Month: June 2013

Surrounded by beavers

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, kits, Video, Why We Care June 10, 2013

Yesterday was weirdly windy as the weather transitioned from hot to cold in a decidedly unsummerlike fashion. I know our windows were rattling and debris was rolling down the streets. When we went down to see the beavers that night we discovered they had had their own little “windfall”. At first we thought a beaver had probably chewed it, but as you can see from the trunk there are no gnaw marks. This particular tree always leaned out over the water so far no beaver without a ladder could sink their teeth into it. So it did something even better. It decided to kindly fall over directly parallel to the dam. Last night I saw ducks, birds, herons, and beavers celebrate its good fortune. It would be nice if the city cleaned up every other fallen tree in Martinez before they got to this one so the beavers could make their job easier. But last night I am sure they lived like kings!

We waited happily by the primary, disturbing a great egret, a California towhee, and several green herons. This was my favorite moment from the first half of the night. Doesn’t it make you think of the story of narcissus?

quod petis, est nusquam; quod amas, avertere, perdes!

ista repercussae, quam cernis, imaginis umbra est:

nil habet ista sui;

(What you perceive is the shadow of reflected form: nothing of you is in it.)

We were greeted with a few beaver visits as various members swam out to investigate the fallen tree and whether we were friend or foe. It was almost impossible to tell who was who but I’m sure we had a cast of characters.

And then we were treated to a full “caution float” which if you are ever lucky enough to see, even though you feel like jumping up and down with glee you must be enormously patient and quiet because something truly wonderful is about to happen. Here’s what the caution float looks like.

Okay, no dangers on the bank, no drunks shouting over the fence looking for monkeys, no sharks or alligators. Dad gives the all clear. And then the wonderful thing happens, and my camera which has been pointed in the right direction since we saw the sentry, does the right thing. I know the video is too dark, (and it will get worse) but trust me it’s worth it.

Mom and baby! Ohh but this is wonderful! Not only is it still light enough to film it, and are they healthy and happy looking, but it means I don’t have to get up at 4:30 ever again until next summer! Thank the gods. But wait – why is there still only one. We haven’t seen two kits in four days. What if something happened to the other one? In 2009 all our kits died. What if…

Two kits and mom. Whoohoo! And not just two little quiet helpless kits either. But two boisterous rascals that were up on the pipe, up on the dam, over the pipe, over the dam, eating branches off the tree. And that’s when I notice that caution float beaver has moved onto our left and has come to eat branches off the generosity tree, and is sparing a little time to glare at us and remind us that no harm should befall his offspring. (“Ever hear of a country called bellarus?”)And for a moment I am surrounded by beavers. Two kits and mom tusseling in front, Dad protectively on my left (that snipping sound you hear is him cutting branches!), and Jr somewhere in the mix. Jon thinks he’s the one doing the wrestling because when he reached up later Jon didn’t see teats. That makes sense, we know yearlings parent and they definitely play.

So all is right in beaver world. The parents are really protective. Mom is very doting. Uncles are extremely indulgent, and kits look healthy and happy. I’m sure they’ll start coming out a little earlier so it won’t be quite so dark in future video, but I’m really happy that things are going so well.

The beaver population bed-time story

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers elsewhere, Massachusetts Trapping Law June 9, 2013

Once upon a time, not too long ago but very far away, there was a prestigiously educated state on the east coast that was so smart it even put beavers on the class rings of its university. Because the collective IQ of the state was fairly lofty and the populace fairly liberal, it decided it didn’t want to use icky leg-hold traps anymore. So around the time that Clinton was president and the Macarena was popular they passed a law to this effect.

It didn’t take very long before the panic started. “No traps!” they exclaimed in horror. “We will be overrun by wildlife. We will be surrounded by coyotes and drowned by beavers.” But the will of the voters had spoken and the legislators had to do what they said. The state with beaver class rings passed a law saying it wasn’t going to use leg-hold traps or conibears to kill anymore.

(Unless one of 9 conditions were met and everyone knows that they can almost always be construed to be met but that’s a post for another day.)

The fact is that smart watershed-interested folk around the bay state started to get panicked at this news. The beaver population was exploding. There were going to be too many beavers. Even folks who thought the occasional beavers in moderation were good for the planet, started to get panicked about the massive numbers that were predicted.

