Category: Beavers and Insects

Afancod for all!

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beaver Chewing, Beavers, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Friends of Martinez Beavers, Who's saving beavers now? January 17, 2017

Wales is on the beaver Warpath, and something tells me they aren’t giving up on their quest to reintroduce beavers any time soon. When Scotland gave the all clear they were immediately lining up to be next. They will be presenting at the beaver conference next month in Oregon. It’s pretty generous them to all do this separately, so we get to prolong the discussion of beaver benefits as long as possible. After they succumb, we still get all of England to do the promoting! Then what?

Proposals to reintroduce beavers to parts of Wales

A SPECIAL talk is to be held next week over proposals to reintroduce beavers to parts of Wales.

Welsh beaver project officer Alicia Leow-Dyke will be opening up the elusive world of beavers at a free event at the Centre for Alternative Technology on 24 January.

Alicia, of the Radnorshire Wildlife Trust, will talk about beaver ecology, the history and future of beavers in Wales and the impacts that beavers have on ecosystems, looking at how this can benefit many species, including humans.

In a report by the WBAI they said: “Beavers are often considered a ‘keystone’ species in aquatic environments, with an ability to modify riverine and wetland habitats to the benefit of many other species, with few negative effects.”

That sentence makes me excited and nervous in exactly equal measures. Yes, beavers modify rivers and benefit species but oh they bring a few negative effects for humans. Or at lets call them ‘challenges’. Truly solvable and worth doing but unfortunately not all people are up for a challenge. I’ll let them know when I get to meet them (assuming the sled dogs can get us both there). Here they are listed on the agenda for the State of the beaver conference:

5:00 pm – 5:45 pm

“The Long Road: Returning Beavers to Wales.”

Adrian Lloyd Jones, Wildlife Trusts Wales. Alicia Leow-Dyke, Wildlife Trusts Wales

Nice photo published this morning from Jestephotography I thought deserved sharing. His description says:

While out at Elk Island National Park this fall I stopped to set up on a family of 5 beavers , mom n pop with 3 offspring doing what beavers do. Most of the time they where at a mid distance but this fellow decided the log right in front of me needed a good chewing. I was belly down in the mud with my lens poking out between the cat tails for this one.

There but for the grace of beavers

heidi08 Beaver Chewing, Beavers, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Who's blaming beavers now? December 29, 2016

It was such a big story yesterday they sent their news cameras to the scene of the crime. Mostly cries if vandalism, but you gotta’ love that resident who suggest “PROTECTING THE IMPORTANT TREES”. For some reason late December-early January has always been a tree chewing time. I remember our beavers gnawing several trees every new year’s without taking anything down. It seemed so wasteful and I thought their ‘forest’ looked a like most people’s living rooms the day after new years – Empty bottles piled up like dead soldiers.

Apparently it happens all over at this time of year. I guess they just get restless and need something toothy to gnaw. Or they need to sharpen their teeth before mating. Here’s a similar report from Brampton, Ontario.

Beavers become gnawing problem for Brampton residents

Call it an epic struggle between man and beast. The man is Giuseppe (Joe) Vommaro on behalf of his Mountainberry Road neighbours.

The beast?

A colony of beavers that has gnawed down trees, built dams and, according to residents, exposed homeowners living along Stephen Llewellyn Trail in Springdale to the risk of flooding.

“We have a big, big problem here,” said Vommaro, one of several residents at odds with the City of Brampton on what to do with these unwanted neighbours.

Residents want the dam destroyed and the beavers evicted. But the wildlife and dam are protected. Rather than euthanize or toss the beavers out, the city’s animal services department has taken several measures to encourage the beavers to move out on their own like wrapping trees with mesh wire.

“That’s not good enough,” said Vommaro, complaining city officials have been slow to react to residents’ concerns. He argued the city has left homeowners to deal with the wildlife problem it helped create.

Beavers moved into the neighbourhood in 2011 after the city moved to “re-naturalize” the stormwater channel that runs between Mountainberry Road and Sandalwood Parkway, just west of Airport Road.

It was soon after city crews planted trees and made other changes that neighbours say beavers moved in and made quick work of the landscape.

Dammed off by wood and brush, the once flowing channel has transformed into a wetland and presented homeowners with some unique challenges.

