PARKS CANADA RESEARCH SCIENTIST IS SAVING SALMON FROM BEAVERS

This may be the funniest headline I’ve ever come across and had the displeasure of reading. All the stereotypes are firmly represented in the article, it’s an fairly tightly written piece of disinformation, someone should be very proud. I thought you’d appreciate the reminder that our work is not yet completed. In my younger days I once wrote “protecting salmon from beavers is like protecting banks from money. It’s like protecting Whole Foods from Vegetarians, or protecting Stanford from bequeaths or protecting Steve Young from footballs.”

I truly used to be even more sarcastic than I am now.

Ecologist concerned beaver dam on Langley creek bad for salmon

A Langley man is hoping that a little help from a local streamkeeping group can allow salmon to migrate up Walnut Grove’s Munday Creek again, after beavers set up shop with a sizable dam.

Marlow Pellatt lives near the creek, around the area of 96th Avenue and 208th Street, and he only recently noticed that beavers that thrown up a sizable dam, one revealed by the The dam, not far from the culvert where Munday creek runs to the west under 208th Street, stretches around 30 feet or more across the ravine floor. (more…)

SALMON SAYS “WE LIKE BEAVERS”

Hey do you remember that awesome beaver habitat that was just across the water from Martinez and in the news this week? Well you’ll never guess what Virginia Holsworth filmed yesterday in the creek by her house. Hold onto your hats.

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MONEY TO MOVE BEAVERS BY

heidi08 Beavers and salmon September 25, 2021

Hey I’ve got an idea! How about we stop spending money to relocate beavers and building our own BDAs to help salmon and just let beavers do it all themselves? You know, HELP SALMON. And maybe use those funds to pay the landowners that are whining about beaver on their property, You know. actually solve problems instead of playing musical chairs with them.

How about that?

Chelan, Douglas counties receive $2 million for salmon restoration

WENATCHEE — Eleven salmon recovery projects across Chelan and Douglas counties have received a combined $2 million in grants from the Washington State Salmon Recovery Funding Board.

The money is a part of $21 million in grant funding the board gave to 105 projects in 29 Washington counties. Okanogan County received the fourth-most funding.

The funded project will repair river habitats, remove barriers blocking salmon and conserve habitat.

In Chelan County, these six projects will receive a total of $813,000:

The purposes of these projects range from creating spawning habitat for steelhead salmon in Peshastin Creek to helping up to 20 landowners relocate 20 to 30 beavers and install up to 100 beaver dam analogs in waterways.err

How about we try my idea first, eh? I’m sure these landowners also drink water and would like their homes not to burn down, right?

A VERY OLD FISH AND BEAVER TALE

heidi08 Beavers and salmon August 9, 2021

Yesterday I suddenly had the inkling that the old bumper sticker “beaver taught salmon to jump” was only telling a PART of the story. So I made this with considerable assisstant from Kay Underwood’s artwork in the lovely Beaver’s Song. What do you think?

THE SHOCKING TRUTH ABOUT BEAVERS AND SALMON?

heidi08 Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout July 15, 2021

I really don’t know anyone who’s going to be surprised by this, but okay, if you say its unexpected I guess its true. Maja Holmquist must be new to the beaver beat. I thought NWF was up on these things by now.

Beavers and Salmon: An Unexpected Alliance

According to a recent analysis done by the Nez Perce Tribe, Chinook salmon and steelhead populations are nearing extinction and need all the help they can get.

Why are these salmon so at risk?

Climate change is causing rises in air and water temperatures, increased winter flooding, less (and warmer) water in the summer and fall. None of these things bode well for cold-water fish, Northwest salmon and steelhead populations, in particular. Most salmon species become vulnerable in waters with temperatures 68 degrees and higher. Waters like those in the West’s Columbia River Basin are repeatedly rising past this temperature threshold. Additionally, increased floods during the winter months wash away spawning beds, taking salmon eggs with them.

Things are so dire California is driving salmon around in trucks. BOTH WAYS.

But what if there was an unlikely ally to help us help salmon?

Enter: the beaver. Yes, the beaver. Two studies done on Central Oregon’s Bridge Creek examined the question: Does the presence of beavers improve habitat for juvenile salmon and steelhead?

Seriously, These studies are five years old. Why are you writing this like we are going to be reading the exciting end of a romance novel under the covers with a flashlight at midnight? This isn’t news. We know that beavers help salmon. We’ve known it for 20 years now and I’m sure our ancestors knew it before that. Why the intrigue?

Without beavers, streams have become eroded and incised, meaning they cut deep channels into the landscape. These channels disconnect the stream from its floodplain, disrupting the flow of water, nutrients, and, importantly for salmon, habitat. The areas around these streams shift from thriving, diverse wetlands with pools and floodplains surrounded by trees and shrubs—to dry grasslands made up of only a few species. As seen in many areas implementing beaver mimicry, including areas of salmon habitat on Bridge Creek, the implementation of beaver dams and BDAs mitigate those effects.

Uh huh. And did you know the moon makes gravity too?

Pacific salmon and steelhead are in trouble. Effects of climate change and human development have put these species on the brink of extinction. We need to examine and explore every option available to save these important, iconic, and impressive species. Although here we only reference two published studies done so far on connections between beavers, beaver dam analogues, and these fish species, beaver-related restoration as a tool in salmon recovery is already being implemented in California and Oregon.

But salmon and beaver lived together for centuries before European influence changed the landscape of the West. Generation after generation of salmon made their journey from beaver-inhabited rivers and streams to the ocean and back to those same beaver-inhabited rivers and streams. Salmon and beaver coexisted, even thrived together.

Could they again?

This is such a weird tone for this article to take. Could the sun continue to rise in the east? Could the earth be actually round? Could the rain continue to fall from the sky?

Sara Bates from NWF explains that Maja is an intern and prepared this for a class assignment. Okay. I’ll stop being snarky. Right after I post this video.

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