Flash forward 20 years, when that exploding beaver population all had kits and exploded some more. An educated man writes me to say that the beaver population has returned to the numbers it had before the fur trade. He cites the number of beaver dams in a particular area and assumes a surprising number of beavers per dam which means that by his estimate the population is enormous.

Which is why I reposted this lovely illustration from the 1868 writings of Lewis Morgan “The American beaver his life and works” The illustration shows a series of beaver dams in a gorge. 7 to be precise. That’s 7 dams tended by a single colony of beavers. Which means you can’t infer populations directly from the number of dams built. Beyond this research has reported again and again that any colony rarely gets any bigger than 9 and the numbers are usually less. (Our largest colony in 6 years of observation, with parents, yearlings and kits was 8 at one time.)

This means that if you multiply the number of dams counted by any surprising number you will be grossly overestimating the population of beavers. And alarming the populace with your inflated statistics. And killing more than you need to do.

But, you may ask, if people have been watching these beavers all this time and it SEEMS like more isn’t that proof?

In answer to this question I will direct you to something I wrote on this website what seems like a million years ago now but was actually only June 2008.

The kindest interpretation of this is that people see things in a new way when they are alarmed. There are several less charitable explanations. An example: At my old office I had birdfeeders and a number of feathered visitors. Goldfinches, white and red breasted nuthatches, and downy woodpeckers to name a few. My downstairs neighbor complained about seed husks so we would sweep his porch every week to keep it tidy. During one such sweeping event, the crabby old accountant watched with folded arms and said, “What about all the green stuff. Get that too.”

The “green stuff” in question was pollen from the hundreds of pines in the area and had been on his porch every spring for as long as he had been there, but of course he had never seen it before because he had never looked with this particular set of eyes.

And those, as it happens, are the very same eyes that this state looks at beaver with.

Here endeth the lesson.

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Nice photos from Cheryl last night, who briefly saw one kit and three adults. Here’s mom inspecting the credentials of her photographer.

mombeaver — Mom beaver: photo Cheryl Reynolds

And what I think is her best photo of a green heron yet.

Learning Curve

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Who's Killing Beavers Now? June 8, 2013

Remember the nature sanctuary in Grafton that misunderstood the meaning of the work “SANCTUARY” and trapped its beavers a while back? I wrote the chief administrator and the council and I bet a lot of other folk did too because I received several responses, including one from Mr. Karokti himself. Well it looks like the learning curve in Grafton has taken an upward slope, at least for now.

Grafton sanctuary struggles with beaver woes

A group of residents and members of the Nawautin Sanctuary Association in Grafton struggled with this issue this May when four beavers were trapped and killed by the Township. The sanctuary is a municipal property at the shores of Lake Ontario. Nawautin Sanctuary Association member Jean-Remy Emorine, who has lived near the sanctuary for the last six years, often walks his dogs at the sanctuary and watched the beavers.

“I was really upset when I heard those beavers were killed,” said Mr. Emorine, who is originally from France. “For me they are emblematic of Canada

I have taken the liberty of highlighting what I feel was the salient issue in this article. The town of Grafton did not, in fact “struggle” with this issue. Nor did the membership of the nature sanctuary debate or discuss because they were never informed. Approximately three folks had a discussion and a memo was written, a phone call was made and 4 beavers were killed. I would say the “struggle” for Grafton occurred instead at the emergency meeting where the remarkably tone-deaf decision blew up in their faces and splattered all over the media.

Never mind. They’re definitely struggling now.

“It’s unfortunate because I love animals,” he said, adding he knows there are other municipalities that struggle with similar beaver problems.

In his 25 years with the municipality, as far Mr. Korotki knows, no one has approached the Township with alternatives to trapping. Ms. Kilmer has been in contact with the Association for the Protection of Fur-Bearing Animals, which does offer other alternatives. Mr. Korotki said they will consider alternatives in the future and consult with members of the association.

Well I personally sent him info on Mike’s DVD and Sherri’s book as well as our website, so hopefully we won’t be reading that excuse ever, ever again. Now it’s Adrian’s job to provide workable consultation and nature’s job to move in some beavers to replace the ones that were assassinated.

