Month: November 2017

BEAVER NEIGHBORS

heidi08 Who's saving beavers now? November 26, 2017

Yesterday our good friend Janet Thew forwarded the “Giving Tuesday” request she received from the Wetlands Conservancy. If you’ll remember, they’re the group in Oregon that brought me to Portland in 2015 to speak about what we did in Martinez, and organized the huge art exhibit this year that traveled the state. They are still working hard on behalf of beavers. Here’s how you can help:

Who doesn’t want to give to beavers? Click on the image to go to their giving page. The Wetlands Society works hard to make a difference and keep the value of beavers on everyone’s mind. And the beavers they support of course work hard for all the wildlife and streams in Oregon. It’s a pretty smart investment in the future of the planet to support them.

(Of course we’re helping beavers too and we’d send you a poster. :-))

Just one state over, I got a note from Sara Aycock yesterday about the work her dad is doing with the local environmental education facility in Idaho. You’ll remember Sara because she’s the one who donated those wonderful Victorian animal prints last year for the silent auction as part of the release of her first detective novel about Mr. Beaverton. Remember?

Now the Nature center is one of those places with an underwater viewing station so you can see the salmon or what have you, and it recently was visited by a beaver! Her Dad is working hard talking to the staff about how important beaver are to the landscape and she says pretty much everyone is trying to help that beaver out.

The center is very interested in wildlife and uses those wildlife cameras to find what’s happening in and around the facility. This is the bold adventure of a hungry and ambitious mink they caught recently that I thought you would enjoy.

I can’t wait to see some underwater footage of that beaver!

NOTHING NEW IN NEWPORT

heidi08 stupid solutions November 25, 2017

Newport Minnesota is directly across the Mississippi river from St. Paul. It’s a little over three square miles and about a quarter of that is water. In the last census they reported a population of 3000 and the median income is under 50,000 a year, They apparently know nothing about wrapping trees and can’t see any value to having beavers around. Fortunately they think they know JUST what to do about them.

Beavers busy chewing down trees on city-owned lots in Newport

NEWPORT, Minn. — An unusual culprit is being blamed for wreaking havoc this fall.

The city-owned properties between Cedar Lane and the Mississippi River have seen at least 12 trees up to 75 or 100 feet tall chewed down by beavers, Public Works Superintendent Bruce Hanson said, and many more left half-felled.

“It’s to the point I believe it’s becoming a safety concern,” Hanson said at the Nov. 2 meeting. “So many (trees) are girdled that I believe there’s an urgency to go down there and take care of it. … There are a lot of areas that deal we this … we just haven’t before.”

The city hired trapper Andy Shoemaker to remove the beavers. He said he’s caught six of them so far, and thinks two to four more may be making trouble in the area.

Some of the trees were dropped, but others hung on, possibly ready to drop anytime. Others, when they have been cut down by the beavers, leave “razor-sharp stumps,” Shoemaker said.

One of the critters he trapped weighed 55 pounds. Shoemaker — who’s been trapping for over 45 years — said the largest he said he’s ever caught was 82 pounds. Shoemaker said Newport isn’t the only place dealing with beavers this year, and they seem to be increasing each year. He said it’s possible they came from Fort Snelling, where there is a wildlife reserve that can get overpopulated.

Just for the record Fort Snelling is 11 miles away by land and considerably more by water. It may very well sustain a healthy beaver population, but even if the park closed tomorrow Newport would still get beavers. You know why? Because it is on the Mississippi River and full of water and beavers use that water like highways to get from one place to another.

And let me say, as a woman who has reviewed beaver news for every day for the last ten years, how very very RARE it is for a local paper to run a photo of the dead beavers its trapped to prove it is doing a really, really good job at killing them. Nice choice Woodbury Bulletin. Hiring a trapper and wasting taxpayer funds on a temporary solution is sadly very common, but being ton-deaf enough to post pictures of their work is not.

Hey I have an idea! Newport could read the writing on the wall. Look at all that water and say, hell we’re always going to get beavers, we better find another solution. You could wrap some of those trees with wire and protect them whether you get beavers or not. And then you could get some local students from the science class at the Junior high to start recording the new species that are using all that coppiced wood.

And saying you have to remove the chewed trees because beavers leave behind razor-sharp tree stumps? Pul-eeze.

