Breached beaver dam closes Mount Jefferson Road in Hubbardston

HUBBARDSTON — The breach of a beaver dam Sunday along Mount Jefferson Road wasn’t bad, unless you live in Marjorie Filleul’s house at No. 26.  “The water came from the street into our front yard. It ruined our driveway and made a couple of ponds in the back,” Ms. Filleul said. Some of the water ended up in her basement, as well.

 The flooding closed the road as crews worked to plow away the rocks and debris that landed there, she said.  Photographs from the scene show damage to the roadway and swaths cut across yards by the rush of water.

Never mind that there was about 5 inches of rain last month in Hubbardston and more in April. It’s gotta be the beaver’s fault because who else can you blame? At least there WAS a beaver dam in beaver-challenged Massachusetts. People who let it stay near or on their property. Although that might not happen again, after this story.

Because driveways never flood without beavers.

A nice article on identifying active beaver lodges after snowmelt from naturalist Mary Holland. Of course it’s absolutely no use at all in Martinez, but you’ll enjoy it anyway.

Beaver ponds have finally started to melt, making it easy to determine whether or not there have been beavers living in any existing lodges over the winter. The tell-tale sign is floating de-barked sticks and branches. During the winter, beavers leave their lodge and swim out to their underwater food supply pile and haul branches back into the lodge where they chew them into foot-long pieces for easy handling. The bark is removed and eaten as the beaver holds the stick and turns it, much as we consume corn on the cob. When little or no bark remains, the stick is discarded out in the open water. These sticks remain hidden underneath the ice on the surface of the water until warm weather arrives and the ice begins to melt. At this point the sticks and branches become visible, and often extend several feet out from the lodge. These sticks will not go to waste, but will be used for dam and lodge repairs. (Photo taken standing on lodge.)

Nice tip, Mary! I will make sure our sierra beaver friends see it. Mary has the brilliant attention to detail and observation skills that has turned into a very successful website and several well-respected books. I am always thrilled to see what she has written and photographed.

Still, our beaver friend and photographer Ann Siegal and myself both had the same reaction about the last line. “Ack! Don’t Stand on The Lodge!” we both said instinctively when we read that. Maybe because we’re used to beavers in more urban areas where there are many more curious feet to worry about. Or maybe we’re just beaver-centric. I admit, I’ve seen footage of bears, cougars, beavers and other heavy things standing on the lodge and not falling through. But she saw a high school student fall through one! Why risk it? Just imagine if baby beavers were sleeping inside and you crushed them!

When I went to her site I saw that she just published a children’s book on beavers so of course you know what I did.

Along a stream a dam pops out of the water. Beavers are busy at work! These aquatic mammals have unique traits that aid them in building the perfect lodge to raise young beavers and keep predators away. Mary Holland’s vibrant photographs document the beavers’ activities through the course of a year. Do these beavers ever take a break? Follow along as they pop through the winter ice to begin the busy year of eating bark, building dams and gathering food just in time for winter to come again.

Someone get me a cup of tea and a cozy chair, I know just what I’m doing for the next half hour! Mary kindly wrote me back that same day:

What a great event and poster you have, for such a worthy cause! I have forwarded your email to my publisher and asked if they would send you a copy of THE BEAVERS’ BUSY YEAR. If they don’t, I will – I’ve asked them to let me know, but if you don’t hear from them within a week or so, would you let me know and I’ll put a copy in the mail to you. Congratulations on the success of your project! Mary

 Thanks Mary! The publisher wrote me this morning and is sending a copy forthwith. If you can’t wait for summer to get your own, go here to support her lovely work. Mary lives in Vermont, the same state as Skip Lisle who installed our flow device, which we are not at all surprised about. The same state as many good beaver articles. Let’s hope we get another lodge some day to be careful of, and just remember that it never hurts to ask…