Month: March 2013

Beaver Melodrama

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Who's Killing Beavers Now? March 21, 2013

Do you ever see those old time black and white movie reels with piano accompaniment where there’s a hero that’s incredibly saintly, and a villain with a black mustache that usually ties a helpless damsel to the rail road tracks? (I’m not sure what the fascination was for killing girls with trains…You would never kill boys with trains. I’m sure there were an array of other weapons around, guns, knives, hammers… and the train would still kill her if she was standing UP, but I guess train tracks and supine women make a nicer visual for all those stirring loins.)

Anyway, believe it or not, those melodramatic tales are retold on the beaver stage today.

Hero beavers of Willard Bay spill on mend at wildlife center

Two beavers, perhaps siblings, are being hailed as the heroes of the diesel fuel spill at Willard Bay State Park, but the dams they created that slowed the spill from reaching the reservoir also led to their being saturated in the toxic substance.

The beavers, thought to be yearlings, were captured by emergency-response workers and Utah Division of Wildlife Resources conservation officer Mitch Lane on Tuesday morning and delivered to the Wildlife Rehabilitation Center of Northern Utah in Ogden.

This is apparently the third time in as many years that a leaking pipe line from Chevron has gifted the state of Utah, this time in Willard Bay state park, which has forced evacuation of much of the area including the Great Salt Lake. They are worried the Diesel will get into the reservoir, but particularly grateful that it was slowed by a certain heroic beaver dam.

Diesel is nasty, nasty stuff and even after a loving cleaning by the volunteers, one of the beavers isn’t doing so well at the moment. All our fingers are crossed for his recovery. And for selection of a shiny new diesel-free territory to release in. And that no family members were left behind. If you want to support the Ogden Wildlife rehab efforts (and beaver rescue in particular) you can donate here.

Now for the villain part of our piece:

Sherwood Park resident eager to get rid of crape myrtle-eating beaver; thinks rodent lives in underground sewer

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — The sight of a beaver waddling across her side yard both startled and relieved Mary Dyer. Her Sherwood Park home is nowhere near a pond or creek, so there was no reason to expect the instinctive dam-builder on her property. But at least it explained why all eight of her crape myrtles had disappeared down to the stumps.

“I was thinking there were some kids in the neighborhood testing out a new hatchet or something, Dyer said. “So that’s good to know, that that wasn’t happening.”

Ahh Alabama, where kids really could be testing out a new hatchet or something. And where FEMA awards hundreds of thousands of dollars to the the drought stricken land. And where I just got a snotty email from the man responsible for killing geese and beavers in Pell county because he “expected more understanding from someone with my education”.

Well apparently since there are no beavers, and no streams, lost dispersers are forced to live in the sewer system, which I suppose is fine until you meet an alligator.

There are no natural creeks in Sherwood Park, a 50-year-old subdivision off Old Madison Pike near Research Park Boulevard. But there is a large network of underground storm drains. And if you think a beaver living in a sewer is a sad existence, you haven’t heard the worst of it.

Turns out beavers occupying storm drains is fairly common, especially as man and nature continue to encroach upon another. Chris Keenum, owner of Keenum’s Problem Wildlife Control in Hartselle, said it’s a regular occurrence to see beavers building dens in storm drains each spring.

Of course Chris would be the go-to quote for the vexing tale of beavers. I especially enjoy his dog-eat-dog (well beaver-eat-beaver) account of how viciously the animals treat one another, (ostensibly so that human reaction doesn’t look cruel by comparison).

“Well, before the mother gives birth, she has to get rid of the kits that are already there. Usually when they’re 2 years old. She’ll bite them and do whatever she has to do to kick them out.”

The young brothers and sisters generally will venture out together and try to settle on the fringes of their parents’ home. Most of the time, however, that territory already belongs to another beaver, who takes a dim view of freeloaders in his self-built pond and fights off the young visitors. This pattern can continue repeatedly until the beaver finds a safe haven far away from established beaver homes, Keenum said.

Welcome to the sewer. Keenum recently caught a beaver with 21 bite marks received from rough encounters. “It looked like two beavers had held him down and two other beavers had beat up on him,” he said.

Or maybe like the neighbors dog had terrorized the poor disperser when he had no place to call home. Sheesh. Why do reporters ask for quotes from trappers? Its like asking inmates for quotes about the legal system. I’m sure they know SOMETHING about the law, but it probably shouldn’t be a reporters first choice.

In 1978, refuge officials intentionally released more than 50 alligators to gobble up excessive beavers. That didn’t solve the problem, so now rangers spend countless hours dynamiting the dams or breaking them up with heavy equipment. Sometimes, they are back a few days later doing it again after the busy beavers rebuild.

