It’s time for some more urban beaver stories and one cautionary tale. This story comes from Michigan. Of course its not news to us because one of the best illustrated beaver books in the country already tells the tale of these heroic tails.
After 180 years, beavers return ‘home’ to Milwaukee River in heart of downtown
The beavers are back. For the first time in nearly two centuries, the buck-toothed rodents have been gnawing away at trees in the very heart of downtown Milwaukee. What better way to start the new year than by cheering the return of these ancient natives to their ancestral home?
I first noticed their presence on a boat trip down the Milwaukee River last summer. On the west bank, just south of St. Paul Ave., several small trees had fallen into the water, and a larger one was leaning precariously in the same direction. I went back on foot a few days later, and it was beavers, all right. They had been munching away on the white poplar and green ash that line the riverbank, and there were piles of wood chips among the plastic bags and empty bottles that littered the scruffy little grove. I had to look around to remind myself that I was just east of the
Pritzlaff Building and directly across the river from some of the trendiest nightspots in the Third Ward.
Ahh I love a good ‘beavers in the city story’. Almost nothing makes me happier than for beavers to remind people that all this used to belong to them and they’re coming back for it.
There was a time when beaver wouldn’t have seemed wildly out of place in the center of Milwaukee. They were once among the most ubiquitous mammals in North America, damming streams and gnawing bark from Hudson Bay to the Gulf of Mexico. Prized for their meat as well as their fur, beaver were a staple of both diet and dress for countless generations of native Americans.
After emptying the beaver streams on their own continent, Europeans turned to the apparently inexhaustible lodges of North America. It was beaver that brought the first French traders to Wisconsin in the 1600s. It was beaver that put Green Bay, Prairie du Chien, and numerous other settlements on the map. And it was beaver, or more precisely European demand for it, that fundamentally altered the Native American way of life.
Millions of hides crossed the Atlantic in the holds of sailing ships, and the same vessels brought trade goods west on their return voyages: muskets, kettles, traps, beads, blankets … and alcohol. French rum, English brandy, and then American whiskey were all solvents that effectively dissolved ancient native traditions.
Interestingly, the center was in the process of establishing an arboretum on the same bank, using funds from the Milwaukee Rotary Club and a federal restoration initiative. Nearly 14,000 trees have gone into the ground so far, representing more than 70 species native to Wisconsin. Having beaver in an arboretum seems a lot like putting pyromaniacs in a fireworks factory. Some stout trees have been dropped and others are on the way down, but the Urban Ecology Center, true to its mission, is determined to let nature take its course. Caitlin Reinartz, the center’s forester, put it succinctly: “We can’t be mad about a species coming back when the whole goal was to create a place animals would want to come back to. The beaver are here, and we’re going to find a way to coexist.”
It’s likely, but by no means certain, that the beaver whose work is on display downtown are “dispersers” from the arboretum colony, adolescents trying to establish their own territories. Unless they can be trapped and fitted with GPS devices, their whereabouts, including where they sleep or even if they’re still present, will remain one of downtown’s more intriguing mysteries.
You have to love the irony. Conservationists save the detroit river and install an arboretum of native trees and then some beavers move in and – um – appreciate them. I guess they were planted there just in time. At least the folks were great sports about the process and understand that beavers eating your native trees is like serving christmas dinner and ending up with only clean plates.
It’s a compliment!
I promised an urban beaver story and a cautionary tale. So here’s the second part. I want to be sensitive to the loss for his family’s sake but I dare say the date had more to do with this tragedy than the rodent in question.
Missouri Man Drowns In Inches Of Water While Clearing Beaver Dam
A Missouri man drowned in a shallow pond on New Year’s Day after he slipped and fell while trying to clear a beaver dam. Police found 29-year-old Caleb James Bruno face down in eight-inches of water and attempted to resuscitate him but were unsuccessful.
Investigators said there were no signs of trauma and believe that Bruno may have suffered from a medical incident before falling into the shallow pond.
I’m saying nothing. I’m pretty sure this story speaks entirely for itself.