I quite liked this little insert the paper did, although for some reason I can’t get my brain used to “Mr. Nelson”:

Now its THAT time again! Let’s hope we can get this on the local channel once more!

Hot dam! Good beaver news!

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Dispersal, Environmental, Who's Killing Beavers Now? June 7, 2013

It’s time we challenged agricultural hegemony

The response by farmers’ leaders to the idea of ‘rewilding’ shows how unaccustomed to challenge they are

: Following successful beaver reintroductions in two parts of Scotland, the first release in Wales could be about to happen. Photograph: Peter Lilja/Getty Images

Their dams, burrows and ditches and the branches they drag into the water create habitats for a host of other species: water voles, otters, ducks, frogs, fish and insects. In both Sweden and Poland, the trout in beaver ponds are on average larger than those in the other parts of the streams: the ponds provide them with habitats and shelter they cannot find elsewhere²,³. Young salmon grow faster and are in better condition where beavers make their dams than in other stretches4. The total weight of all the creatures living in the water may be between two and five times greater in beaver ponds than in the undammed sections5. Beavers slow rivers down. They reduce scouring and erosion. They create small wetlands and boggy areas. They trap much of the load that rivers carry6, ensuring that the water runs more clearly.

Beavers slow rivers down. They reduce scouring and erosion. They create small wetlands and boggy areas. They trap much of the load that rivers carry6, ensuring that the water runs more clearly.

Excellent beaver defense in this article. Where’s it from? Since it uses a word like “hegemony” we know it can’t be American because that’s too many syllables for US readers. Maybe you’re thinking ‘it’s just a blog’. But it’s a blog for the GUARDIAN, and its a blog with FOOTNOTES. And it’s really really good. I think it’s primary argument is that farming interests are treated as the only rural interests and ignore 95% of the population. He goes on to talk about reintroducing Lynx and halting the badger cull, but it’s a great read. With great footnotes.

Yesterday was a good beaver news cycle. There was also this from Idaho

Beaver pond in the high water of June. SE Idaho. Beaver remake creeks, streams, springs, even seeps. They usually greatly increase the diversity of wildlife in an area with their ponds. It is surprisingly hard to get Fish and Game departments to take them seriously, have a rational trapping season and to keep people from just killing them. Copyright Ralph Maughan. June 2013

Ralph Maughan

Dr. Ralph Maughan is professor emeritus of political science at Idaho State University with specialties in natural resource politics, public opinion, interest groups, political parties, voting and elections. Aside from academic publications, he is author or co-author of three hiking/backpacking guides.

Of course I looked up Dr Maughan and found that he is in Pocotello Idaho, which (as it happens) is where our friend Mike Settel got the grant from Audubon to count beavers so I wrote both of them to make sure they were friends! (Because that’s what beaver cruise directors do). I was a little chilled by the “educated and scientific” comments on his post though. Check this out from someone who calls himself CodyCoyote.

But here is an interesting fact about Beavers. When a pair mate, they will have 4-6 kits. When the time comes as the kids grow up , the parent beavers will selectively kill all but one male and one female from their litter, and drive them off to find a new territory of their own. It’s their way of dispersing, increasing habitat and domain , and assuring good genetic viability. But it’s a little draconian to us primates.

Beaver death panels? Just so we’re clear, this isn’t true, has never been true, and would never be true. A parent wouldn’t nuture children for two years just to set up their own little “HUNGER GAMES” right in the middle of their living room and see who lives. What frightens me about this comment is the pseudo-science of it. He uses appropriate words like “diperse” and “litter” and “viability” and I’m going to bet he worked (or works) for some government agency involved in the regulation of beavers. USDA springs to mind, but maybe it was USFS or Fish and Game. He’s educated enough to toss out words like draconian and he is still astonishingly beaver ignorant.

It’s also why you cannot transplant more than a mated pair of beaver anywhere, much as you’d like to have several colonies of beavers out there. I know of a couple instances where conservation-minded ranchers actually tried to restore beavers to their stream in the Cody area here, and they plunked down as many as six animals at once in the same stream basin. They immediately eliminated themselves by infighting. For not understanding beaver behavior, they overdid it and underachieved their goal of rebuilding riparian areas overgrazed by cattle in critical winter range for wildlife.

