey the keynote speaker of the conference and the co-founder of the Wetlands Initiative.

He also is executive director of Wetlands Research, Inc., which manages the Des Plaines River Wetlands Demonstration Project in Lake County, Illinois, one of the nation’s first large-scale wetland restoration projects. He formerly was president of Hey & Associates, an environmental services consulting firm.

So Dr. Hey wrote Len back and said, I be willing to offer that beaver plenty of wetlands and lots of friends if he’s in good health and the caregiver can take care of the paper work! I wrote back the woman excitedly and heard this morning that they are starting the process to get things moving. Imagine, what better life for a beloved beaver than a trip to the nation’s first large-scale wetlands restoration! It’s like sending your daughter to Stanford. I can imagine the tearful goodbye as the foster-mom camps out at the thawing pond to make sure the little orphan is accepted by a colony. Sniff.

They grow up so fast.

In a second burst of good news I heard from the Tri-State Bird Rescue and spoke to Rebecca Dunne Senior Coordinator of the Oiled Animal program. Remember the beaver dam that stopped the fuel-oil spill in South Carolina? She was concerned about the beavers based on what she read and had not been contacted by any local agencies. She said that number 2 fuel oil is so toxic that the fumes make the beavers ‘drunk’ before they even exit the lodge. They have an immediate reaction and are frequently observed acting erratically. (Which is logical, given what a huge neural load their olefactory sense carries – the greatest proportion.) She said she would make a few phone calls to the wildlife agencies involved, but couldn’t jump in without being asked. I said I understood and encouraged her to contact the city who may not have any idea of the risk to these beavers.

I’ll send the info to the reporter and city engineer and see what I can do. Then it’s off to make shortbread beaver cookies for dessert at the fourth annual Worth A Dam Ravioli feast.

One last thing, Eric the beaver is sitting in a Scottish prison with no family this New Years. Why don’t you send him some good cheer?

If your house is as windy as mine is this morning, you might enjoy this.

Defying History

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, History, Who's Killing Beavers Now? December 28, 2010

This Christmas Eve the Daily Iberian in Louisiana published another head-scratching WTF article. In it we learn that in addition to being considered a ‘nuisance animal’ by the State Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, beavers are ‘not native‘ to the region and have ‘no natural predators’!

Big, bad beavers are wreaking havoc on drainage channels in Iberia Parish, said Public Works Director Kevin Hagerich. Not indigenous to the area, beavers have started appearing here in the past several years, Hagerich said. “It seems to be getting worse every spring,” said Public Works Supervisor Herman Broussard. “They don’t have too many natural predators down here.”

Lets take those points one at a time, shall we? Beavers aren’t native in Louisiana? Umm…what do you think all those French people were doing there in the 1700’s? and 1800’s? They came down from Quebec looking for something. I wonder what it might have been?

The French in Canada, relying less and less on Indians to serve as middlemen, spread rapidly into the interior of the country, where fur-bearing animals were plentiful. Father Jacques Marquette and Louis Joliet, a fur trader, reached the Mississippi River in 1673. The Sieur de La Salle followed them a few years later, in 1682 reaching the mouth of the river and claiming the entire Mississippi Valley for France. La Salle planned to found a colony in Louisiana, as he had named the region, to control river traffic and keep a monopoly for France on the fur trade there. His plans were carried out after his death, and New Orleans was founded in 1718, cutting off the British from use of the Lower Mississippi. Fur Trade

So the French came down the middle and the English came down the coast across and the Dutch came across the Hudson and Louisiana itself wouldn’t have been worth fighting over if it wasn’t for beavers. It was a big greedy free-for-all where destruction of several native peoples was just an incidental bonus in the pursuit of wealth. I’m going to go out on a limb here, boys and say if the entire economy of New Orleans was based on the beaver fur-felt hat industry circa 1750 then we can assume that beavers were native to the area.

Let’s move on to the pesky predator issue. Last time I checked the state still had a whole mess of these:

smile! — Alligator Everglades: Photo Heidi Perryman

Turns out they live the same place beavers do! They have a pair of the most powerful jaws on the continent! And they eat meat! They can even hold their breath a whole lot longer than a beaver, which has zero defenses against them! Whew, that must be a relief.

Now as for beavers being a ‘nuisance species’, I really can’t argue with that. They can create a ‘nuisance’. Small, narrow minds focused on short term solutions can find them an awful nuisance. They build dams and chew trees and generally change things. I bet a smart parish like Iberia, however, could be smarter than an actual beaver. You could install flow devices, protect culverts and wrap trees. Then your ‘nuisance species’ could improve your water quality, increase your fish populations, raise bird count and provide essential wetlands for wildlife and a much needed buffer for your coastline. It would be like an investment. Sometimes a ‘nuisance’ pays off.

Just one more thing. Since you seem kinda confused about history, you do know what your state was named after right?