Category: Beaver ecological impact

BOUCHER BELIEVES IN BEAVERS

It made me happy to see this headline the other day…I guess Bob isn’t retiring any time soon…

Boucher shares a healthcare plan for the watersheds

At the FLOW Science Symposium, held on September 23, at the River Arts Center in Prairie du Sac, Bob Boucher, founding president of the Superior Bio-Conservancy (SBC) shared his healthcare plan for watersheds, including the Lower Wisconsin State Riverway. His talk was entitled ‘Rewilding with Beavers: Improving Hydrology, Biodiversity and Climate Resilience.’

“Beavers are the original ecosystem engineers and habitat builders, and when humans can find ways to work with them and co-exist, the co-benefits will be profound,” Boucher explained. “The hydrological structure of streams with beavers give us the ideal shape to store and retain water on the landscape, increased resilience in the face of weather and climate extremes, improved water quality, stable quantities of water, increased biodiversity, flood reduction and climate resilience.”

And he’s off! One thing that particularly impresses me about Bob is how he gets the media to write down what he says exactly, and not fill in their gaps in attention with their own made up misinformation.

“Beavers were locally extinct in the Milwaukee River watershed by 1730,” Boucher explained. “All rivers in Wisconsin in pre-settlement times had a beaver pond structure.”

According to Boucher, beavers, when included in a natural watershed and landscape management plan, retain eight times as much volume of water as in watersheds without them. This results in making the watersheds flood resistant. They also filter and cool the groundwater entering the system, producing increased stream health, complexity and biological productivity.

“Essentially, beaver ponds function as sewerage treatment plants and storm detention ponds,” Boucher said. “Beavers create conditions for the abundance of flora and fauna, and natural predators create a counter pressure and help to regulate the populations. Home territories of predators focus on connected routes between beaver wetland complexes.”

Nicely done Bob, tie it into something they can relate to.

According to Boucher, including beavers in a watershed increases the amount of water retained on the landscape. This provides numerous ecological benefits, and supports the goals of ‘biological integrity’ in the Clean Water Act by:

• creating habitat and shelter for fish, plants and organisms

• reduction of pollutants, especially nitrates

• cleaner water through filtration and recharging groundwater

• stabilizes water temperature to be cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter.

“Beaver wetland ponds are keystone habitats to waterfowl, and all bird populations, including ducks, geese, swans, cranes, herons, bitterns, egrets, and more,” Boucher pointed out. “They also create connected habitats that facilitate species migration, which is crucial given the plummet in bird populations in recent years.”

Beaver wetland ponds also, by retaining more water on the landscape, can serve as firebreaks and a refuge for species during a wildfire, according to Boucher.

Perhaps the most significant benefit of co-existing with beavers for humans is the ability of their ponds to support storm water storage. With the increasingly large and intense rainfall events seen in recent years, beaver ponds serve as natural storm water retention structures, similar to the dams built by humans. These structures, like dams, store the runoff and release it slowly.

Dam that reporter is paying attention. Didn’ t I tell you? Bob and I did a talk together for the Oakmont Symposium a couple years ago, a smart ecological group of movers and shakers in Sonoma. He was a man who was often mystified by technology and absolutely brilliant when it came to explaining beavers.

Wisconsin out of step

Boucher pointed out that the State of Wisconsin is completely out of step with most states in terms of beaver management. He said that from 2000-2021, there had been 37,205 beavers killed in the state. He said this had ‘accidentally’ resulted in the killing of more than 2,200 otters.

“Wisconsin DNR sees beavers as threatening trout streams and creating nuisance flooding,” Boucher said. “On June 22, 2023, the Superior Bio-Conservancy filed a lawsuit against the USDA for killing 28,141 beavers, 1,091 river otters and destroying 14,796 beaver dams in 10 years, with all of the activity funded by the Wisconsin DNR. In 2022 alone, these activities hit a record high by killing 3,492 beavers – a figure more then three times the number anticipated in the 2013 environmental assessment.”

According to Boucher, the lawsuit alleges that as a result of this activity, WDNR and USDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) have destroyed wetlands, weakened flood resiliency and hampered biodiversity in the State of Wisconsin. The funds used for this ‘Beaver Elimination Program’ total millions of dollars, including revenue from timber sales from Wisconsin’s national forests.

According to WDNR, 32 percent of the state’s listed species are wetland dependent, and the state has already lost 47 percent of its original 10 million acres of wetlands. Thus, Boucher explained, beaver and beaver dam elimination further devastates and destroys the precious remaining damaged wetlands.