TRIAL BEAVERS PRODUCE

heidi08 Devon Beavers November 24, 2017

How was the turkey? Ours was barbecued and strangely delicious! There was a huge table that barely fit all the guests and last year’ infant was fascinated by holding this year’s infant for a while. It was a family kind of day, and we were all thankful for it. I started the morning by adding titles to the headers on the website. I like them a lot, what do you think?

In the mean time there’s more detailed story on the river otter beaver population growing this year, I’m not sure what gives them confidence that they have the count correct, because we watched our beavers very closely with an accurate count of new kits nine years out of ten. That one pesky year we were VERY surprised to find out in July there was one more kit than we thought we had.

Boom time for beavers on the Otter

Six new babies born this year

“Beaver kits are born in May and we know that at least two female beavers gave birth in the trial area in 2017,” Stephen Hussey from the trust said.

“The beaver family living in the lower part of the River Otter is thriving. In 2016 the adult pair produced a remarkable five kits. “These one year olds were mostly still in the same area in 2017 – young beavers begin to move further afield to establish their own territories at the age of two years.

“This year the adult female gave birth to another four surviving kits. Once they’d learned to swim, at the age of a month or so, these kits were seen exploring the river on their own, as well as clambering over their parents and feeding on bankside plants.

“Just as in 2016, the female beaver and her kits proved a very popular wildlife-watching attraction this summer, from the public footpaths on this well-used section of the river, near Otterton.”

In May last year the wildlife trust and project partners introduced an additional male and female beaver to a private site where suitable beaver habitats had been identified. In their first year on this site on a tributary of the River Otter, the beavers have been very active, creating a number of dams around the release pond.

Photos from cameras installed around the site show this beaver family has doubled in number – two kits have been recorded moving confidently around the release site since July 2017. Camera traps have picked up lots of interesting behaviour, including interaction with other mammals.The River Otter Beaver Trial receives no government funding and relies on donations.

Why we are seeing these stories now. It’s November in England too right? Well I’m happy that England is cheerfully counting its beavers after they’re hatched because it raises interest and keeps people attentive to the changes these animals make. The article has a lovely video of mom (I’m guessing) Mrs, Bob and two kits. Click on the link to visit the site and watch.

A FLOOD OF BEAVER INFORMATION

heidi08 Beavers and water November 23, 2017

This busy morning, before we do the stuffing, feed the cat or straighten becky’s hair for the grand family palooza we’re expecting this afternoon, let’s stop and be thankful for this letter to the editor. Even if does appear paired with a photo of a nutria which I will not be reposting here for obvious reasons.

Reader’s letter: Beavers can prevent flooding

I read with interest about Green Party deputy leader Amelia Womack’s visit to England’s first beaver reintroduction in east Devon this week. The River Otter Beaver Trial is a five-year project, led by Devon Wildlife Trust in partnership with Exeter University, running until 2020.

The trial is monitoring the beavers’ impact on the landscape, other wildlife, water resources, water quality, local communities and infrastructure, and local farms. Initial results reveal strong evidence for the role beavers might play in reducing flooding downstream, even during prolonged wet periods.

The trial is already producing promising results that indicate the role beavers can play in helping to protect our towns and cities from floods, while giving us a richer, more exciting natural world.

Floods are devastating for communities, as we have seen in Stroud – they destroy our homes and belongings, damage our economy and disrupt our daily lives. Without serious action to tackle climate change, the floods we face every winter are only going to get worse.

But just a small number of beavers can have a disproportionate effect on the environment around them, influencing water flow, improving water quality and increasing biodiversity and bringing great benefits to other wildlife.

Successful flood prevention means working with nature starting with our soils and land management which hold huge capacity to absorb intense rainfall, through to allowing more space for rivers and floodplains to behave more naturally, not covering it in concrete. This is about working with the grain of nature and not battling against it.

But there are potential challenges ahead, not least the possible impacts these industrious creatures could have on farmland. The trial is looking at all the possible impacts, and exploring how we can maximise the positive and minimise the negative ones.

I have heard of attempts to get salmon back to Salmon Springs, so why not introduce the beaver to the River Frome? It may well complement the great work that Chris Uttley at Stroud District Council has been doing with Rural Sustainable Drainage in the Stroud Valleys.

