Our Wikipedia beaver friend makes use of some Paiute-Beaver research I sent his way.
“The Mormons noted there were many beaver (Castor canadensis) dams along the Santa Clara River. The coexistence of beaver dams and Southern Paiute farming along the lower Santa Clara River suggests that the Santa Clara Southern Paiutes let beavers perform some portions of the dam construction and maintenance in the Indian water management system. (1) Elimination of the flood control provided by beaver dams was probably one of the causes of the series of disastrous floods that swept away much of the rich bottomland after Mormon colonization began. In any case, the close association of Indian farms and beaver dams suggests that the presence of beaver dams was an intentional part of aboriginal water management strategy. This association is suggested in the eyewitness observation of Thomas D. Brown: “There appears many patches of good wheat land on this stream, across which Beaver dams are built every few rods, & the banks being low, the water overflows much & renders the bottoms good grazing patches”.[2] As Mormons colonized the Santa Clara, they eliminated the beavers, their dams, and their labor. Juanita Brooks notes that at the time the wife of Thales Haskell was shot by a young Indian man, Haskell was “away up the creek taking out beaver dams”.
(1) Richard W. Stoffle, Maria Nieves Zedeño (2001). “Historical Memory and Ethnographic Perspectives on the Southern Paiute Homeland“. Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology: 229-248.
(2) Juanita Brooks. The Southern Indian Mission. In Under Dixie Sun: A History of Washington County by Those Who Loved their Forebears. Washington County, Utah. pp. 23-33.
Hmm. That’s good thinking. Letting the beaver work for you. Or you know, 200 years later when people have forgotten everything they once knew, you could always pay some environmental firm to do a study:
