Category: Who’s blaming beavers now?

Another Inexplicable Beaver Headline

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, stupid solutions, Tail slap, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now? August 30, 2017

From WBRZ in Louisiana comes the weather report we’ll be wondering about for years to come. There is something in the writing that seems very what we called in my trade ‘word-salad‘ – maybe it was computer generated? It’s hard to believe anyone ever transitioned from talking about Harvey to talking about beavers, but who knows? They’ve been blamed for many ridiculous things before.

Pat Shingleton: “The Storm and Beavers…”

Our weekend intentions are extended to the folks in Texas.

In closing, the second largest rodent in the world is the beaver. The engineering of their dams, canal and personal lodges not only protect them from predators but provide still pools for floating food and building materials. When startled, beavers are also able to initiate an alarm on those quiet pools by energetically smacking the water with their broad tail; forwarding a message to others. Stockpiled sticks provide a food source and an insulation of snow prevents water from freezing around their homes. Examples of beaver complications include the Lawrence, Massachusetts, Conservation Commission’s report that additional flooding was caused when residents removed a local beaver dam. The water release overwhelmed a smaller beaver dam, exiting onto local roads.

The Eagle-Tribune reports that the undisturbed dam would have minimized two road washouts.

That’s why we don’t let google translate bots write copy for the news. Some jobs should just be performed by humans, you know? But okay. This is a fine opportunity to mention that if more beaver were allowed to build dams in more streams backing up more water across the state there would be more wetlands to soak up storm events and everyone would benefit.

Just sayin’. Although this is we more typically get with some human-generated word-salad.

Beavers create flooding problem at Colona

COLONA — Beavers have contributed to the plugging of a 15-inch culvert at the southwest corner of the city. As a result of beaver activity, trees and logs have jammed up the tube, and flooding has affected residents on 10th Avenue.

The property isn’t in city limits, and aldermen voted Monday to contact Colona Township to ask if they will assist the city in fixing the problem. “The problem is the city equipment is not able to do what needs to be done. We need larger equipment,” said Mayor Rick Lack.

“We need an excavator, not our backhoe,” agreed public works director Rick Crew. Ald. Tom Jones, 3rd Ward, said the city should ask the township or the county to maintain the culvert. “It would be better for our residents to have a solution than a bureaucratic circle,” said Ald. Tristan Tapscott.

Okay, that part makes sense. Beavers block culverts, we all accept this. And if there’s one thing we ALL KNOW it’s that boys like to say they could solve any problem if they just had bigger equipment. And if you chose not to install a beaver deceiver to protect a culvert, you need to spend time cleaning them out.

(See how I’m delicately avoiding mentioning their bureaucratic circle [jerk] because that’s just the kind of sensitive woman I am? )

But this is what confused me.

Alderman Mike King said duck hunters occasionally fire close to homes there, and the floodwaters displace coyotes, exacerbating that problem.

?????????

Mr. King said if it were zoned as a conservation area, the city could have control over letting people hunt, suggesting coyotes could be hunted there.

???????????????????????????

Now you might think I’m editing out the context of this paragraph to make it sound more confusing. But go look at the article yourself if you want. The paragraph is context-free. I’m still trying to find it. So if the gunfire and flooding hadn’t pushed them out the coyotes would eat the beavers and fix our problem? Or if the coyotes were around to eat the ducks there wouldn’t be so much hunting there? Or maybe the duck hunters could shoot beavers? Or just shoot out the culverts?

Or maybe I just wanna shoot coyotes so I’m changing the subject?

You aren’t making any sense, Mike. But, fortunately for you it doesn’t seem to matter much in Colona, IL whether you make sense or not. Your colleagues or constituents don’t seem to mind, and the reporter writes it down and reports it as if you actually contributed. Good job.

You might be mayor soon.

Stonewalled by the Quarry

heidi08 Beaver Art, Beaver Behavior, Beavers and water, City Reports, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? August 29, 2017

I had an indescribably beaver day yesterday, if it pans out I’ll fill you in on the details. Let me just say that it started at dawn with a phone call from Karen Corker of Maine WildWatch, who is testifying tonight and wanted to learn what was most helpful in Martinez. We had an epic chat about how to enlist support without alienating potential allies. We also talked about how folks get numb or hostile to the animal rights message, and how to frame arguments differently for the maximum effect. I stressed the importance of pragmatic solutions and talked about the art of the possible.

We basically revisited these ideas, which is so fun to do again. Especially without the personally impending dire consequences. It was like going to your high school reunion without any snobs. Very fun. I am wishing Karen all the luck in the world today.

Accidental Advocate

Then my copy of The Knotty Pine Mystery Series arrived! I was so excited I couldn’t wait to settle down in a comfortable chair and read the adventure. On the very first page Mr. Beaverton looks up at the wall of his lodge where he sees the portrait of his grandfather who had “always walked with him along the banks of Cobble Creek and explained how the land was healthy because of their dams“.

Ha! Do you think I’m going to keep reading? Go ahead guess!