Nice. But this is my favorite part.

“The Humane Society of United States actually recommends euthanizing them,” Abernathy said. “We try to relocate them when we can.”

Yes, that crazy humane society. Always out recommending killing beavers. Remind me to send this to John Hadidian.

Luxurious

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental, Festival March 20, 2013

Some days I feel like I am scrambling to chip out beaver news from an already depleted quarry, grateful for a handful of pebbles I can string together incoherently. And some days I definitely get the feeling that everything is handed to me on a silver platter and all I have to do is savor and share.

Like this picture, sent yesterday by Mary O’brien of the Grand Canyon Trust. Don’t laugh at these boys with beaver on a leash because if it wasn’t for their hard work fixing the damage of the fur trade we wouldn’t have any beavers at all. I love their ruddy faces and the beavers complete impatience for the photo shoot. We won’t complain about a hard strap around their middle because its at least wayyy better than dropping them out of airplanes in a box.

Good excuse to repost this:

But wednesdays are full of riches around here, and yesterday when I was reading rather indignantly the dissertation that said flow devices don’t work I was checking out her references for this fact and came upon a researcher from Alberta I hadn’t encountered before who listed among his many publications, this recent one.

Potential Conservation Benefits of Wildlife Festivals

by Glen T. Hvenegaard

Wildlife festivals promote a variety of social, educational, economic, recreational, and community development goals. As ecotourism activities, wildlife festivals should also promote conservation goals. This article examines five potential conservation benefits of wildlife festivals which can be generated by providing: 1) incentives to establish protected areas; 2) revenue for wildlife and habitat management; 3) economic impact to nearby areas, encouraging residents to conserve wildlife; 4) alternatives to other uses that cause more environmental damage; and 5) support for conservation by educating local and nonlocal participants. The discussion includes wildlife festival examples, along with research and management needs.

The amazing thing about reading this paper is that all these schemes, efforts, and strategems we made up out of our own exhausted brains are actually commonly employed methods for using eco-tourism to promote conservation. Who knew?

Wildlife festivals are short-term celebrations of local natural wildlife features. They attract mostly local and regional visitors, and offer a variety of social, recreational, and educational activities.

From an organizational perspective, wildlife festivals are open to the public (Lawton & Weaver, 2010) and usually offer activities such as guided walks, presentations, birding competitions, wildlife carving competitions, children’s crafts, and trade shows (Hartley, 2005). Most wildlife festivals attract a few hundred visitors, although attendance can range from a few dozen to several thousand.

I cannot tell you what it feels like to read a recipe that so clearly spells out how to make a dish you thought you invented. I don’t say that in a proprietary way, but rather in the way someone who stayed awake all night reading War and Peace for a test might react when their friend tells them the next day that there’s a movie. We’ve been reinventing the wheel without even understanding the term ‘wheel’!

I got a kick out of reading how much money other festivals require and generate, and also how many were than one day so that folks stayed over in an area and spent more money. But I was especially impressed with this list:

Check out how many of those festivals are for fur-bearing mammals. (That would be none.) Note how many of them are for animals of the feathered variety. The Martinez Beaver Festival is apparently a frickin’ unicorn.

This is my very favorite part of the article in directions for future research.

How is burnout of organizers and volunteers managed?

Now, for those of you following on at home, this was published in 2011 and is from the science department at the Augustana campus at the University of Alberta. Where Dr. Glynnis Hood is also a professor. In February of that year she attended a conference where yours truly presented on the Beaver Festival for the first time. Coincidence?

Kentucky Gold

heidi08 Friends of Martinez Beavers, Video March 19, 2013

Ian update:

The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards 2013 national winners were announced today. This year I won a Gold Medal for my film Day Shift, a Silver Medal for All My Dreams music video, and a Silver Medal for my whole portfolio. Day shift also won an American Visions Award, and a Best In Grade award. The national ceremony is in May at Carnegie Hall in New York City and for the first time will be streamed live online. Scholastic has been a huge part of my life in the last four years, and I thank everyone at the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers for their support and encouragement.

Congratulations Ian. And have a blast at Carnegie Hall. (Again.) Worth A Dam is so enormously proud of you. With about two months left to go on your senior year, the world is definitely your oyster. Whether you end up at Cal Arts or SCAD in the fall your professors will soon be scrambling to take credit for what is certain to be an awesome career of varied and inspiring achievements. I’m so grateful our paths crossed.

It seems like only yesterday that I was thrilled to discover this for the first time.

