News from Washington…

heidi08 Beavers September 16, 2012

Somebody must have forgotten that the new role of media is apparently to repeat and inflame and never evaluate the accuracy of the rumors it reprints. They mistakenly assumed their job was to do some “actual journalism”, (cold research and statistic laden fact-checking) instead! Shocking development in this day and age, but good for us. (I’m sure the offending outliars at the Washington Post will be fired in the morning.) In the mean time we should enjoy our good fortune because this could save a few thousand beavers’ lives. Pass it on:

Got rabid beaver fever? Remain calm

The country’s largest rodents hadn’t made news in the D.C. area since a rogue beaver munched iconic Tidal Basin cherry trees in 1999. Then last week, rabid beavers attacked twice in four days in Fairfax County, mauling a swimmer and chasing children on a dock. Those attacks followed one in New York last month and three in Philadelphia last year. Are area beavers running amok?

Probably not, said Julia Murphy, Public Health Veterinarian for Virginia. She has not seen more rabies cases than usual this year. The East Coast, particularly the Mid-Atlantic region, does report more rabid animals than any other region in the country, but Murphy said that’s because we have the most people. Animals are usually tested only when there is reason to think people have been exposed to disease, and in large population centers, people and wild animals practically live on top of each other. No one notices a rabid animal who dies in a rural forest, but when one terrorizes kids in Springfield, it gets our attention. We kill it, test it, report it — and it becomes a statistic.

Outstanding reporting from Bonnie Berkowitz and Patterson Clark at The Washington Post. Thank you very much for putting an alarming issue in context. Send this article to your aunt or co-worker who keeps sending you those ‘ rabid beaver’ emails, and do NOT let anyone tell you that beavers are a threat.

Oh and about those cherry trees….Remember my accidental discovery of the “ Paddles the beaver” button from the Cherry Blossom Festival in DC? Well I must have written NPS about it because I got an email this weekend from a ranger at the park who thought our website was amazing and was happy we were saving beavers. He said that the buttons were so popular they were nearly sold out before the festival, but that he had a few left and would be sending them our way.

One of course will be for ME and my ‘rabid’ pursuit of all things beaver. But maybe the rest are silent auction items? Here’s further proof of the old adage that if you’re not nuts about beavers by now, you’re really not “Worth A Dam”.

beaver peanut family — Inspired by the fact that a beaver kit is shaped exactly like a peanut. (Peppercorn nose, lentil ears, black mustard seed eyes and pumpkin seed tail set in macaroni noodle.)

Sign my yearbook?

heidi08 Beavers September 15, 2012

The summer issue of Beaversprite, (the quarterly newsletter of Beavers: Wetlands & Wildlife), reads like the class yearbook of that school where you really had a lot of friends and wanted to remember every single one. There is a lovely account of Lega Medcalf and her beaver festival in Maine. There’s a fierce account of Anita Utas and the beaver drama in Ottawa. A cover of the Amherst tale where beavers were saved from trapping for eating memorial trees. And an excellent article from Susan Rolleri, that I met through the beaver management forum, the environmental grad student that worked with Mike Callahan on a flow device installation.

What we need are a thousand more Susans, interested in studying beavers all across the united states and canada. If you aren’t already receiving this very ‘who’s who’ informative newsletter, you become a member and support a great cause for 20 dollars a year by signing up here.

And the reason I know we need a better spread of beaver knowledge and recognition across this hemisphere, is that THIS is the cover photo for this mornings Ottawa Citizen article describing beavers as the founding father of Canada.

The Canadian beaver: our nation’s forefather

Those teeth make our beaver an industrious tree-feller and dam-builder.

Sigh.

In addition to not being a photo of a beaver, the article does not describe a single important environmental contribution of the beaver. Not that they build and maintain wetlands that filter toxins, raise the watertable, help and sustain wildlife, and improve the density and diversity of fish populations. The article doesn’t mention that beaver chewed trees coppice triggering a dense, bushy regrowth that increases the ideal nesting habitat for migratory and songbirds. It doesn’t note that when beavers were trapped off the landscape the entire continent changed and became less hospitable and productive.

Well, what should we expect from a news source that offers a close-up of a woodchuck and suggests it gnaws down trees with those pointy incisors?

Resignation

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Who's Killing Beavers Now? September 14, 2012

I received an email this morning from Donna Dubreuil of the Ottawa-Carlton Wildlife Centre that the wildlife groups working with the city of Ottawa on a ‘wildlife plan’ have resigned and asked that their names not be included in the report.

