The beaver festival is hitting its sweet 16 this year. Everyone wants something special for the occasion so don’t miss the first of its kind debut of the hit game show:
“BEAVERS OF FORTUNE!”
Spin the wheel to answer the question and win the adorable stuffed beaver of your choice! Made possible by a generous donor Missy and her mom Leslie.
Do you feel lucky?
This was a fantastic presentation on pubic opinion and urban beavers. Fun fact: Matt Guziejka went to Martinez Junior High School in 2000.
I just read the entire report about the series of unfortunate beaver events in CDFW’s pilot relocation efforts. I will have lots to say about it in the future. But for now this is by far the best part:
The extent of human-beaver conflicts reported each year is far greater than the number and geographic distribution of beaver family groups that can be translocated for restoration projects each year. As such, and since other beavers often readily migrate into recently vacated beaver habitat, translocation should not be considered a primary solution for resolving beaver depredation. For these reasons, as well as for the ecological benefits beavers provide to the ecosystem, the Department encourages human-beaver coexistence through implementation of non-lethal deterrents as the primary solution for depredation
What are you doing this weekend? Why not celebrate with your new friends at the third annual beaver festival in San Luis Obispbo?
The day includes free admission, food, vendors, live music, children’s activities, a beaver trivia contest, speakers, and a plethora of information on the benefits that beavers.
The SLO Beaver Brigade invites eager beavers of all ages to the Third Annual San Luis Obispo County Beaver Festival on Saturday, April 12th in Mission Plaza from 10 am to 3 pm. We will have strong focus on the nexus between prescribed burn, beaver restoration, and ranching at this year’s festival.
Cosponsored and founded by Santa Barbara Permaculture Network
The day includes free admission, food, vendors, live music, children’s activities, a beaver trivia contest, speakers, and a plethora of information on the benefits that beavers provide to us in our state and county. Live music by local violinist Miles “Danger” Kennedy and Cuyama Mama & the Hot Flashes.
They’re growing up so straight and tall! Sniff. I remember when they were just an apple in Audrey’s eye!
Event Schedule
10:30 am ♫ Miles ‘Danger’ Kennedy on the violin ♫
11:30 am Opening Speaker Shaunie Briggs, Salinan Tribe
12:00 pm Keynote Speaker Molly Alves, California Department of Fish & Wildlife
12:30 pm Restoration Focus Speakers
Sophia Marquez, SLO Prescribed Burn Association
Grant Johnson, Grant Johnson Ag
Cooper Lienhart, Nature’s Engineers
1:00 pm Kids’ Beaver Trivia Contest
1:15pm Creek Walk & Talk Creek Lands Conservation: The Creek as a Classroom
1:30 pm ♫ Cuyama Mama & the Hot Flashes ♫
Our Keynote Speaker
Molly Alves, Beaver Restoration Supervisor for California Department of Fish and Wildlife
Molly Alves has a long history relocating beavers from areas where coexistence is not possible to headwater streams that beavers struggle to naturally recolonize in an effort to store water, enhance biodiversity, and protect our landscape from wildfire. Come learn about California’s relocation efforts from the experts.
Great to have Molly on board. Maybe you could ask her about the 40-60 percent debacle I can’t really see how they aren’t sure whether 12.6 beavers died or 15.6?
Oh and my presentation to the Sonoma Historical Society is tomorrow night. If you think you might want tickets sign up here:
There’s a back-patting update from CDFW on their beaver relocation project for the past two years. We did such a good job in Maidu habitats beavers built a hundred foot dam!
And only 40-60% of them died! Isn’t that great?
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) set out on its mission one-and-a-half years ago to begin returning beavers to watersheds throughout their native range in the state. Since then, the translocated beavers have begun their work as ecosystem engineers, initiating the restoration of wetlands and building resilience to the effects of climate change such as drought and wildfire.
Today, CDFW announces the release of a status report on the translocated beavers and restoration sites, summarizing project successes, lessons learned and next steps for beaver restoration in California.
Between October 2023 and September 2024, CDFW placed 28 beavers in the Sierra Nevada at five release sites within two pilot projects, which were launched in partnership with the Tule River Tribe in Southern California and the Maidu Summit Consortium in Northern California.
Yes and you got a ton of great press and made a lot of foolish people feel very hopeful and happy. How did that go?
The translocated beavers have since produced two litters of kits and built dams at three of the release sites. At the most productive release site, beavers have begun to dig a network of canals, reconnected the stream with its floodplain and increased the surface water area by approximately 23%.
As part of the state’s Initiative to Expand Nature-Based Solutions, in 2022 CDFW created the Beaver Restoration Program using funding appropriated when Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 1757. The program aims to better understand where, when and how beavers, long thought of as a nuisance species, can be utilized to restore ecosystems and habitats in California. That knowledge will allow CDFW and the state of California to effectively utilize beavers as a nature-based solution in restoring and conserving habitats and watersheds.
“The Beaver Restoration Program was formed because we recognize the value that beavers can provide on a landscape,” said CDFW Beaver Restoration Program Supervisor Molly Alves. “We are putting beavers back into those portions of their historic range where they can build dams and create wetlands that protect our landscape, wildlife and people from climate change like drought and wildfire.”
Ooh they had kits and built dams. You did such a great job! What a stroke of genius!
To date, survival of the translocated beavers is estimated to be between 40-60%, with the primary causes of mortality being predation and illnesses related to underlying conditions (e.g., pneumonia) and capture-related stressors.
Read that again. You can accurately measure the amount of water but you can’t accurately count the number of beavers that lived? Are you kidding me?
Here you are, with the benefit of years of learning from Methow and Utah and Washington state and Sherri Tippie and didn’t know the beavers in your care had pneumonia and you killed some beavers from TRAPPING STRESSORS?
“Beavers used to be everywhere, but sadly that is no longer the case,” said CDFW Director Charlton H. Bonham. “Our history treated beavers as nuisances, and we removed them from the landscape. In the past year CDFW working with the Tule River Tribe and the Maidu Summit Consortium brought beavers home to places they’ve been absent over 100 years.
“Beavers are nature’s Swiss Army knife. The things they can do are amazing. We are finding in some of our scientific work that when beavers are on the landscape in the Sierra, the way they can create wet meadows serves as a fire break that can slow down or even stop catastrophic wildfire,” added Director Bonham.
CDFW’s status report also details the process for submitting beaver restoration project proposals (i.e., translocation requests), identifying priority projects for future implementation and selecting beavers for translocation. Additionally, to better understand the current distribution of beavers in California, CDFW is asking for the public’s participation through an online Beaver Observation Survey Tool.
Beavers are wonderful and we don’t deserve them.
