Yesterday’s bagging and tagging of the silent auction items was a breeze with Leslie and Deidre’s capable help. Everything should come together easily on the day, and I have great faith it will produce irresistible attraction to many gleeful bidders. Both Leslie and Deidre already bought 5 posters each and two beaver mini-journals, so the allure of those items is not in question!
Which makes it a great time to appreciate the very good work coming out of Alaska who is (as it happens) much, much smarter about the relationship between beavers and salmon than the PBS program on the very topic in question. Here’s today’s podcast on the subject of upland sloughs in glacier rivers. Listen for a great short description of why beaver ponds are safe rearing habitat for Coho salmon.
The third of a new series from the Susitna Salmon Center: The Ecology of Glacial Rivers. This segment by Jeff Davis, and voiced by Katie Kierczynski, describes how suspended sediment changes conditions in main channels of glacial rivers, and how fish have adapted to these changes.
Beavers often build dams across the mouths of upland sloughs increasing water depths, and decreasing water velocities. Water depths in sloughs is maintained by flows in the mainstem. High mainstem water keeps waters deep in sloughs; however, when water levels drop in the fall, sloughs can drain or become very shallow. Beaver dams help maintain water depths in sloughs even when flows in the main channel are low.
Thanks KTNA for a great summary. I only wish everyone was listening!
I found out this week from a friend working for the beaver patrol started by our old friend Bob Armstrong in Juneau, that Bob has retired from the patrolling but is maintaining a great website using his photos and observations over the years. It’s called Bob Armstrong’s Nature Alaska! Go check it out with caution because you just might end up spending hours lost in the wonders of his epic work.
Meanwhile festival-news gotta boost from a nice article in the Martinez Gazette yesterday. Hopefully all this will help us have a great attendance this year, even without the peddler’s fair! Double click on it to zoom in close.
Yesterday was an unbelievably delightful and challenging journey through the year’s accumulation of goodies getting everything ready for today’s meeting with Leslie and Deidre for the important ‘bagging and tagging’ of items for the silent auction. We were reminded how many, many unbelievable treasures we received courtesy of enormously generous souls from as far away as Rhode Island, Kent, Calgary and Melbourne. Here is our small and precious collection of beaver jewelry which we were eager to display. This year we were given less jewelry and more art. Far more. There are 38 stunningly creative images this year in the auction, with everything from beaver ballerinas to otter notepads and avocets in flight.
The hardest job of pulling and sequencing is done. Believe me when I say some colorful language was spoken yesterday. Today will be reviewing, oohing and ahhing, and sticking numbers on items. 89 in total. Not bad for a beaver charity!
In the meantime there is PLENTY of good news this sunday, starting with a fairytail report from Calgary where folks are protesting the removal of a beaver dam and subsequent loss of habitat because of a proposed road building. I like every single thing about this story, but especially the name of the town, which sounded almost like candid camera was trying to see how I’d react.
Protestors concerned about wildlife habitat loss due to construction of the southwest ring road led a walk to a popular beaver pond in the Weaselhead area Saturday.
The biggest issue is the realignment of the Elbow River and construction of a bridge overtop, which could mean the loss of a popular beaver pond, said Diane Stinson, a bird watcher who regularly frequents the area in the southwest corner of Calgary.
“They’ve proposed to fill in 24 wetlands between Highway 8 and Highway 22X,” she said.
“Four of those wetlands directly impact the beaver pond and the beaver pond is a local treasure. People go there all the time to see the wildlife and if the wetlands are filled in as the contractor has applied, the beaver pond will cease to exist.”
Ahh the chills up my spine when I read a sentence like that! You can’t imagine. Or when I see a photo like this:
“People are obviously concerned,” he said during Saturday’s protest organized by the group, YYC Cares. “Any damage that might happen to any wildlands, we compensate it three-to-one. We work with Ducks Unlimited and other organizations.
“In the original plan, our project would have come much closer to the beaver pond, but we’ve actually moved the road and changed the plan, so we’re going to have a pretty wide buffer between the two.” Johnson said trees and other vegetation will also be planted to strengthen the buffer between the road and beaver pond.
That’s right. We work with Duck Hunters to trade the destruction of habitat by our bulldozers for some more wetlands for duck hunters. That seems fair, right?
The $1.42 billion southwest ring road project will link Highway 8 with Highway 22X and is slated to be completed in the fall of 2018. The resident group has also filed letters with the province’s Environmental Appeals Board about the design, without success.
“We’ve had two different levels of appeal and our first appeal was dismissed,” Stinson said. “We just heard [Friday] that our second appeal was rejected. They’re saying we’re not directly affected by this.” The style of bridge being used to cross the Elbow River is also a problem for some members of YYC Cares.
“We were never aware until just recently that instead of an open-span bridge like Stoney Trail in the northwest, this is a cut-and-fill earth and berm dam,” Stinson said.
Something tells me there’s a reason you weren’t informed about this, Stinson.
Founded in 1965 by Grant MacEwan, the Weaselhead is one of three protected parks in Calgary — the other two being the Inglewood Bird Sanctuary and Griffith Woods Park. The Weaselhead is a source of Calgary’s drinking water and is “incredibly biodiverse,” said Paul Finkleman, president of the Weaselhead Preservation Society.
“We at the Weaselhead Society call it Calgary’s largest outdoor classroom,” he said.
“We have thousands and thousands of kids every year learning about water ecology, forest ecology, water biology and environmental stewardship. It’s just such a wonderful place, not just for families to enjoy, but for children to learn… right within city limits.”
Thousands of children, and some very wealthy-looking protestors. My odds are on the beaver dam. Great work friends of the beaver pond! You have all our support and spirit! Send your happy thoughts to the plucky folks of WEASELHEAD which, in addition to being the kind of name a newspaper loves to write over and over, is also about 3 hours over the border from Montana.
A protester, left, speaks to Ian McColl with KGL, the company building the southwest ring road, during an event Saturday organized by YYC Cares. The group says construction of the southwest ring road will negatively affect wildlife in the Weaselhead area. (Julien Lecacheur/CBC)
There are two more prizes this sunday, the first will be adored by all, and the second might mean nothing to anyone but me. Here’s the first, which was posted on my FB page by beaver buddy Lee Lawrence of Oregon. No back story provided, but honestly, none needed.
There are cute babies an there are oh-my-god-I-wanna-die cute babies. And I believe you know how I would classify this one.
Now onto the Heidi amusement, which comes because I stumbled across this nursery rhyme in the context of our current presidential administration. Everyone knows the first line but few remember the poem it comes from.
Birds of a feather, Flock Together And so do pigs and swine Rats and mice shall have their choice And so will I have mine.
There were two things that struck me about this jingle. The first was that it should obviously be about beavers, which I’ll get to later. The second was that its rhyme is SO off. Obviously there’s an internal rhyme scheme in the first line with feather and together, but what happens to that in line three? In what crazy world do ‘mice’ and ‘choice’ rhyme?
Jon and I brainstormed a bit about this mystery and he thought there was a chancethey rhymed in the Cornish dialect. So of course I marched straight to beaver expert Derek Gow and asked him. Guess what he said?
“Here in Devon and Cornwall there is a tendency to pronounce things like mice as moice. Same applies to the other words so maybe the connection is there.”
Ah HA! Mystery solved! Rats and Moise will have their Choice! Heh heh heh…Thank you, Derek! Now for the other problem.
Birds of a feather, flock together Both closely and beyond Bugs, frogs and fish, are all they wish Beside a beaver pond.
A week to go! Can you believe it? Tomorrow Leslie comes over to tag and process every item for the silent auction, and our living room starts to look like a festival way-station as we bring everything down we need to remember. I found out yesterday that the electrical has been laid in the park but the wifi boost installation has been delayed until wednesday, which matters because people can’t use credit cards at the auction without it. Wednesday? Two days before the festival. Do you think they could be cutting this any closer?
Knowing our city maybe they mean the wednesday after the festival.
Be that as it may, we stumble onward. There’s nice letter published this morning in Scotland from a Mr. George Murdoch of Laurencekirk, whom I don’t believe we know.
Sir, – What a shame Mr Milne’s attack (July 26) on Jim Crumley led him to ignore the positive influence beavers have on the surrounding environment and focus only on the inconvenience they may have helped cause through helping raise the water level by an inch or two.
In a long-term (2002 to 2016) study conducted by Stirling University it was found that the presence of beavers increased the number of species found by 28%, improved pollutant levels, increased the retention of organic matter by a factor of seven, and almost halved phosphorous and nitrate levels.
By strange coincidence they also reduce downstream flooding in addition to helping restore degraded streams.
These measures, in turn, aid our avian community no end and attract and sustain an increasing number of birds.
If I may remind Mr Milne, Kinnordy is primarily a bird reserve managed by the RSPB.
The Alyth Flood Report, compiled by The Scottish Environment Protection Agency and Scottish Natural Heritage, concluded that beaver activity made little or no significant contribution to the flood there, contrary to the subtle claim made in his letter.
If he wishes to look for a constructive response to his criticism, he could do worse than offer to lend a hand with any measures the RSPB might deem necessary to help him keep his feet dry.
George Murdoch. Auchcairnie Cottages, Laurencekirk.
Nice job, George! Excellently written. Of course it takes a hundred smart citizens to force a city to make 1 modestly less ignorant decision about beavers, and that’s in America. Probably more in a land where they’ve been extinct for 5 centuries it will take a thousand. But it’s good to know that folks are getting the message.
Even MassWildlife seems to understand about beaver-biodiversity. I just couldn’t help but notice where they chose to install their tail cam to get this fine footage. It makes sense.
WESTHAMPTON — Nearly a week after we picked up trail cam footage of a cow moose and her calf, a good-sized bull came wandering by.
Footage of a bear, which came by that same trail cam two days later, is included at the end of the video. That bear, as a friend pointed out after watching the clip, was clearly on a mission. That mission apparently included a quick dip in a small beaver pond a short distance away. Footage of that swim, taken by our second trail cam, follows the first video.
I bet our city is grateful they never had these visitors to their beaver pond!