Beavers: Marginally better than pollution

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Environmental, Recent Sightings March 18, 2013

Apparently the best city based pre-beaver campaign isn’t education or widespread information about solutions. It years and years of horrible, toxic, pollution supplied by endless factories to multiple riverbeds in a region so that the river itself becomes so wretched and inhospitable to life that when hardy beavers actually move in, they we briefly welcomed as champions.

First the Bronx, then Chernobyl, and now this:

Yes, beaver making a comeback along Detroit, Rouge rivers

The return of the native creature was heralded in early 2009 after perhaps a century without seeing any evidence of beaver in Detroit. A beaver was spotted having built a lodge at the DTE Conners Creek power plant. He moved on during that summer, but in November of that year was spotted having returned with a family.

Now there is fresh evidence that the beaver are multiplying along several points of the Detroit and Rouge rivers and might be making a sustained comeback in the city, said John Hartig, a manager with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He said evidence of beaver has been found at the Conners Creek plant in Detroit, the River Rouge plant and other points.

“They could be expanding their range,” he said.

Ahhh how Nice. Okay, mark your calendars and set your clocks, because as encouraging as this article is I predict it will be a matter of months before we start reading stories about neighborhoods with blocked culverts and chopped trees. Folks are excited when beavers come BACK to an area because they assume it means they did very good things to make it possible. Hughlet Hornbeck once explained to me that the beavers coming back to Alhambra Creek was proof that EBRP had been doing the right thing for 50 years, for example.

That may be a little bit true. We may make efforts to stop ruining things and take the necessary steps to turn things around. But lets be honest and admit the beavers are the ones who actually make things better!

Then industrial pollution in the mid-20th Century made the Detroit River too toxic for beaver and many other species to return. The cleanup of the river in recent decades has seen many species making a comeback.

“This is one piece of evidence,” Hartig said of the latest beaver sighting. “But if you add in there the return of lake sturgeon, the return of lake whitefish, the return of walleye, the return of bald eagles, peregrine falcons, osprey, beaver, wild celery, it’s one of the most dramatic ecological recovery stories in North America.”

Beavers are still exciting enough along the Detroit River that the reporter does an excellent job researching their history and providing context. Go check out the article and read what good beaver reporting looks like. Enjoy it while it lasts though, because in the blink of an eye they’ll be reporting that gangs of four foot tall beavers cut down all the trees and caused tularemia.

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Also, this morning I was sent an recent dissertation looking at the genetic diversity of the American beaver population, which apparently is ‘dam’ ‘hardy. (Color me surprised!) I’m still gleaning to see if it addresses subspecies, but in the meantime you can check it out for youself online here.

And the newly named Dr. Karla Pelz Serrano should definitely be in touch! Beaver festival Arizona anyone?

Selecting a Surrogate Species

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions March 17, 2013

Since this was posted 6 months ago by a federal agency with thousands of employees and offices in all 50 states, but still has only 141 views, we can assume that Fish & Wildlife has mixed feelings about asking for public input on this important topic. Never mind. They got some.

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If we were assigned to select an ideal species that could be used to represent a myriad of others, it would be important to choose an animal whose impact is felt equally closely on the land, in the air, and under the water. Theoretically it should have as large an effect on birds and frogs as it has on fish and invertebrates. This ecological ‘everyman’ would be robust to the dramatic effects of climate change, and maybe even help combat its deadly droughts. Ideally the animal would leave convenient clues to its presence that were easy to observe any time of day, and be sure to draw enough attention to itself through its charismatic (and even challenging behaviors), so that everywhere children and adults would be determined to learn more about the animal.

Enter the beaver.

Of course this ‘ideal’ nominee already exists, and its rebounding population is proof of its dramatic capacity for robust adaption. Beavers are a keystone species that were brought back from near extinction after the fur trade nearly extinguished their influence on the landscape forever. An explosion of research in recent years has documented their dramatic impact on birds, fish (especially salmon and steelhead), frogs, riparian borders, water-tables, and biodiversity. In fact, it has been argued that no other animal has as great a restorative impact on the watershed as the beaver.

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You can read the rest here, where I talk about the beaver and its importance to our community, but on this particular Sunday morning, maybe you’ve had enough of reading Heidi? Maybe its time to let some other voices talk about the importance of beavers?

Selecting Beavers as a Surrogate Species would contribute to many components of the Strategic Habitat Conservation (SHC) approach. Beaver dams and wetlands are natural and efficient Conservation Designs and their continuing activity contributes Conservation Delivery for free, on a landscape level. And beaver dams, ponds, and chewings provide easily visible Outcome Based Monitoring.

