You and I have limited appetites for the BEAVERS CAUSING GLOBAL WARMING narrative but I just had to listen to this short interview with the author of the study. It won’t let me embed the audio and I can’t seem to record it yet so I’ll just transcribe and rely on you to listen for yourself.
Hot dam: Beavers have gnawed their way into the Arctic, speeding permafrost thaw
Beavers are moving to the Arctic as the Alaskan tundra heats up and the beaver population rebounds after centuries of trapping. A study published in December shows the small, industrious mammal is accelerating climate change in the north.
Beaver ponds are showing up in places they’ve never been before. For the past five years, ecologist Ken Tape has used satellite imagery and old aerial photos to map where beavers have dammed streams and created ponds. The University of Alaska Fairbanks professor says he was shocked by the magnitude of change.
What are they eating up their? Ice? I bet that’s it. They worm their way in. Eat up all the ice. And cause global warming!
Now I know you meant that as an insult to beavers but honestly, it’s the first time I’ve ever heard a scientist be truthful about how much impact they truly have have and how much their removal means to any stream. I’m sure you meant it as hyperbole. But it’s actually true. That’s certainly what we learned in Martinez.
When beavers dam a stream, it creates a pond that’s deeper than the stream was, and it retains more heat. Tape says if you liked the Arctic the way it was, this is not a good thing. He says to think of ponds as little oases for creatures that don’t usually live in the Arctic. They thaw permafrost and release carbon dioxide. It’s a case where increased biodiversity isn’t healthy for the native ecology.
Oh puleeze. Ya the beavers are doing all that.Just ruining the artic. That’s what they do.
“The landscape is falling apart with permafrost thaw, and beavers are that trend on steroids. And one of the big reasons is that permafrost is really rapidly impacted by changes in hydrology and surface water. And that’s precisely what beavers do,” Tape said.
The full effects of these new beaver ponds on fish and water quality aren’t clear yet — Tape says last season kicked off what will be about five years of field study around Nome and Kotzebue. He says he has an idea of the big picture, but it’s the people in arctic communities who can help him learn how beavers are changing life and livelihood in the North.
Yes. Because we have ZERO idea how beavers affect water quality and fish. It obviously has never been researched before by anyone. Because this whole permafrost thing. It’s a game changer.
Hey if a growing beaver population depletes permafrost, do you think the decimated one in the 1800’s might have expanded it? I mean do you think you’re whole expectation level might be wrong because of shifting baselines?
Gee.
Yesterday morning I received a completely unexpected phone call from a VERY excited Michael Pollock of NOAA. He had read the good salmon news in Bloomberg and was thinking this could be a major change to California’s dwindling salmon population. He wanted to know who was tracking these sudden salmon and all the places they were showing up. He thought DNA samples would be helpful in figuring out what was triggering them to come back to rivers they hadn’t spawned in for a century.
Endangered Coho salmon are returning to Marin County, California, creeks this winter where they’ve long been absent, thanks to intense rains that scientists say will become more frequent as the state swings between climate-driven drought and deluge.
Leave It to Beaver