Oh no! They made a wetland? You mean to say those beavers have created one of the most important environment’s on earth in just a few short months? No wonder you’re outraged. Let me just say one thing to Mr. Vommaro. Wrapping trees isn’t supposed to make the beavers “leave”, or the trees leave, or you leave even It’s just supposed to make them less accessible. Did any of your wrapped trees get chewed? Just asking.

Mr, Vommaro and his neighbors are now complaining the flooded vegetation stinks like excrement and no one wants to barbecue anymore. Plus all that water will bring more mosquitoes! Something must be done right away.

Animal services crews are scheduled to return in the spring to get a better handle on whether these measures are enough to encourage the beavers to move on.

Vommaro said without a lasting solution to the problem —reverting the trail to its pre-2011 state — beavers will continue to be a gnawing problem for residents of this Springdale neighbourhood.

Ahhh a true ecologist! Return the area to its prenaturalized state by adding more concrete and maybe the beavers will stay out. Or you know you could just install a flow device and drain some of that water away. But that would be actually solving the problem. You obviously don’t want to do anything like that.

Let me tell you a little story I heard about a city very far away. Their creek and Marina were damaged with chemicals and riprap. And some people worked very, very hard for half a century to get it restored. As soon as they finished some beavers moved in. Just like that. People were very surprised. But a very wise man said to me that it was a stamp of approval for all their hard work. He knew the beavers were a reward for a job well done. But some curmudgeons like you said it was icky and the beavers needed to be gotten rid of.

If you want to know what happened next read ‘our story’. And if you want to know who the very wise man was click here.

Christmas for Beavers

heidi08 Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Ice, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water December 25, 2016

Merry Christmas! The present I got you is one-of-a-kind and really hard to find. It’s a nice article from a property-owner who enjoys the beavers in his pond and is having fun watching them. No need to thank me. The look on your face is thanks enough.

A crash course in beaver denizenery

When three beavers in our Back 50 pond whacked their tales – in unison, no less – I was smitten.

***Beavers on the pond: When three beavers in Denis Grignon’s Back 50 pond whacked their tales – in unison, no less – he was smitten***

From my lawn chair on shore, they’re always entertaining. Industrious. Patient. Determined. Funny.

Hey, the internet is spotty in our parts and this is 4D TV – without the cumbersome pick-and-pay contract.

My recent fascination with them coincided with what would become our worst drought in decades. Our pond’s about the length of a football field – the larger Canadian field, fittingly, given its inhabitants, eh.

As the water level dropped drastically, it resembled a large puddle dotted with what appeared to be about a dozen beaver lodges. But were there really more lodges than in previous years? Or had the receding water simply made them more visible?

Ahh, Denis! I can’t tell you how refreshing it is to read about someone actually watching beavers instead of just trapping them because they’re a nuisance. He’s located in Peterborough, across Lake Ontario from New York. Maybe he has benefited from our friends in the area? I myself started watching beavers a million years ago because they were ‘cool’ to watch and I was curious about them. It opened the door for learning and helped me be forever hooked.

Seems Denis is watching them during a drought year, while the pond shrinks. This makes several other lodges visible that he hadn’t noticed before. He wonders whether more beavers move into a pond in drought and whether there will be competition.What he doesn’t realize, is that beavers don’t ‘go’ where there’s water, they more or less make water wherever they ‘go’. Beaver ponds in drought contained 9 times more water than equivalent ponds without beaver according to Dr. Glynnis Hood’s Alberta research. For the most part, the strange thing is he asks people who tell him the right answer. Go figure.

“You probably already know that beavers are territorial,” Lisa Soloman, a management biologist with the Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR), told me.

Uh, no. I didn’t. But go on, I pleaded.

“All beavers in a pond are related,” she continued, explaining that a pair will breed, keep their three to five “kits” nearby for about two years, then send them off to university or to teach English overseas.

So my pond is not overcrowded. And those additional lodges I thought I saw are, according a friend and hunter, merely failed construction attempts.

Is there anything, then, I can do to ensure a second season of my backyard reality TV?

“I would say nothing!” says Soloman. “This is how nature works. If the conditions aren’t good for them, they may not survive or they may disperse…But if it’s good habitat, new beavers can move in and claim the unoccupied territory.”

