Category: Beavers and Insects

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

Reaching and Teaching

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Environmental October 27, 2016

And it came to pass that the CBC picked up the story, making it known in all of Canada and beyond that four men in Wolseley did something heinous for sport.

People in Wolseley, Sask., upset after beaver killed with chair

There is zero new information on the crime but that cute photo of a beaver doesn’t hurt the cause any, so thanks for that.

In the meantime I guess this beaver’s battle is lost but the war goes on. And Worth A Dam is on the front lines as always. On Thursday we were asked by a the Helen Schuler Nature Center in Alberta, Canada regarding use of Cheryl Reynolds great photo of beaver teeth for an educational display on beaver adaptions. To which she graciously agreed. And yesterday I was asked by the preserve manager of The Nature Conservancy in Rhode Island if my poster was copyrighted and could anyone use it? To which I replied they were welcome to use it for educational purposes but the name Worth A Dam should appear somewhere on it because it was our design.

I would just point out that these two recent examples represent an educational broadcast range of some 4000 miles that our hard-won beaver knowledge has informed, which ain’t too shabby for a small-time organization that was formed to save a few beavers. Both organizations have large backing and structural support but they are asking this little mom-and-pop beaver group for assistance.

Which is pretty dam cool.

Beaver Public Radio

heidi08 Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere October 23, 2016

Now new Hampshire Public Radio reports on beavers!

Something Wild: West End Farm Trail

Over another small hill, Knight leads us to a beaver complex, pointing out the three ponds these rodents have constructed. Chris explains how each of the ponds are formed by beavers channeling water and flooding forest land. And if we come back in another year or two there could be a fourth pond. “You build another dam, flood another forest and presto you’ve got a fourth pond.”

Eventually this first pond drains, and shrubs and trees return to what is now a clearing. Dave explains those first plants to colonize after the water has drained are actually primary food source for beavers. “So they’ll move back up to the top of the drainage and they start all over again. So they cycle in and out, and up and down the watershed.” Flooding a forest seems like extreme behavior, but it creates habitat for fish, frogs, turtles and water birds. And all inside the city limits.

After 9 years of covering beaver news I’m starting to see a pattern. September is full of beaver problem reports because the animals are busy taking trees and making food stores for the winter. But come late October we’re treated to an assortment of beaver benefits as people either start noticing the wildlife, water storage or upcoming beaver moon. I might like late October the best of all the year!

In the meantime, lets just appreciate the harvest.

Praise beavers from sea to shining sea

heidi08 Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Who's saving beavers now? October 20, 2016

Nice description from Ruth Grierson of the Mount Desert Island in Maine. Even though they’re east coast and not very far from solutions they aren’t exactly floating in beaver wisdom and coexistence up there, so this is nice to read.

Eager beavers help selves, others

Many have noticed lately that the water level in island beaver ponds is way down. Someone asked me what the beavers will do this winter if we don’t get more rain before winter starts. This could be a problem for them. I know my pond is quite low at the moment. The beaver ponds are interesting to see now, for you really can check out their lodges and dams and realize what wonderful structures they have made. They are excellent engineers. The term “busy as a beaver” has real meaning.

Beavers are the largest living rodents in North America and among the mammals living on this island that are easy to see and observe as they live their lives. Other wildlife benefit considerably by their presence, for they create an excellent habit supplying food, shelter and water, the requirements for life. Plants also benefit from their presence. Migrants find the many beaver ponds excellent places to stop, rest and eat on their long journeys. You sometimes even come across geese or ducks nesting on the top of a beaver lodge, for it makes a safe place for a home. The trees that have died because of the flooding of an area provide great nesting places for many birds and mammals.

Well said, Ruth. It’s a good point that is never made often enough. In fact I think it deserves a poster. What do you think?

Jeanette Carroll from Redding has some similar thoughts. Here’s a recent letter she published in the Record Searchlight which is part of USA today. Redding is famously beaver danger zone, so we are thrilled about this.

Please help the salmon.

Thousands of dollars are spent restoring salmon habitat and pouring suitable sized gravel into the Sacramento River for the salmon to use as they migrate upriver to spawn. All efforts to increase the salmon species are very worthwhile.

I sincerely hope the Department of Fish and Wildlife will provide some guidance to the Department of the Interior so the waters from Shasta and Keswick dams are not abruptly curtailed as was the case in 2014 and 2015. The salmon no sooner completed their spawning efforts and their depleted and decaying bodies began to wash downstream in the Sacramento River when the water flow stopped so abruptly that not enough water was left to allow their eggs to hatch.

Their nicely cleaned gravel spawn beds were exposed to the elements and their eggs would have never hatched into tiny fry had not our local pair of beavers quickly rebuilt their dam just in time to inundate the salmon eggs in their redd. So, the 2014 and 2015 eggs did hatch but there are not enough beaver and suitable sloughs in the Sacramento River to save other vulnerable spawning grounds. If the same thing occurs this year, will the beaver come to the rescue again and save the 2016 salmon eggs?

This is a fine reminder of what NOAA fisheries research has been pointing out for 20 years. Beaver ponds are salmon nurseries. And ripping out beaver ponds is salmon genocide. If you’re going to save one, you have to cooperate with the other. Shorter column: When Jeanette writes “Please help save the salmon’ what she is really asking is “Please help save the beavers”.