Category: Beavers and Forests

Surrounded by riches and treasures

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beaver Rehabilitation, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Environmental, Who's saving beavers now? December 5, 2016

It’s Monday, you have tons of Christmas wrapping and decorating to do, so you need this. Really.

Back when famed wildlife photographer was photographing our ill-fated baby beavers, she would have to leave occasionally to go to Washington where Sarvey rehab facility had a very small baby beaver that she needed to include with the photos for the beaver story for Ranger Rick. I remember because in the beginning she talked about filming him in a ghillie suit because he shouldn’t learn to trust humans. The timing is right and I think this little guy was it.

Never A Dull Bling

I work at Sarvey Wildlife Care Center, a rescue and rehab facility for wildlife.

In May 2015, this baby beaver was discovered by some campers. He was without his mother and too young to survive on his own, so the campers brought him to us. We actually already had a female beaver with us who was rehabbing from an animal attack, and the two beavers were eventually put together. The older female became a surrogate to the baby male. The two beavers spent a year with us. This past spring they were both released, together, in a secluded area with lots of access to trees, water, and natural habitat.

Beavers play a crucial role in biodiversity. Many species rely on beaver-created habitat, and a lot of these species who rely on beavers are threatened or endangered. This year, the baby American beaver was made Patient of the Year at Sarvey. Ornaments and cards were made to celebrate this particular animal.

BENEFITS OF BEAVER PONDS

Decrease damaging floods
Recharge drinking water aquifers
Remove pollutants from surface and ground water
Drought protection
Decreased erosion

Sarvey does excellent rehab work and has earned a reputation throughout the world for their wildlife care. Aside from having the very cutest kit photo I have ever seen, they understand why beavers matter, which isn’t always the case. If you want to send them some love donate here because they deserve it.

Now there’s something that I’m even more excited to talk about. It’s an article in the very respected magazine Natural History that a beaver buddy alerted me to yesterday. The article is by Katy Spence and she obviously spent some quality time with our beaver friends in Alberta with Dr. Glynnis Hood and Lorne Fitch of Cows and Fish. You can’t believe how great this article is. Guess what the title is. Go ahead, guess.

Ding! Ding! Ding! That’s the title I have been waiting for a decade to read! Somebody give Katy a Worth A Dam t shirt! Unfortunately the very impressive article isn’t online and doesn’t want to be shared with the likes of people who haven’t purchased a subscription, so it required stealth to obtain and sharing it with you requires stealth as well. I figured I’d put the cute baby photo on the top and all the copyright police would walk on by saying ohh, just some cute animal loving website; nothing to see here, move along.

Are they gone? Shhh. It starts with the account of Pierre Buldoc, who wanted to use beaver on is private land.

Sometimes called “nature’s engineers,” the North American beaver (Castor canadensis) is one of the few mammals — including humans — that substantially alters the landscape to suit its own needs. In fact, ecologists consider beavers to be a keystone species because their presence or absence will drastically change an ecosystem. With increasingly extreme weather events, ever-growing human populations, and declining freshwater sources, some beaver advocates believe the animals offer a vital, natural solution for retaining water in ponds and mitigating floods in other riparian ecosystems.

When Bolduc first proposed reintroducing beavers to the landscape, his neighbors — not to mention county officials — were not happy. Beavers had previously clogged a nearby culvert, which, in turn, often washed out the road. They were a nuisance, so the county removed them. Property values, crops, and roads in many rural areas have suffered damage from beaver construction sites. Sometimes, the territorial rodents will cut a favorite tree or even kill curious pets.

Yet, the rodents have had a tremendous impact on Bolduc’s pond. After approaching each of his neighbors individually about the beavers to convince them to try his reintroduction experiment, they eventually agreed. He even suggested an alternate solution for the county road: beaver-proof culverts. Unlike standard culverts, which run parallel to the water, these culverts are perpendicular — letting water rise into them like a straw in a glass. If the water gets high enough, it will drain through a connected horizontal pipe that runs underneath the road, preventing floods. Even when the beavers’ dam breached in May 2016 and drained hundreds of thousands of gallons of water, the culvert prevented a flood.