“After the 2013 assessment, APHIS failed to carry out the requirement to conduct annual reports on the beaver elimination program until 2020, when the six years prior were reviewed. The conclusion was that a revision to the program was needed because the amount of beavers killed was triple the amount targeted,” Boucher said. “And WNDR is no better, not following any accepted wildlife management guidelines for beaver. There is no WDNR tagging requirement or bag limit for the beaver trapping season, and in 2014, they discontinued all population counts.”

“To avoid being sued, APHIS responded to our lawsuit by August 17,” Boucher said. “We are hopeful that this will cause all stakeholders, and especially WDNR to review and revise the ongoing outdated beaver elimination program.”

Well to be fair, killing lots of beavers is right in step with most states including California. It’s just that the reason they do it is unique in all the world except for the next state over which is also insane. Blowing up beaver dams to save trout is deeply insane. Good luck fixing that Bob.

In summary, Boucher detailed things that citizens can do to produce a beaver management plan in the state that allows us to capture their ecosystem services for the benefit of humans, and allow for co-existence between beavers and humans:

• become a ‘Beaver Believer’ and encourage others to become one too

• talk with elected representatives to promote legislation and policies aimed toward co-existence and beaver protection

• promote non-lethal management

• continue learning, and stay engaged.

Well that’s pretty good advice for everyone and not just the part about beavers! Thanks Bob.

MARTINEZ BEAVERS IN SLATE MAGAZINE

Last month I spoke to a Ethan about the Martinez beavers and his idea for beavers in New York city. I wasn’t sure what would become of our conversation, but I was very pleased to see this last night.

Hot Dam

A radical, beaver-filled idea to improve city parks

Imagine a New York City brimming with life. A city where bullfrogs sing in marshes, where otters and muskrats frolic along the waterfront, and where kingfishers perform aerial acrobatics into ponds thick with fish.

This may seem like a distant dream. But what if I told you that New York could take a meaningful step toward this urban paradise with a little help from a humble rodent?

I’m talking, of course, about beavers.

People all over are starting to think about beavers in their neighborhoods and whether that could improve biodiversity. Well yes it could. But beavers aren’t throw pillows. You can’t just tuck a few where you want them and expect them to brighten the space.

They might have their own ideas.

But beavers, I realized one day, are not particularly large—and they prefer to stay in the water, away from dogs and small children. The question was: Would it be possible to introduce a small population of these semiaquatic rodents somewhere like Prospect Park?

“Oh, I think it’s possible. I totally do,” Benjamin Dittbrenner, a beaver expert at Northeastern University, told me.

Beavers can live in a relatively small area, Dittbrenner said, as long as there’s enough food and water. Prospect Park has plenty of water in its creeks, ponds, and lake—and those waterways are full of potential beaver food like pondweed. Beavers will also gnaw down trees along the water to open up space and stimulate the growth of the shrubby vegetation they love to eat, Dittbrenner said.

It was Ben who suggested the reporter might want to talk to me about what happens when beavers move into a city. Which I was happy about because I think Martinez makes a fine test case story.

That’s not to say bringing beavers to the big city would be easy.

In a place like Prospect Park, if a beaver were to dam up a creek, those creeks could flood, submerging nearby trails and amenities. Plus, the beavers would go to town on some of the park’s trees.

But these problems are manageable. To start, beavers don’t like to move very far over land, Fairfax said, meaning that only the trees closest to water would be at risk for gnawing—and the city could wrap fences around more important trees. The park could also plant some of the beavers’ preferred species, like willows, to supplement their food options, Dittbrenner suggested.

When it comes to flooding, as dedicated to hydrological interference as beavers are, humans are also pretty crafty. “Beavers: amazing engineers. People: also amazing engineers,” Fairfax said.

We’ve invented various ways of outsmarting beavers with contraptions like “pond levelers,” which drain water out of beaver ponds and limit flood potential. When trails do flood, the park can build signs to help people understand why the trails are flooding—Fairfax noted that ongoing environmental education is important for any urban beaver population. And when in doubt, the city could always build a boardwalk to help parkgoers cross over newly muddy patches. “People love boardwalks,” Fairfax said.

Happy that this got worked into the conversation. People need solutions when coexisting with urban beavers. And do they work?

