I can’t believe the headline isn’t from me, but you’ll never guess who that quippy little approximation of Biden’s infrastructure plan came from: Boris Johnson. But it works, I like it, and I’m taking it forward. Lots of surprises this morning, 30 names added to the letter so far. And a nice upcoming talk with Dr. Fairfax that mentions the beaver festival?

Beavers in the Landscape with Dr Emily Fairfax

Beaver dams are gaining popularity as a low-tech, low-cost strategy to build climate resiliency at the landscape scale. Emily Fairfax

Join Santa Barbara Permaculture Network for an evening with Dr. Emily Fairfax, PhD. as she shares her research focused on beaver, a keystone species that until very recently was a vastly underrated ecosystem restoration hero. Passionate about science from a young age, Emily Fairfax was happy when nature and science came together with her interest in beavers. As a geoscientist who studies ecohydrology of wetlands and riparian areas, it was a perfect academic and vocational match.

With extended droughts and catastrophic fires plaguing California and the West in recent years, Dr. Fairfax began focusing her research on the impact of beaver on wildfires. Squishy, wet landscapes simply don’t burn. And where beaver are, with multiple dam complexes and ponds, squishy land abounds. These conclusions prompted Fairfax to coin the phrase “Smokey the Beaver”. (more…)