As climate change increases the risk of extreme weather events, some scientists are eyeing beavers as a tool for maintaining volatile watersheds. In 2008, Glynnis Hood, an environmental scientist at the University of Alberta-Augustana who specializes in wetland ecology and the impact of beavers, published a paper describing beavers’ unprecedented ability to mitigate drought. She and her team analyzed fifty-four years of drought data from Elk Island National Park in Alberta and found that where beaver dams were present, there was more water-up to nine times that of a pond or water source without beavers. Because beaver ponds are so much deeper than other ponds, water lasts longer, even in times of drought.

Hood has continued to examine the nuanced effect beavers have on a landscape, as well as how humans respond to them. She’s completing a study that compares costs of different beaver management efforts. The study will contribute to a larger project, called Leave it to Beavers, which aims to reduce human-beaver conflict. The Alberta-based, inter-agency effort uses citizen science to gather information about the long-term effects beavers can have on a landscape. The project is composed of several agencies, including the Alberta Riparian Habitat Management Society, a non-government agency informally known as “Cows and Fish.” Cows and Fish works with landowners and stakeholders to clarify how water flows through different landscapes, especially agricultural areas.

A riparian specialist for Cows and Fish, Lome Fitch, is trying to spark discussions about living with beavers. He offers a voluntary workshop on how beavers affect the landscape and how humans can peacefully coexist with them. He isn’t interested in pushing people to accept beavers, necessarily. He’s simply holding the door open. “You don’t bring people to the middle,” Fitch said. “You just start them thinking about where their position is and, hopefully, use that and expand their information sources. Maybe they’ll continue to migrate towards the middle.”

Fitch developed a ten-step list of goals, the first of which is building tolerance. Perhaps the most formidable step will be to change government policy in Alberta. The province has no clear policy concerning beavers, leaving confusion over what is permitted and what is not when it comes to relocation and rehabilitation.

The article goes into a full description of flow devices and how they work, and talks about how Glynnis and her students are using them effectively and teaching others how to use them. It even talks about how polarizing beavers are, Rachel Haddock of the Miitakis Institute calls them the ‘Wolves of the watershed’ because people either love them or hate them. Ahh! Sounds familiar!

Then it ends on this POWERFUL note.

If people are willing to compromise with beavers now, the result could be a new narrative in which humans and wildlife co-engineer a healthier, more resilient landscape. The big unknown is whether or not we can move past old assumptions.

That sure is the big unknown alright. But wowowow! What a fantastically public place to put this out there. We can only hope it gets read and circulated in all the right places. Lets hope someone leaves it on the governor’s desk right away. And decorates the halls of congress with it. And forces everyone waiting in line trying to get a depredation permit to read it. And if, btw, you work somewhere someone needs to read it email me, and we’ll see what we can do.

And a child shall lead them…

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Who's saving beavers now? November 24, 2016

Mike Callahan posted these photos on the Beaver Management Forum page. This is a first year robotics team called the “Greenheads” with a leader that employed Mike recently to install a flow device and unflood a trail in Massachusetts. Vance the leader blogged about it nicely which I’ve excerpted. You can read about the whole project here:

This fall The Greenheads are taking on the Animal Allies Challenge. The challenge is composed of Core Values, Project and Robot Game components. For The Project, they were tasked with:

Identifying a problem when people and animals interact.
Designing a solution that makes the interaction better for animals, people, or both.
Sharing the problem and solution with others.

The team began by conducting some online research. This led them to consult with beaver expert Mike Callahan from Beaver Solutions. During their interview, Mike explained that beavers are a Keystone species and their work is critical for biodiversity. He did a great job describing how the work that beavers do can be a nuisance for people but how simple solutions can be deployed to remediate common problems seen when people and beavers interact. The kids proposed their idea of building a bridge to replace the current planks on trail 75 and Mike offered feedback on the pros and cons of such a bridge, along with the materials that could be used.