Martinez Children watching Beaver- Suzi Eszterhas
Children watching beaver in urban environment
Martinez, CA

Beavers can also bring a lot of joy to a community. In 2006, beavers moved into Alhambra Creek, which runs right through downtown M.artinez, California. Initially, the city wanted to kill the animals because of flooding concerns, but many Martinez residents quickly protested the removal plan. This was partly because of local political quarrels, Heidi Perryman, a Martinez local and beaver advocate, told me—but at a 2007 City Council meeting to discuss the beavers’ fate, many locals also expressed their appreciation for the animals.

Eventually, the city installed a device to prevent the creek from flooding and wrapped some of the trees to prevent gnawing. The beavers, meanwhile, got to work transforming Alhambra Creek into a lush, vegetated habitat filled with animals like otters and green herons. Even though the beavers moved away from Martinez a few years ago, the city still hosts an annual Beaver Festival.

Tadaa! Martinez beavers in SLATE! Our little story and beaver festival in Slate! This must be kind of a big deal because Mark Ross himself wrote me back last night when I sent him this article.

What if, instead of trying to manage around our local ecosystems, we let our ecosystems manage us for a change? What if we let some beavers chop down a few trees, creating little glades of open sky next to our ponds? What if we embraced some flooding around our parks as biodiverse wetlands and vernal pools replaced sterile, trimmed lawns? What if, as Fairfax suggested, we reconnected Prospect Park to New York harbor by digging a canal through Brooklyn toward the East River or the bay?

Four hundred years ago, beavers covered New York City, building dams and engineering wetlands that shaped and nourished the local ecosystem. In our own efforts to manipulate and control nature, we’ve driven countless species toward extinction and pushed the world into climate crisis. Beavers are, in Dittbrenner’s words, “chaos-makers.” But maybe it’s time to stop separating ourselves from the chaos that is ecology, and instead embrace something disorderly, bold, and revolutionary—something, dare I say, bucktoothed.

Sounds plenty good to me.

IF YOU WANT SOMETHING DONE ASK A BEAVER

heidi08 Attitudes towards beavers, Beaver ecological impact, Beavers and water August 27, 2023

Supposedly Maggie Thatcher famously said “if you want something said ask a man, if you want something done ask a woman”. Which is very true and mostly more likeable than anything else I ever heard about her. Well maybe that’s true for beavers too.

Dr. Katie Holzer is a Watershed Scientist with the City of Gresham, Oregon. She completed her doctoral degree in Conservation Ecology at the University of California, Davis, where she studied amphibian habitats in urban and agricultural areas in the Pacific Northwest. Her research focuses on the human-animal-ecosystem connections affecting urban stormwater runoff and its impacts on freshwater habitats and water quality.

Earlier this week she presented her findings at the beaver institute and this part really blew me away. One treatment storage pond had a series of manmade steps to clear out particles and some beavers moved in and built dams RIGHT on top of them Here’s how they worked with and without beavers.

BEAVERS, CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE POWER OF POSITIVE STORIES

heidi08 Attitudes towards beavers, Beaver ecological impact, Beavers and climate change August 25, 2023

I get a little excited every time I read a NRDC article about beavers. It just feels like the heavy weights have joined the fray. This was not a disappointment,

Partnering with Beavers to Adapt to Climate Change

Mitigating climate change and adapting to a warming planet requires as many partners as we can muster. This includes embracing nature as a key ally. Estimates suggest that nature-based solutions can provide 37% of the mitigation needed to keep climate warming below two degrees Centigrade. And, nature, can help us prepare for the changes we are already experiencing and know are coming. Many people appreciate that if we plant more trees, they can both cool our cities and absorb carbon. But, perhaps less well known are the many benefits that beavers bring to the climate fight. Beavers are ecological engineers whose ponds store carbon, improve water quality, create habitat to support biodiversity, and help reduce climate impacts.

I’m dying of curiosity to know how they arrived at that figure. 37% of climate change relief? Really?

Riverscapes are stream or river habitats and their associated floodplains, wetlands, and riparian vegetation. These habitats are disproportionately important parts of the landscape, especially in arid and semi-arid regions. Riverscapes with beaver dam complexes are capable of naturally storing more water during storms and slowly releasing it later in the year. This reduces flood peaks and can prolong water availability during periods of heat and drought, supporting riparian vegetation and decreasing water-related stresses for aquatic and terrestrial wildlife. The wet, saturated soils and braided stream channels don’t readily burn and can therefore also serve as firebreaks, slowing the spread of fire, and giving firefighting teams time to contain them before they get out of control.

Now that is familiar and we know it well. Good for us. Good for beavers.