Tracey Fletcher: Ruscombe Stroud

Nice work Tracey! You covered all the basics and then some! If only every letter about beavers was equally well prepared I could retire and move to Florida. I’m sorry about the photo of the nutria and I wish that I could promise that once beaver re-acquaints itself with beaver they’ll know better and these kinds of mistakes won’t happen, but America is living proof that’s not true. It still happens all the time, to our small papers, or nonprofit cousins, and even our scientists from NOAA or the Forest Service!

But the letter was EXCELLENT!

We at Worth A Dam wish you a fine feast with family and friends today. Mine will have a new baby on scene (born a month early, like me!) from my niece and four generations of Perryman’s arguing over who gets the drumstick. I am thankful my sister is hosting it and I don’t have to, Also thankful that we have beavers in Martinez again (even if we can’t see them), that we have will have another festival in a new park, and that Amy Gallaher Hall will be donating her talented chalk art. I am also grateful for the shiny new website (thanks Scott Artis) that I am nearly starting to get the hang of, and that I heard this week from author Ben Goldfarb that he has just completed his first draft of the wonderful new beaver book and is planning on a much better title.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We are bringing stuffed cherry tomatoes. How about you?

WAITING FOR BEAVER CHRISTMAS

heidi08 Beavers and climate change November 23, 2017

The other day I was contacted by an ecologist in Wyoming who was interested in the beavers and climate change movie project by Sarah Koenisberg. He wanted to see it completed so it could be released in a couple of venues he was interested in. He was considering ways to make that happen and wanted my opinion since I was in the film. I agreed that it should be done and encouraged him to move funds in that direction. Them I poked about to look up the work he was referring to. My search brought me to this article from the Wyoming Wetland Society out of Jackson Hole whose primary interest is in Trumpeter Swan restoration, But of course that makes them very good friends of the beaver on whose lodges the swans love to nest. I’m not sure I reviewed back in 2014 back when it this out because I don’t always catch blog posts, but I know it will interest you too.

The Rancher Who Wished for a Beaver

“They’re really beneficial, to get the shrubs in, get the water up.”

IClyde Woolery, a rancher near Kinnear, Wyoming, wishes he had more beavers. n 2011, he called the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and asked if they could live trap a beaver and transplant it to his ranch.

Bill Long, the program director of Wyoming Wetlands Society, says that beavers can establish new wetlands and make existing wetlands work better. “Cleaner, colder water comes out of beaver dams,” he says. “They’re a keystone species.” Beaver dams raise the water table and increase water quality by slowing down the flow and filtering the water, Long says. That helps establish willows and other shrubs, which are good habitat and browsing for animals including livestock.

After all, “it’s been said many times before, they’re nature’s engineer.” He says wetlands benefit ecosystem health and even boost biodiversity. “They’re doing good things. Whether it be for cutthroat trout or for cattle, they’re good for the system.”

When a landowner has a problem beaver, Long’s group live traps it and moves it to public land, usually national forests. Wyoming Wetlands Society has been moving dozens of beavers each year since 2004. Game and Fish reacts to isolated phone calls, also moving troublesome beavers to public and sometimes private lands.

And, meanwhile, ranchers like Clyde Woolery wish for a beaver. In a state looking for ways to store water in an arid landscape, beavers could help. A program for landowners to request beavers could be one step toward healthier wetlands for people, livestock, fish, and ecosystems.

Woolery believes he’s not alone in his dreams of bringing beavers back to his ranch. If Game and Fish streamlined a way for landowners to get on a beaver request list, Woolery thinks there would be demand. He says Game and Fish agreed to bring him a beaver once he could get willow established closer to his creek. “The coyotes get them, if they have to go too far for willow,” Woolery explains. He’s on beaver hold until then.

I”m pretty excited about anyone whom appreciates the value beavers add to the land, and I hope Clive gets his beaver and tells all his friends how important they are. I wish it the article was clearer about the idea of moving family units instead of individual beaver being more successful. Also in Wyoming I’m sure you have to give beavers some kind of safe cover initially so they don’t get eaten! Let’s hope they had lots and lots of meaningful conversations with the Methow folks, shall we?

In the meantime we can all support the idea that this fine film will one day get finished and be presented at the wetlands conference next year. I for one would LOVE to see the finished product. I can’t embed the trailer here, but go to Sarah’s site to watch the trailer if you need your memory jogged.