I couldn’t be more proud of The Greenheads. Their teamwork was first-class, they had a lot of fun, and they learned a great deal about the importance of human and beaver interaction. Their solution is certainly an improvement over the previous one and hopefully their efforts will improve the alliance between people and beavers by allowing the beavers to continue to improve biodiversity and water quality in the area while permitting people full access to the trails throughout the year. The team is now sharing their work with the community and preparing for their upcoming robotics event later this month. Go Greenheads!!!

They went on to teach other teams and their class mates what they did and why beavers matter. Look closely at their lovely folded beaver display because you might recognize one of the photos. (And no, I didn’t photo shop it in!)

From Vance G. in Ipswich, MA: “Just a quick update. Thought you’d like to see some pictures from their event this past weekend. They did a great job educating the judges and other teams about beavers.”

That’s right, with a decade of blogging and designing, we’ve created a trickle down beaver economy that will keep pollinating itself long after we’ve gone! That’s my graphic in the middle using Scott Stolsenberg of Ohio’s awesome photo and about 20 other artists silhouettes because creation requires collaboration.

Even without beavers in residence I guess there’s still lots to be thankful for this year. Have a wonderfully thankful day!

MORE TO BE THANKFUL FOR! This just in: Beavers approved in Scotland!

Beavers to remain in Scotland

The Scottish Government is minded to allow beavers to remain in Scotland, Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham has announced.

Ms Cunningham has said the species will have to be actively managed, in line with practices in other European countries.

Work has now begun to ensure beavers can be added to Scotland’s list of protected species as soon as possible. It will be the first time a mammal has been officially reintroduced to the UK.

Scottish Ministers have agreed that:

Beaver populations in Argyll and Tayside can remain
The species will receive legal protection, in accordance with the EU Habitats Directive
Beavers will be allowed to expand their range naturally
Beavers should be actively managed to minimise adverse impacts on farmers and other land owners

It will remain an offence for beavers to be released without a licence, punishable by up to 2 years imprisonment and an unlimited fine

Research has shown beavers, which were native to Scotland before being hunted to extinction in the 16^th century, provide important biodiversity benefits.

Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham said:

“I have been determined to find a pragmatic approach, which balances the biodiversity benefits of reintroducing beavers with the obvious need to limit difficulties for our farmers.

We are soo SOOO happy for our Scottish beaver friends. I know for a fact it was a heck of a lot of working protecting them in a single city. Imagine how much harder it was to protect them in the entire COUNTRY!!!! Congratulations Paul and Louse et al al al!!!!

Colorado Callings

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers, Who's saving beavers now? November 3, 2016

You really should watch this. It was a piece of work to put together, I can promise. But I’m fairly cheered with the result, and with the tech help from Powtoon who for some reason answer questions IMMEDIATELY and at night even if I’m using the free version. Thank you.

Now that you’re informed, maybe you’re looking to share what you know? How about a career in beaver education? Beaver Ponds in Colorado is looking for a new executive director.

Job Description:

Beaver Ponds – www.beaverponds.org – is a young, 501c3 non-profit that began operations in October 2012.

Beaver Ponds mission is to provide environmental education that gives individuals of all ages the tools and knowledge to become better stewards of the earth. Its vision is to become a leading environmental education center inspiring action to protect and improve the environment.

Beaver Ponds serves individuals of all ages in its experiential field-classroom setting. A significant portion of Beaver Ponds’ initiatives are developing programs that will educate young people on how to be better stewards of the earth. Schools visit Beaver Ponds to enhance science lessons through hands-on experiences in ways that strive to meet Colorado State Education Standards.

Beaver Ponds focuses on 6 program areas:
1. Beaver Ecology
2. Watershed Ecology & Stewardship
3. Sustainable Agriculture, Greenhouses & Gardening
4. Medicinal & Native Plants
5. Renewable Energy Systems
6. Healthy Forest Management

That’s right. You could get PAID for doing what I do every day for free. Who knew? The job is is in Park Co Colorado between Fairway and Alma and the center is at a cool 10,200 feet elevation. Altitude sickness might be a issue. When I was in Cuzco, Peru (11,200) a million years ago I was sick as a dog for a while. But hey, its for beavers. You can do it for beavers, right?