Beavers improve water quality and create biodiversity hotspots

Beaver-dam complexes improve water quality and reduce pollution. One way this is achieved is by providing a vegetated buffer between agricultural lands, transportation corridors, and other land uses and adjacent water bodies, which can filter out pollution and sediment before they can impact water quality. Maintaining or increasing beavers and their habitat benefits a wide array of native aquatic and terrestrial species. Beaver habitat provides microclimates and shade, complex hydraulics, clean and abundant water, nutrient cycling, and food-web support for a wide range of aquatic and terrestrial organisms, including endangered species. These benefits increase in importance as the climate warms.

You mean like this? Yes beavers really make biodiversity hotspots. Do you know I’ve seen three different organizations in three states copy this design and advertise it as their own. I guess that’s a kind of flattery.

Today, the beaver population in North America is estimated to be 10-15 million animals. And, wetlands in the continental United States have been reduced by more than half. Where beavers are absent or reduced in number, we are left without the rodent partners that can repair and restore our degraded streams and wetlands and sustain the ecosystem services communities need. Luckily, we can help nature bring back the conditions that beavers need by kickstarting natural processes. If we take steps to make riverscapes healthier again, beavers can return and get to work making dams of their own. Once this happens, ecosystem services can start to accrue.

I know right away the number one thing I would do to let beavers help with climate change. Get out of their way and stop killing them. That would be a great start.

The White House recently released a report outlining how we can invest in nature to solve today’s challenges. The report called out protecting beavers as a nature-based solution and recommends using federal facilities and assets to deploy a suite of nature-based approaches. To accomplish this, the Department of Interior and U.S. Department of Agriculture should work together to launch a National Healthy Riverscape Initiative to prioritize and invest in maintaining and restoring freshwater habitat on public lands. To support such an effort, the Bureau of Land Management should finalize its Public Lands Rule with strong provisions for both conserving and restoring priority lands and waterways. At the same time, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) should increase investments in wetland protection and restoration to support communities and tribes seeking to invest in nature-based solutions to reduce future flooding or increase ecological resilience to drought. By protecting and recovering the places that beavers live, programs such as these can give these critical animals an opportunity to revitalize the entire landscape.

And get out of their way and stop killing them. Don’t forget that part.

In 2022, the California legislature provided essential funding to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to invest in beavers’ natural ability to improve ecosystem health and help adapt to climate change. The agency is currently staffing up and developing a comprehensive beaver management program. Across the country, states are working to update their State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs) which will guide fish and wildlife conservation starting in 2025. Congress requires a SWAP for all states and territories that apply to the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants program which has distributed over one billion dollars since 2000. While beavers aren’t threatened, their beaver ponds create essential habitat for many species of greatest conservation need. Protecting and restoring beaver habitat should be prioritized in SWAPs. Finally, state, tribal, and local governments, can prioritize wetland protection and restoration to help reconnect streams to their floodplains as a risk mitigation strategy in the hazard mitigation plans required to secure grants from FEMA.

Okay. You can use California as a model. I’m not sure what they’ve accomplished yet but sure, it’s a start.

Tribes across the West are demonstrating what is possible when beavers are returned to the landscape. The Tulalip Beaver Project relocates “nuisance” beavers to hydrologically impaired tributaries in Washington’s upper Snohomish Watershed to improve fish rearing habitat and retain more freshwater in the watershed for longer periods of time. In Montana, the Blackfeet Nation’s Ksik Stakii Beaver Mimicry Guidebook focuses on mimicking beaver habitat to restore streams and naturally store water. And, in California, Indigenous leaders are leading the way in advocating for policies that support beavers to benefit salmon conservation and contribute to holistic land restoration.

Yeah. Okay. Hype California again.

If given the chance, beavers can serve as a free restoration workforce that increases our ability to adapt to climate change while also stemming biodiversity loss. Positive stories of communities, tribes, and landowners partnering with beavers are emerging across the country—let’s create more of them.

That last line is my favorite in the entire article. POSITIVE STORIES OF COMMUNITIES. Let’s create them. Tell them. Share them. And spread them. I think Martinez agrees with that.

By the way did you see that recently this was voted the most popular mural in Claycord?

Best Mural In Claycord? Nothing Says “Welcome” Better Than a Snorkling Beaver Eating Ice Cream

MARTINIZING CALIFORNIA?

heidi08 Attitudes towards beavers, Beaver ecological impact July 25, 2023

A couple of weeks ago I was contacted by AP reporter Amy Taxin regarding the beaver policy change in California and what it meant. She was also interested in what we saw in Martinez all those years ago when we decided to coexist with our beavers and our recent festival. She said their photographer needed to see some for the story so I introduced her to Rusty and the beavers in Napa.

