What a difference a week makes. It seems like just seven days ago I was reading in Ted got-it-wrong Williams Angler artiicle about how BAD beavers are for fish. Apparently just 100o miles away they know better.
After a century’s absence, beavers return to Cedar Creek
Skiing into Cedar Creek isn’t easy, but a few Montana Trout Unlimited members willing to brave this year’s deep snow were rewarded with more than pretty scenery.
A few days ago, on her way up the drainage near Superior, Trout Unlimited project manager Tess Scanlan did a bit of a double take as she stared at one of the jumbles of wood she had helped position along the stream.
Where there should have been an undisturbed pillow of white covering the wood, she saw a narrow channel through the snow connecting two areas of open water. It could signal only one thing: beavers.
“We’ve been working for the past 10 years with the Forest Service on restoration up there,” Scanlan said. “Beavers are in that zone, but they’re now back in Cedar Creek for the first time in over a hundred years. It’s a super pleasant surprise.”
A decade ago, Cedar Creek wasn’t healthy enough to support beavers or a thriving population of native fish. A long history of placer mining had degraded the stream and surrounding riparian areas. Streambanks were damaged, some segments of the stream channel had been rerouted, and large woody debris and natural formations within the channel had been removed, according to Lolo National Forest documents.
Beavers can take over from biologists and finish restoring the stream, because beaver dams improve water quality, trap and store carbon — and can help retain groundwater during dry spells. Plus when that groundwater wells up at points downstream, it keeps stream temperatures down, helping native fish that need colder water.
Recognizing the importance of beavers to stream health, states such as Nevada, Utah, Wyoming and Washington are trying to reintroduce beavers into streams that need help.
Fortunately, they moved into Cedar Creek on their own.
AHA! Finally some trout lovers who love beavers too! It’s about time they got some respect around here! What a fantastic way to recognize their top-notch contribution to streams. Everything’s better with beavers! This is what Sarah Bates from Missoula wrote this morning on the beaver FB management forum
Beavers recolonized a western Montana stream after a restoration project added woody debris and allowed a more dynamic floodplain. Since then, native fish numbers have increased, otters have showed up, and riparian vegetation is thriving. And now the beavers are making the news!
Now this is how it’s supposed to work. Beavers are given the credit they deserve and in return they give us the streams and fish we deserve. Isn’t that wonderful?
We’re trying to provide cold, clean, connected and complex habitat. The complex part comes with all that added wood. But with that, we’re also reconnecting the floodplain because it slows down those high flows in the spring runoff and helps recharge the groundwater,” Scanlan said. “You’re bringing back this natural ecosystem.”
Montana Trout Unlimited will do a little more road and revegetation work this summer, but this may be the last work season, Scanlan said.
“We’ve compared stream sections we restored to reaches where beavers have moved in and they create the same (natural formations),” Scanlan said. “You make it more habitable and they come in.”
I still think folks get this wrong much of the time. They think we cleaned the creek so the beavers come. When in reality the beavers don’t care much whether the water is polluted or clean. They care about willow or aspen and cottonwood. If you give them that, they can fix the pollution for you.
Just give ’em time