Just because it’s called ‘educational programming’ doesn’t mean it makes you any smarter. GRR! Wild Alaska had so much potential and mentions how important ponds are to other wildlife, but it decided to emphasize instead that salmon HATE beaver dams. (At least it clearly shows them jumping over.) Quick, to the bat beaver mobile! Leave a comment so they read some research that shows how crucial beavers are to those precious fish.
Meanwhile there’s plenty of good news from beaver central, with a nice beaver article published yesterday in the Mercury News, written by our old friend Sam Richards. The nicely-written plug even links to the festival website!
MARTINEZ — There probably aren’t any beavers in Alhambra Creek as you read this, but there definitely will be a 10th annual Beaver Festival, to honor both the paddle-tail swimmers that put the city in the national news in 2007 and 2008, and the creek environmental experts say benefited greatly from the beavers’ presence.
This year’s festival runs from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 5, at what’s come to be known as “Beaver Park,” the grassy plaza off Marina Vista adjacent to Alhambra Creek, near the Amtrak station.
The festival boasts environmental booths and displays from groups in five counties, live music, a wildlife-centered silent auction and children’s activities that combine craft-making with environmental learning.
Festival participants can learn everything they need to know, through a kid-friendly illustrated “beaver wall” showing the process, and a costumed beaver expert explaining on stage the good works that beavers do to help the overall ecology where they live.
Brock Dolman of the Sonoma County-based Occidental Arts and Ecology Center’s Water Institute will give a presentation about the beaver’s worth in an ecosystem. That group leads a “Bring Back the Beavers Campaign” to encourage their return to more local creeks.
Award-winning author Ben Goldfarb will be on hand to discuss his upcoming book about beavers, and other experts will be on hand to offer their views.
The festival is free, and decidedly family-friendly.For more in formation, click here
Wonderful! He did a great job of sifting through my tome of a press release and finding the important bits. (There’s always too much to say or explain. I have a pith problem, I admit it.) I’m glad that he talked about the importance of Brock’s presentation and the “Bring Back Beavers Campaign” and even happier he mentioned Ben Golfarb’s upcoming book. But I love decidedly family-friendly the best, and that’s why it’s in blue. It makes us sound soo cheerful and appealing.We’re also expecting an article from Jennifer Shaw and the Gazette, so with any luck at all I won’t be the only one there.
BTW if you haven’t seen the festival page yet you should check it out.
I know how this works. I could have predicted the last minute drops outs for the festival last night or the last minute sudden addition. Of course the brochure has already been to the printer and we can’t make changes to the map now, and that means everyone has to move over one or they’ll be big holes in the exhibit, and I already talked to the media about whom we expect, but staffing issues come up. And folks cancel at the last minute. They just do.
You know by now how I cope.
Ahh, much better. I had a dream the other night that the festival was happening and I looked around and saw it was in a parking lot with very few attendees. I guess those kind of nightmares are to be expected, right? There are only 9 days left before the festival. Some folks will have to show up, and the exhibits can’t all cancel before them, right?
It’s high time to celebrate the arrival of a new kit in Mountain house. Caitlin McCombs captured very adorable footage last night and posted it on FB. She’s headed off to college soon, and we’re glad she got to see them before she has to go! In this scene the new kit is trying out nibbles on the bank and Mom or Dad calls him back with a tailslap.
You know exactly what the kit would say if he could talk.
More folks getting kits that aren’t us? This news story was publisher on Tuesday of the rescue of three kits in Langley, Canada. Apparently they were found with no adults in a puddle of motor oil. You can guess what happened to their parents.
The keen eye of a Good Samaritan, along with TLC provided at Critter Care Wildlife Society in south Langley, have likely saved the lives of three beaver kits. The siblings, believed to be around two months old, were found covered in motor oil in a ditch on the corner of Dewdney Trunk Road and Turnbridge Avenue in Mission July 17.
“A gentleman was in the area and heard them whimpering and crying,” said Dawn Johnston, animal care supervisor with Critter Care. Two of the beavers appear to be recovering well, while a third was taken to a vet on July 25 for further examination.
Pretty impressive grooming from a youngster isn’t it? You can see why grooming motor oil would make them ill. But we’re happy that good folks stepped in and can take it from here.
Beavers often build dams across the mouths of upland sloughs increasing water depths, and decreasing water velocities. Water depths in sloughs is maintained by flows in the mainstem. High mainstem water keeps waters deep in sloughs; however, when water levels drop in the fall, sloughs can drain or become very shallow. Beaver dams help maintain water depths in sloughs even when flows in the main channel are low.
I found out this week from a friend working for the beaver patrol started by our old friend Bob Armstrong in Juneau, that Bob has retired from the patrolling but is maintaining a great website using his photos and observations over the years. It’s called Bob Armstrong’s Nature Alaska! Go check it out with caution because you just might end up spending hours lost in the wonders of his epic work.
MARTINEZ — There probably aren’t any beavers in Alhambra Creek as you read this, but there definitely will be a 10th annual Beaver Festival, to honor both the paddle-tail swimmers that put the city in the national news in 2007 and 2008, and the creek environmental experts say benefited greatly from the beavers’ presence.