When we talked about CDFW’s policy change and how we had been a test case for coexistence she quipped “So now the policy is to Martinize California?”:

Don’t look at me. I didn’t say it.

California aims to tap beavers, once viewed as a nuisance, to help with water issues and wildfires

(AP) — For years, beavers have been treated as an annoyance for chewing down trees and shrubs and blocking up streams, leading to flooding in neighborhoods and farms. But the animal is increasingly being seen as nature’s helper in the midst of climate change.

California recently changed its tune and is embracing the animals that can create lush habitats that lure species back into now-urban areas, enhance groundwater supplies and buffer against the threat of wildfires.

A new policy that went into effect last month encourages landowners and agencies dealing with beaver damage to seek solutions such as putting flow devices in streams or protective wrap on trees before seeking permission from the state to kill the animals. The state is also running pilot projects to relocate beavers to places where they can be more beneficial.

The aim is to preserve more beavers, along with their nature-friendly behaviors.

“There’s been this major paradigm shift throughout the West where people have really transitioned from viewing beavers strictly as a nuisance species, and recognizing them for the ecological benefits that they have,” said Valerie Cook, beaver restoration program manager for California’s Department of Fish and Wildlife. The program was funded by Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration last year.

You make it sound so simple and bloodless. A policy shift. Funny how minds just change like that. I mean it’s not like there were law suits and letters and heated meetings or anything.

The push follows similar efforts in other Western states including Washington, which has a pilot beaver relocation program, Cook said. It marks a new chapter in Californians’ lengthy history with the animals, which experts say used to be everywhere, but after years of trapping, attempts at reintroduction, and then removal under depredation permits, are found in much smaller numbers than they once were — largely in the Central Valley and northern part of the state.

It is unknown how many beavers live in California, but hundreds of permits are sought by landowners each year that typically allowed them to kill the animals. According to the state’s Department of Fish and Wildlife, the beaver population in North America used to range between 100 million and 200 million but now totals between 10 million and 15 million.

Kate Lundquist, director of the WATER Institute at the Occidental Arts & Ecology Center, said she expects California’s changes will lead to fewer beavers killed in the state and a growth in wetland spaces. She said she believes the past three years of drought and devastating wildfires contributed to the state’s shift on beavers.

“There has been increased motivation to identify and fund the implementation of nature-based climate smart solutions,” she said. “Beaver restoration is just that.”

Beavers live in family units and quickly build dams on streams, creating ponds. The pools help slow the flow of water, replenishing groundwater supplies, and can also stall the spread of wildfires — a critical issue for a state plagued by fires in recent years, said Emily Fairfax, professor of environmental science and management at California State University, Channel Islands.

“You talk to anyone who has lived near beaver ponds. They’ll tell you: These things don’t burn,” said Fairfax, who has researched beavers and the ponds they build.

Well okay, Before Emily leaves her job at Channel Islands and heads off to Minnesota pastures let her stand once more and recommend we need beavers here.

This is only part of the article I really LOVE. And see our influence in.

California will continue to issue depredation permits as needed, but the state wants people to try other solutions before resorting to killing the animals, officials said. Those could be wrapping trees with wire mesh or using flow devices on streams to control beaver pond levels to prevent flooding.

California has planned two pilot relocation projects, including one to bring beavers back to the Tule River. Kenneth McDarment, a councilmember for the Tule River Indian Tribe, said the tribe started seeking ways to reintroduce beavers nearly a decade ago due to drought and hopes to see them relocated later this year.

“We’re going to give these beavers a chance to do what they do naturally in a place where they’re wanted,” he said.

The state is also hoping to educate people about the benefits of beavers.

Rusty Cohn, a 69-year-old retired auto parts businessman, said he knew little about the animals before he spotted chewed trees on a walk through the Northern California city of Napa in a region better known for winemaking than the critters. He later observed beavers building a dam on a trickling stream, converting the area into a lush pond for heron, mink and other species, and became a fan.

“It was like a little magical place with an incredible amount of wildlife,” Cohn said. That was eight years ago, he said, adding that beaver sightings in that spot are becoming rarer amid increased development, but he can still find them on streams throughout Napa.

Ahh Rusty you took the words right out of my mouth! So glad the article ended with you. I guess it’s fine that our hour long conversation appears no where in it. You know how it is…

Always a bridesmaid and never a bride,