Of course the added bonus is that Sherri Tippie is 90 minutes away! Wouldn’t it be fun to do donuts and coffee every saturday?

This morning I’m off to meet with the Junior High principal to talk about his new neighbors. Flashbacks to 7th grade might be an issue. But hey, its for beavers. I can do it for beavers. right?

State of the Beaver 2017

heidi08 Beaver Conference, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Who's saving beavers now? November 2, 2016

The State of the Beaver Conference Website is up and running. They are still in the process of adding presenters to the agenda so the schedule isn’t filled in yet, but it is already looking fine.

The State of the Beaver Conference

This Year’s Theme: Beaver – Agents of Regeneration

From its inception the Beaver Advocacy Committee (BAC) has well understood that a lack of data, disinformation and a dearth of understanding regarding the benefits of beaver ecology has dominated many State agency policy making venues. There was also evident a deeply entrenched cultural intransigence and social stigma in local communities associated with beaver in western society. “Grandfather did it this way and so do I.”

In contrast to this, many valuable studies have been done by several reputable academic institutions and government agency employees making it clear that beaver ecology a significant component essential to threatened specie recovery.

As a result BAC began directing its efforts to gather as much current information that they could find to address restoration ecology issues. A cursory survey of contemporary individuals interested in the science and application of beaver ecology turned up an wonderful array of resources. The end result was the establishment of the State of the Beaver Conference regime. A strategy to consistently meaningfully gather new and old beaver ecology advocates was born.

The conferences are designed to be low budget. Though we value immensely the investments individuals have made to glean data and discover critical influences of beaver ecology, we wanted to make the conferences affordable to anyone that wanted to come. At the same time it was important to have the highest caliber of academic and professional standards possible for the purposes of disseminating worthy information and networking. The design was to have science and information meld with grass roots passion and commitment. What value is a published pier reviewed scientific paper if it sits on a shelf or remains in the ethereal realms of intellectual nuance?

Since then we have had the incredible experience of working with deeply committed scientists, academics and visionary advocating individuals at these biennial events. People from across the world have come to the State of the Beaver Conferences to contribute their expertise and passion. Through the awesome venue of world communication we have become a support network to move this critical ecology forward. We do this as people of place connected to our own ecosystem health. The idealism that drives natural science discovery is melded with practitioners of restoration ecology and human infrastructure/nature interfaces. We are grateful for this participation.

We especially want to thank the many individuals who have contributed to the conference successes. There are far too many to enumerate individually. The Cow Creek Band of the Umpqua Tribe of Indians has been particularly generous in supporting this work. Needless to say we want to extend our sincere gratitude to Leonard and Lois Houston for their tireless commitment to enhance life in our world.

The conference is truly THE place to hear and talk about new developments being done to cooperate with beaver and benefit from their hard work. If you’ve ever thought about going you really should plan on making the trip. It’s a pleasant drive and it truly exciting to be in a room full of these eager minds connecting and recharging off each other. I have heard that Cows and Fish’s Lorne Fitch is gratefully considering being there with Worth A Dam and Leonard Houston’s help. Obviously I’ll be there as well – so you’ll already know people.

Here’s the outline for my talk I just pulled together last weekend.

Surviving and Thriving with Urban Beavers

Urban streams boast the low gradients and comfortable conditions beavers prefer. Even more inviting, these neglected corridors often come decorated with appetizing trees. In 2015 alone 38 states reported beaver activity in urban areas. While trapping is still the most common answer to uninvited beavers, more and more cities like Martinez CA are learning to welcome these ecosystem engineers with surprisingly beneficial results.