In our Lake Tahoe area, beavers are also critical for water quality. Their dams filter sediments and pollutants from streams and help prevent further decline of Tahoe’s world-renowned clarity. In this era of Climate Change, the water-storage and water-replenishing provided by beavers is ever more important. In the Tahoe and Truckee area, the only green and watered natural areas at the end of last year’s dry season were where there were active beaver colonies.

Sherry Guzzy: Sierra Wildlife Coalition – Tahoe, CA

I will not endeavor, in this writing, to enumerate the myriad benefits of beavers’ natural and instinctive behaviors to the riparian and wetland landscapes they inhabit, as I trust you are in possession of ample data from other sources. I would, however, suggest that review of all available research and observation clearly leads to the conclusion that within the context of their natural habitat(s), Beavers are, by far, the best candidates for the “surrogate species approach” to strategic conservation, satisfying three of the key definitions, as “umbrella”, “flagship”, and “indicator” species.

Let’s not miss this golden opportunity to recognize beavers for their instinctive vital (and tireless) contribution to the health of a planet beleaguered, threatened, and disregarded by the machine of irresponsible shortsighted “development”.

Glen Smith: Musician & Wildlife photographer – San Francisco, CA

Please place beavers in the surrogate species category for their protection, and most importantly for the benefit of ecosystem health and survival of many other species, especially critically endangered birds and amphibians. Beaver-constructed habitats create food and water resources not only for local species, but also those which migrate. The wildlife attracted to beavers’ well-maintained dams and ponds are critical for the survival of larger species, too, which depend on smaller species to survive. The importance of beaver engineering cannot be underestimated, also, to mitigate flood and drought made more extreme by climate change, and its anticipated impacts on wildlife in the present and future. This definition of beavers is simply common sense, and long overdue. Help make your local ecosystems resilient by defining beavers as they are, a surrogate species, which is necessary for its local ecosystem health and a great variety of species survival.

Jo Marshall, Children’s author of ‘Twig stories’ – Seattle, WA

Please grant the Beaver (Castor canadensis) status as a Surrogate Species. Probably no other animal is as useful in its support of MULTIPLE species and no other animal CREATES AS MUCH NATURAL HABITAT for them. By protecting the Beaver we get the most bang for our buck because s/he is a natural ally in our efforts to achieve comprehensive conservation. If we make the Beaver a Surrogate Species, they will do the job we would otherwise have to do…and do it with almost no help from us! Please act now.

Kira Od: Sculptor – Sunnyvale, CA

As a citizen who is concerned about the integrity of natural systems and encouraging the peaceful coexistence of humans with wildlife, especially in developed areas, I am writing to urge FWS to list the American beaver (Castor canadensis) as a Surrogate Species in its Technical Guidance on Selecting Species for Design of Landscape-scale Conservation.

The challenges that are posed when beaver activity comes in conflict with human desires for land use are relatively easy to solve and offer good lessons in problem-solving skills, providing a model for learning to coexist with other wildlife. While the beaver may not be large physically, positive cultural associations with it mean that it looms large in the minds of many. Plus, if left undisturbed, beavers tend to stay at a given location for a long period of time, so they have longevity, if this is considered over multiple generations.

Finally, the work that beavers do to keep high water levels and maintain wetlands in the upper reaches of watersheds–work that would cost hundreds of thousands of dollars were humans to attempt to replicate it–is invaluable as we come to grips with the effect of climate change on the resources and ecosystem services upon which we all depend. FEMA recognizes the drought conditions that are being visited upon a growing portion of the country every year as natural disasters–meaning that more and more federal funding is being spent providing assistance to farmers, ranchers and neighborhoods affected by drought. Why not save some of this money by letting beavers populate streams largely unmolested and do what they do best–build dams to save water upstream for the benefit of humans, crops and livestock as well as other wildlife? DC

Malcolm Kenton, National Association of Railroad Passengers -Washington D.C.

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You realize of course whose comments are still missing?

Yours.

There are eleven more days for you to convince Fish and Wildlife that beavers are the species that takes care of our wildlife and wetlands and salmon and birds and frogs. You don’t have to be a biologist or a great writer. You don’t have to research the subject for hours. Pipe-fitter, retailer or math teacher, if you are even an occasional reader of this website you should know everything you need to recommend them. Beavers have done and continue to do so much for us, won’t you lend them your voice? You can send your comments here.

Oh and could this be a bigger coincidence? Comments close the day AFTER this amazing film airs in Canada. Who else thinks everyone at Fish and Wildlife should take a mandatory road trip?