THE DUTCH ARE FORMING PATROL GANGS TO SCARE AWAY BEAVERS

I would generally say that for the past five years beaver news has entered American hyperdrive with the publication of Ben’s Goldfarb’s book. (Who by the way was in the New York Times yesterday.) (Not about beavers. The NYT will never – mark my words – publish a positive article about beavers) But ever since 2018 this website made a left turn and stopped posting stories about European beavers so much. They have been doing great work and helping futrher our cause greatly but I often ignored headlines to focus on our own shores.

I couldn’t pass this up though.

Too many busy beavers are weakening dykes in Gelderland

(more…)

THE BEAVER POND ALGORITHM

I woke up this morning to see that Kylie sold her annoying HCN beavers ruining the artic article to the atlantic. Well, bully for her. They took out most of the trapping stuff and left in the nice paragraph about biodiversity. Good. But we need to talk about something else this morning.

Lynker Partnership Tracks Wetland & Beaver Pond Changes Using Cutting Edge Technology

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) tracks the status and trends of wetlands across the United States. The National Wetlands Inventory (NWI), maintained by USFWS, is a nation-wide map of wetlands that has been created over several decades by multiple different mapping partners. The dataset is incredibly valuable, but does not track changes over time and the age of the data is variable across the West.

This is the first project of its kind, wherein the research team will use state-of-the-art remote sensing and machine learning techniques to map the extent of wetlands as well as the presence of beaver ponds and their changes over time. The mapping and analysis will be carried out using high resolution 4-band aerial photography from the National Agriculture Imagery Program (NAIP) and LiDAR acquired by the government between 2006 and 2021. (more…)

THE RARE HCN ARTICLE WORTH IGNORING

heidi08 Attitudes towards beavers, Beavers and climate change, Who's blaming beavers now? February 22, 2022

As a rule I have a strict YES policy about posting beaver articles from High Country News. After all, they are generally more responsible and thorough than other news souces, and they are very environmental in their focus. Plus they made BEN GOLDFARB which is a very wonderful achievement. And they boasted the very first truly inspiring beaver article I ever read back in 2009. It remains my gold standard of all beaver articles.

So I won’t be writing at all today about the whining debasement from the new intern (Kylie Mohr) there that will never replace you-know-who. She starts the article with a profile about the new fascination for beaver trapping in the area. because of HATS and all the beaver slums that have appeared where they never used to be. I won’t even point out how horrifically wrong she is about beavers causing giardia and ruining the drinking water. What would be the point? (more…)

DETROIT ISN’T EXCITED ABOUT BEAVERS ANY MORE

heidi08 Attitudes towards beavers, Beaver ecological impact, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? February 21, 2022

Remember when Detroit was excited to see beavers again after a century of setting the river on fire? Well that’s over. Short welcome committee eh?

DNR kills some beavers on Detroit’s Belle Isle

A decade ago, beavers returned to Detroit’s Belle Isle for the first time in a century, causing celebration among environmentalists. But now it seems the rodents have worn out their welcome on Detroit’s island park, or at least with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, which has run it since 2014. On Thursday, the department announced it had killed some beavers during a Belle Isle Park Advisory Committee meeting.

Ron Olson, DNR’s chief of parks and recreation, confirms that the department killed four beavers on Belle Isle and the nearby Milliken State Park. Olson tells Metro Times the DNR isn’t trying to exterminate the aquatic mammals from the parks, but only trying to keep their population in check. Each pair of beavers has around four young, and around this time of year, they start moving out of their dens and establishing their own territories. (more…)

BEAVERS COULD BUILD THE ARK

heidi08 Attitudes towards beavers, Beaver ecological impact February 20, 2022

Another nice headline story from our beaver friends at Phys,Org.

Reintroducing large mammals could restore the world’s ecosystemsosyst

A report funded by the United Nations found that the return of large mammals could shore up the health of the natural world, tackling climate change and biodiversity loss in the process.

Reintroducing just 20 species of large mammals could help to restoring the world’s biodiversity. (more…)