Dr. Perryman formed Worth A Dam to defend the beavers in her home town of Martinez CA. Using outreach, resource coordination and the educational website ‘martinezbeavers.org/wordpress’ the group works to teach other cities how and why to co-exist with beavers. In 2016 the group won the John Muir Conservation award for education. Since 2008 it has organized an annual beaver festival that has inspired similar efforts in 5 states and Canada. Last year, the festival was formerly recognized and added to the national congressional record. As California faces more drought years, Perryman believes that it is more important than ever to coexist with these important ‘water savers’.

Skip Lisle made a flow device in the conference hall at the first meeting which I didn’t attend. I talked Mike Callahan into attending the second one where I was star-struck to meet Sherri Tippie, Mary Obrien and Glynnis Hood. I convinced Leonard that Brock Dolman of OAEC should talk at the third one and Mike Settell of Watershed Guardians on stage as well. I’ve played my little part in deepening the beaver bench over the years so to speak, and I sometimes get fed up of listening to talks were people are only thinking about using beavers as a means to an end but I always come back a little smarter and eager to work harder.

More wonders from Cows and Fish

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers, Who's saving beavers now? October 29, 2016

Time for more beaver wisdom from our very impressive friends at Cows and Fish in Alberta.

Beavers are friends of the environment

Beavers were promoted as friends of the environment and property owners during Beavers in Our Landscape workshop Oct. 12 in High Prairie.

Lesser Slave Watershed Council and Peace Country Beef and Forage Association co-hosted the event with presenters from Cows and Fish – Alberta Riparian Habitat Management Society.

“Livestock producers usually consider beavers as pests,” says Jen Allen, agri-environmental program co-ordinator of the beef and forage association.
“The workshop showed that we can work and live with beavers.”

Currently the critters seem to be rampant in the northern parts of Alberta.

“Beavers will always be prevalent here, so more people need to know about them better,” says Kaylyn Jackson, watershed co-ordinator for the water council.

Cows and Fish presenters urge property owners and livestock producers to be friends with beavers, that help sustain and enhance water supply and provide many benefits to the environment, habitat and people.

One of the most remarkable things about this Alberta organization is that it marches straight into the heart of the greatest possible beaver conflict and teaches “It is in your best interest to keep beavers on your land”. Even the name itself conveys how unafraid of conflict they are. They understand that you will never convince folks to work with beaver if they feel it is not in the interest of the two things held most dear to them: so Cows and Fish is a fearless name for this fearless organization.

Earlier this year they released their very impressive publication on beaver ecosystem services which you should go read again here and resolving conflicts. It happens to have some of the VERY BEST teaching illustrations I have ever seen on the subject, crafted by their brilliant artist Elizabeth Saunders.

And my personal favorite:

Back to the article which does a less outstanding job at describing this:

“We encourage people to work together and have conversations about where beavers fit into the watersheds and landscapes and how we might expand our tolerance for them,” says Kerri O’Shaughnessy, riparian specialist.
“We want to give people a better understanding of beavers so we can look at ways of living with them and reducing the conflict.”

A pond leveler maintains the capacity of water that suits the landowner and the beaver.

Wrapping the trunks of large trees with wire mesh deters beavers from cutting them down.

Other tips are offered in the section Beaver Solutions in the booklet Beaver – Our Watershed Partner, published by Cows and Fish in 2016.

-For smaller areas, excluding beaver with a mesh fence is an option to protect valuable trees and shrubs in yards.
-Fences can protect young trees, often the most targeted age classes of woody vegetation by beavers and many other animals.
-Circular wire mesh extending upstream of a culvert may prevent beavers from damming the flow.
-The most effective deterrent is fencing coupled with moving the intake of water far upstream of the culvert with a pipe system.
-Greater success will occur by increasing the area blocked from beaver upstream of a culvert. Beaver may create a dam upstream but the culvert will remain unplugged.

Honestly, I love seeing any article with their name in it because I always know I’ll be delighted by what is said. I made sure to invite their director, Lorne Fitch, to the state of the beaver conference and he said he was very interested but didn’t think he could afford the flight. Sad face. We need to hear more from them. You do such great work, Cows and Fish!

Now, if only they could start a sister organization in Saskatchewan!

Save