Wow, not only is Denis enjoying them now, he wants them to stay next year. I appreciate Lisa Solomon’s mostly accurate advice. But I disagree with one part. ‘Nature’ is no longer the thing that decides whether beavers will stick around or not. Human interest is. And if you’re happy to have those little flat-tails as your neighbors I would say the odds of them sticking around are very, very good.

You might also plant a little willow from cuttings around the pond’s edge. Good for the pond anyway and the beavers will help keep it thriving. Happy watching!

Speaking of beaver lodges, I thought this was a great photo of the one Suzi Eszterhas took in Napatopia. How’s that for ‘Nature in the City’? Happy Christmas!

Three states of why beavers matter

heidi08 Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Ice, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, City Reports, Environmental, Who's Killing Beavers Now? December 19, 2016

Sometimes we get the faintest whiff of beaver benefits and actual solutions from sources you’d never expect. I think I’m a little like a mother who knows that her middle child isn’t the brightest bulb in the box and so reacts with extra praise when he gets the simple problems right. We want to encourage them, right?

Discover Nature and Evidence of Beavers in Your Area

This is the Missouri chapter of public radio, not an area usually known for progressive beaver solutions. So this quote at the end got my attention:

Beavers play a valuable role by damming backed up silt-laden waters and subsequently forming many of the fertile valley floors in the wooded areas of our continent. Beaver dams stabilize stream flow, slow down run-off, and create ponds which influence fish, muskrats, minks and waterfowl.

However, some landowners wish to protect certain trees from potential damage from beaver cutting. This can be done by enclosing the target trees with wire netting up to a height of three feet.

It must be the season. This article from North Carolina actually focuses on the benefits of joining BAMP (their beaver-killing club), but look at what it also finds time to include;

Rodent causes problems for farmers, residents and roadways

Beaver aren’t all bad. In fact, they can be responsible for some very diverse ecosystems. A 2015 PBS article titled, “Leave it to Beavers,” explains beaver dams as “Earth’s Kidneys.”

“Beaver dams and the ponds they produce act as filters, generating cleaner water downstream.”

One pond observed in Greene County, known as good duck hunting grounds, has a beaver family to thank. The dam extends several hundred feet across the mouth of a swamp creating a large, shallow home to waterfowl.

You heard it here, folks. Beavers aren’t ALL bad! Spoken like the most educated ecological mind in the entire state. Over the years I’ve become accustomed to the annual justification for BMAP printed in local papers. Usually they say something about how bad beavers are and what a cost-saving deal it is for the unlucky counties that are suckered into it.

Seeing the need for the management for the ever-increasing damage caused by the growing beaver population, State Legislative action created the North Carolina Beaver Management Assistance Program in 1992.

BMAP is a cost share program to aid landowners having problems with beaver damage. As of 2016, the cost share is a $4,000 per county contribution for annual membership.

The BMAP cooperative endeavor also receives funding from the NC Wildlife Resources Commission, NC DOT, USDA Wildlife Services and others.

Participation in BMAP is a county-by-county decision. Locally, Lenoir and Greene County participate, Jones County does not.

The total $21,800 set aside in Lenoir County for control and management (between BMAP membership and specialist) is an investment that pays dividends. Per the BMAP 2015 annual report, from June 2015-June 2016, beaver control prevented the loss of, or damage to, $262,140 in resources, including over $140,000 to roads and bridges alone. Efforts resolved beaver damage problems at 28 sites in the county, 13 were private landowners and 15 were Department of Transportation sites.

Of course, the more you use BMAP the more you NEED BMAP because of things like population rebound and short term solutions. Its a racket. Guess how much money BMAP spends on flow devices and solutions that will last longer than a season? I’ll give you a it, it’s a ROUND number.

One thing that confuses me in the article is this:

Also in the budget are funds to support a percentage of a Wildlife Beaver Specialist.

What percentage of the guy did you get? The part that goes over the fence last? Because I’d ask for my money back.

Hey, speaking of actual beaver specialists, and beaver benefits, NOAA just released its offical Oregon coast Coho Recovery plan. Which mentions beaver lots of times (by my count 227 times). Lots like this:

It even had time for the honorable mention of our noble friends in South Umpqua.

If you want to grind your teeth in envy that California is so remarkably backward that we just can’t have nice things, go read the report. It’s beaver-licious, and someday we might be too!