Information is not a banquet table, Cody. You can’t select randomly the tidbits you might like (the pasta salad and cheese slices) and put them together on a plate based on your own preferences. Yes beavers are territorial and won’t tolerate being dumped together with 5 strangers to happily start a new commune. This is why you relocate INTACT families. I know its not as convenient, but its a lot more successful.

Where did Cody get his information you wonder? A field manual for beaver management from USDA? I think the reason rumors like this and the Belarus killing get such success is that folks like to think about beavers actions are ruthless, so that their own actions look justified in response.

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Cheer from Cheryl who made the 4:30 trek this am and was duly rewarded.

Kit 4:50 Escobar bridge

Checking out raccoon on bank.

Mom come by and wrestled with kit then both went to annex where mom climbed bank for fennel. She sat below bridge with kit,wrestled some more before coming back to lodge.

Second adult went towards annex 5:10.

Beaver working on the dam at 6:05 until 6:20.

Mom mallard and 2 big babies

Whooohooo! I’m glad Cheryl got to see baby 1 even if it was too dark for photos! Soon my pretties!

Peanut Season

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, kits June 6, 2013

This morning at 4:45 I staggered onto the Escobar bridge to see a raccoon milling about in the water. Uh-oh, if he was there the kits might not be allowed to come! Mom swam protectively by and the raccoon skedaddled. And then a little peanut with a beautifully light underside floated into view. And then another. Mom swam up and appeared to be taking them to the annex. Then raccoon appeared on the other side of the bank and SLAP!!! I was worried I wouldn’t see them again, but I waited anyway.

The raccoon again appeared on the first side of the bank, and tiny kit number one popped out of the water and made a bee-line for him. Curious about everything the raccoon seemed to do or touch. The raccoon started to look around nervously for the adult, like we might if a cute bear cub started to approach. Mom swam by and the raccoon vanished again. This time the brave kit climbed onto the mud bank where the raccoon had been, right below me. The other kit never returned after the tail slap. In the streetlight I could see him clearly, not a foot long – about twice as big as when I saw him in May. He was much more skilled at swimming and diving. I thought how this was the 7th year I’ve sat watching new kits emerge, and how it never got less amazing.

The funny thing is that it never gets less terrifying either. No sooner had I gotten a good look at him that I was suddenly afraid the raccoon would eat him, suddenly worried there appeared to be soap suds in the creek, worried that raccoon feces would give the kit Baylisascaris, and then suddenly worried when the tide turned and it looked like all the water was going to flush away at once. (UPDATE: Found out it was a water main breaking and not the tide or the dam. As Jon says “good clean water” so go ahead, Martinez. Leak all you want) There are a million things that could go wrong in a beaver’s life, and in my 6 years as guardian I’ve seen most of them. Honestly, when I watch those little faces, part of me just melts, but a large part of my thinking is dedicated to this running inner monologue trying to talk myself out of whatever terror I’m currently imagining.

And still…and still…in the middle of a tiny urban creek…our beavers manage to bring new lives and raise children and carry on the family name. And they do it without midwife’s or healthcare or electricity. And their babies have fingers and toes and tails and learn to be beavers and have babies of their own. It’s all pretty amazing.

Looking about when the kit swam out of sight, I could see the memorial of mom and I thought of what a grand thing she had started. The first time I heard about the beavers it was on the street and a woman I didn’t know and never saw again told me about them. She said she had seen them many times, but that morning she had finally realized there were three, a slightly smaller beaver out on the bank. I never saw three and wasn’t sure I believed her, but thinking back now I am sure she meant a yearling, which means when the parents settled in Alhambra Creek they had already had families before someplace else. Where? We can know for certain that mom was at least 6 at the time – probably even older because she had 4 kits in 2007. (Beavers can reproduce at 3, beaver fecundity goes up with age.) Remember our current mom had one kit last year and two this year. The original mom had 4 the first year they were here, which suggests that it was probably the third or fourth time our old mom had kits.

Maybe they relocated because something happened in their old territory, which meant that they had no kits and only one yearling left. It’s a dangerous world for beavers, and their are few safe havens. Martinez was going to trap them until we stopped them. Now San Jose, American Canyon, Sonoma, Santa Rosa. Come to think of it, I guess there are a few more havens than their used to be.