On Thursday I was happy as a cloud because this article appeared and I knew everything about the festival was going to work out fine. Two wholly unexpected compliments were dropped in my lap and I started to feel uneasy. When is the other shoe going to drop?
I got my answer the following day when a key player withdrew from the festival and I was left scrambling to cover. Everything felt bleak, like the festival could never succeed, like it wouldn’t even happen.
And then I remembered the annual bipolar event planning.
‘Let It Beaver’: Popular Wildlife Festival Returns To East Bay
MARTINEZ, CA — What started as a controversy turned out to be a teaching moment on how an entire state can cooperate with beavers.
Now valued for their benefit to water storage, wildlife and fire prevention, beavers will celebrate their 15th festival in the city that was first to learn about them.
From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, June 29, over 50 nature groups will gather at the historic Susana Park in Martinez to celebrate urban wildlife and invite the public to join them.
I felt better remembering I have been here before. Every year for 17 years in fact. It’s practically a tradition.
Renowned chalk artist Amy Gallaher Hall from Napa will create a beaver mural in the plaza, and the Acorn MusEcology Project will come from Sonoma County to perform “original beaver music,” according to Heidi Perryman, longtime organizer of the event.
The beloved event celebrates the unwelcome beavers who took up residence in Alhambra Creek in 2007 and caused a flood of concerns about the wildlife often seen as pests. The result: an outpouring of support for Buster Beaver, the original beaver father who co-habited with two consecutive mama beavers in Martinez for 10 years, resulting in 27 kits (beaver babies). Beavers believed to be his descendants have shown up in recent years in urban waterways in Walnut Creek, Fairfield, Sonoma and Napa, Perryman told Patch.
“The beaver population is rebounding all over the Bay Area, and we believe the 27 kits born in Martinez had a huge part to play in that,” Perryman said. “Plus, the Martinez success story influenced new beaver policies from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.”
Sure there are ups and downs along the way but we usually muddle through.
She encourages families to bring their children to the festival for an education about beavers and other area wildlife and their contributions to the local ecosystem.
“Take a photo with the Martinez Beaver mascot and let your child solve a wildlife puzzle while browsing the gift-laden silent auction,” said festival founder Heidi Perryman. “It’s a dam [sic] good time you won’t want to miss!”
You know how it is. If things go well I feel uneasy and if things fall apart I get stubborn.