Riparian Ecology 101 and Beavers

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Ice, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental, Who's blaming beavers now? December 18, 2016

It’s hard to appreciate beavers in South Carolina. Even if you’re an environmentalist and teach riparian ecology, apparently. Sigh.

ECOVIEWS: A beaver dam could test your environmental conscience

Whit Gibbons

My first evidence of something unusual happening came in autumn after a month of no rain when I measured the water level. I do this at least once a week downstream from our cabin and was surprised to find that instead of dropping an inch or so, it had actually risen 2 inches. I attributed it to mismeasurement until I took my walk.

Beavers are unquestionably keystone species in a region with small to moderate-size streams. They not only modify the habitat but can also change the environment in ways that dramatically influence the lives of animals, including people, and plants.

Beaver activity can result in big trees dying from flooding and smaller ones being debarked for food or cut down for dam construction. A mile downstream from my incipient beaver dam a larger one has flooded several acres, leaving tall, lifeless sweetgum and pine trees that began life in a terrestrial habitat and cannot persist in an aquatic one.

Animals are affected, too. Large aquatic salamanders called sirens thrive and become more abundant in pools of a stream created by beaver dams. We once observed more than 500 sirens along the margins of a small stream when a dam was removed and the water level dropped.

Cottonmouths, watersnakes and turtles are more apparent, and maybe even more abundant, around beaver dams, which create areas for basking on sunny days. Waterfowl, such as wood ducks, are attracted to the pond created above the dam. Clearly, beavers and their dams set the tone of the neighborhood for many wildlife species.

So close. So very close. I feel we are standing at the very threshold of almost discussing beaver benefits – peering through the keyhole at the verdant green garden on the other side. But Whit isn’t wild about beavers. And he’s surrounded by UGA buddies who feed him bad information.

Beavers live 35 to 50 years in zoos and more than 20 years in the wild.

One of the conundrums with beavers is that their positive traits – being chubby, cute, industrious pioneers – aren’t always enough to outweigh less desirable traits. I know folks who have had beavers cut down a beautiful dogwood tree, flood an area intended for a garden not a fish pond and dismantle a wooden boathouse to build the beaver lodge. The predicament is how to keep beavers for outdoor show-and-tell yet not have them misbehave, from a human’s point of view.

An ecofriendly society will always face perplexing wildlife problems and environmental dilemmas. Entertaining, yet potentially destructive, beavers are a good example of the complexity inherent in environmental preservation, with no simple solution as to how to handle the issue. A range of responses are available for dealing with nuisance wildlife. Which solution people choose will depend in part on their environmental conscience.

Whit is a reflective and thoughtful man with an ecological conscience. He wants to appreciate the inherent coolness of beavers because it’s fun to see wildlife in his creek, but he doesn’t want to be flooded out for 50 years. What’s a good man to do?

When information fails you its time to get better information. I’m glad you asked. First of all beavers don’t live for 50 years. Who ever wrote that down was wrong and should have their credentials surgically removed. I did read a scientific report that identified one as 19 once, but in the wild 10-15 years is an astoundingly good run.

Secondly, if beavers are flooding an area you can’t live with then you install a flow device and make the water a height you can tolerate. Here’s a video that will teach you how to do it cheaply yourself. I know these things work because they solved our problem for a decade. The first flow device was invented in your own state! But this works better and is cheaper to install. Oh, and if the bad beaver is eating your dogwoods try wrapping the trees with wire or painting them with sand.

Beavers do cause problems. True. And cars get flat tires. We can fix them.

Why not just trap the beavers and get rid of them instead of fixing the problem? First of all you can’t, because more beavers will return to adequate habitat and you’ll be in this fix all over again in a year or a season. But more importantly all the wildlife that depends on the beaver dam will be lost if you remove the beaver. Meanwhile, that dam is removing nitrogen, letting trout fatten, filtering toxins, and regulating water flow which god knows you need in South Carolina and Georgia!

The article concludes by saying Whit teaches at the University of Georgia’s Savannah River Ecology Laboratory. I can’t think of a more useful place to start a conversation. Our retired UGA librarian friend needs to have coffee with him and nudge some useful information his way. Hey, maybe you could take this image into your classroom?