WILDLIFE ORGANIZATIONS RESIGN FROM OTTAWA’S WILDLIFE STRATEGY WORKING GROUP

Wednesday, September 12, 2012: Wildlife organizations, appointed to help develop a Wildlife Strategy for Ottawa, have resigned in frustration, requesting that their organizations’ names be removed from any final document produced by the city.

Donna DuBreuil, president of the Ottawa-Carleton Wildlife Centre (OCWC) said “we regret having to make this decision because we were instrumental in bringing the proposal for a progressive Wildlife Strategy forward to Council. However, we cannot endorse the Wildlife Strategy Report because it will not change the very negative climate for wildlife in Ottawa and, in fact, further entrench outdated attitudes”.

Liz White, spokesperson for the Ontario Wildlife Coalition (OWC) and a member of the Wildlife Strategy Working Group, has also submitted her organization’s resignation. “I have very serious concerns not only with the substance of the report but the process used. It seems the community organizations were simply used as window dressing and that staff had never any intention of implementing real changes to the status quo, explaining why the process was dragged out for two and a half years,” said White.

The development of a Wildlife Strategy was prompted by Ottawa residents who were angry and embarrassed with the City’s long-standing approach to wildlife in the Nation’s Capital that included shooting moose, trapping beavers and coyotes and gassing groundhogs in neighbourhood parks.

Wow. I am so loathe to have wildlife folks ever ‘leave the table’ because it takes so much work to even be invited to the table in the first place, and almost any influence is better than no influence, but when i read this I understood. I remembered poignantly when our own city was determined to install sheetpile through the beavers lodge and invited me to be on a “Citizen oversight” committee, that couldn’t advise, halt, influence, delay or affect the work in anyway.

I declined.

Donna and Liz outline their concerns clearly:

the on-going trapping and killing of beavers throughout the city
the labelling of wildlife as “nuisances”
the inclusion of lethal trapping or live trapping in combination with euthanasia as options for dealing with “nuisance” wildlife
a large mammal response that remains secretive and unaccountable to the public
demonstration projects to evaluate flow devices where there is no beaver, little water and no
risk and, even if there were, the devices installed have been designed to fail
education and outreach projects that will provide little benefit to the majority of Ottawa residents
the recommendation for the hiring of a Wildlife Biologist at a cost of $100,000 annually to support these questionable endeavours

You can go read the whole thing here, including the secret Rural plan for continuing to kill wildlife that city staff has jokingly referred to as the “Trapper’s Manifesto”. The decision merited nice response from the media which hopefully will continue to shine some uncomfortable light on this issue.

As I said at the time….

More Reasons to Kill Beavers in Virginia

heidi08 Beaver News, Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Who's Killing Beavers Now? September 13, 2012

This latest rabid beaver threat occurred 6 miles from Lake Barcroft where the swimming 83 year old woman was attacked earlier. You can set your watches for how soon the county decides to engage in massive trapping to ‘cure this problem’. I suppose the best possible outcome will be if they restrict themselves to killing all beavers and raccoons in the county, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this went state wide or father if a journalist or administrator spends three minutes on the google and learns about the attack that occurred on the two young swimmers earlier this summer.

Remember any mammal can contract rabies, including beavers, house cats and humans. It’s not nearly as common but it certainly can happen. Sigh. It’s depressing to see this story even made it to the Huffington Post today, I guess everyone likes a good beaver-cujo story. Not me. I think its depressing. I think we should all watch this to cheer ourselves up.

Beavers in Hollywood

heidi08 Beaver Art, Beavers, Friends of Martinez Beavers September 12, 2012

Guess who has won best animated short film in Burbank this weekend? Kentucky’s own Ian Timothy for Beaver Creek Episode 7, that’s who. Here’s what he had to say about the evening on his facebook page where I found out about it:

Beaver Creek was screened in the Burbank International Film Festival and won Best Animated Short Film. The festival was great, Jeff Rector was an incredible host, I got to know animation judge and Disney art director Ed Ghertner. At the Awards Dinner I meet Matthew Senreich(Co-Creator) and Trisha Gum (Director) of Robot Chicken. I also met The Simpsons director Matt Kirkland, 7 time Academy Award winning special effects makeup artist Rick Baker, actor and musician Tim Russ, actor James Hong, NBC weatherman Fritz Coleman and so many more! Thanks to everyone at the festival for all of the encouragement.

Here he is with his beaming parents on the red carpet all dressed up in their sunday best:

And in case you want to be reminded of the winning episode that now has advanced beavers in the home of the most famous rodent in history, here it is:

No shabby accomplishment for a young man who’s still in highschool. Congratulations Ian! This has been an amazing year for you, and the 17 ones that proceeded it weren’t bad either!