I was so interested in the origin of the tale I asked artist Sara Aycock about it. Did the illustrations come first or the story? She wrote back,

“It was actually my artwork. A little over a year ago I decided to paint animals dressed in Victorian clothes. My very first painting was Mr. Beaverton and I was in love. I saw his personality and profession. (I actually finished him on August 24, 2016 and exactly a year later on August 24, 2017 we released our book!) As I continued to paint the characters, I named them, came up with their jobs, and wrote up the personalities. I decided to feature North American animals (except our hedgehog, which book 1 explains how he got to North America). In September 2016, I approached my sister-in-law (who lives clear across the U.S.) and asked her if she would be willing to write a children’s chapter book based on my characters. She said she’d love to! She was amazing to work with and took the characters and town that I had envisioned and gave them a lovely story. We have 8 books planned and have made a list of problems that animals may experience in the wild and made a long list of things to teach about nature that we hope to sprinkle throughout the series. It’s been such a fun project and I’ve learned even more about nature as I study different animals and whatnot.”

Sara Aycock

What an adventure! And I’m so grateful that it worked out our festival got to be part of it. I love the idea of the image of Mr. Beaverton starting the whole thing. Beavers do change things, you know. Maybe you haven’t ordered your copy yet. But you REALLY SHOULD. I’m already very curious who has been stealing things around the forest and am relieved Mr. Beaverton is on the case.

Too bad the folks at Ruby Construction in Vermont didn’t have a similar appreciation for the animal’s work.

Wells quarry operators fined $9K for excavating beaver dam, cleanup required

Montpelier – The Agency of Natural Resources announced today that Ruby Construction, Inc., former owner of the hilltop property containing the Mammoth Quarry in the Town of Wells, and the company’s lessee Royal Harrison, were jointly held responsible for a massive discharge of water and sediment into Lake St. Catherine. They have been fined a minimum of $9,000 and are required to appropriately remove the deposited sediment from the lake.

On a sunny Sunday afternoon in April 2014, neighboring homeowners on West Lake Road, a residential road along Lake St. Catherine and downhill from the Mammoth Quarry, were outside enjoying the weather when an enormous discharge event occurred. The homeowners described witnessing a wall of water that rumbled down the forested hill, quickly overwhelmed an intermittent streambed, blocked a culvert and overtopped West Lake Road. The Wells Fire Department and road crews responded to close the road and assist in diverting the water away from the two homes, one of which had water flowing into the basement. The water moved swiftly for several hours, ripping up and dragging slate flagstones across one homeowner’s property and gouging out new pathways into the lake on the other. Debris and sediment flowed well into Lake St. Catherine. The event temporarily cut off road access to residents of both Wells and Poultney on the northern portion of West Lake Road, which dead-ends.

One homeowner followed the water up the hill behind his property in an attempt to investigate the cause of the release. He followed the rushing water up the steep hill and identified recent excavator tracks around the area. While the excavator was no longer at the site, there was clear evidence of unnatural excavation of a beaver dam at its downstream point, which was now draining the large reservoir of water. Later that day, Town of Wells officials retraced the flow of the water, which had subsided but not stopped by the evening, and tracked the excavator marks away from the draining pond. They followed muddy tracks to a full-size excavator, parked, and with a warm engine.

Following the event and investigation, the Agency issued notices to Ruby Construction, Inc. and Royal Harrison alleging the violation of an illegal discharge into a water of the state, and outlining the process to clean up the damage. Ruby Construction, Inc. and Royal Harrison never admitted fault for the discharge, and requested a hearing in front of the Vermont Superior Court, Environmental Division. The two-day hearing was held March 2 and 3, 2017, and the Court issued a decision on the merits and judgment order on July 28, 2017 affirming the Agency’s position. The Court’s order requires Ruby Construction, Inc. and Royal Harrison pay a penalty of $9,000 and apply for a permit from the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation’s Lakes and Ponds Management and Protection Program to appropriately remove the sediment from the Lake by next fall. All sediment removal and lake restoration is to be paid for by the respondents, and an additional penalty of $3,000 will be assessed if compliance is not achieved by October 31, 20

The damn dam-wreckers! I guess we shouldn’t be surprise that when they were confronted with their own wrongdoing the Quarry owners stonewalled, but I’m glad the authorities tracked them down anyway. I personally wish it was MORE money they are being fined but I’m sure the 9000 will sting a little. I love the idea of the homeowner following the excavator tracks and laying his hand on the engine to find it was still warm. I actually did that myself once in Martinez at the secondary dam. Ah, memories.

Maybe that should be the next knotty pine mystery!

The Watch of the Wild

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beaver Chewing, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? August 24, 2017

Fantastic column today from Karen Corker, the director of WildWatch in Maine. I’m guessing she attended Skip’s lectures last year in the state. Or maybe she even made them happen? Either way this is exactly the kind of writing we want to see everywhere.

Maine Voices: Beaver Deceivers allow people, nature’s engineers to go with the flow

At the end of each summer, Maine’s Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife determines the fate of thousands of beavers. August is the month the department sets the trapping season dates for beavers across Maine’s 29 wildlife management districts. Towns and private property owners may request that specific areas be closed to trapping, but the closures represent a tiny fraction of the vast territory that is open to trappers to kill beavers in Maine without limit for five to six months a year.

Approximately 10,000 beavers lose their lives each year as a result of this aggressive, expansive approach to beaver management. The number of other, non-targeted animals killed in traps set for beavers is not generally reported, but the department admits that otters are frequent victims because they share the same wetland habitats.

Now I just have to interject and say how on earth does she know that the number of beavers trapped? I’m guessing she’s citing the numbers that come from the USDA stats for Maine, but is USDA the only folks allowed to do nuisance trapping? In California APHIS is responsible for a very small fraction of beavers killed by depredation permit, which can also be used by private trappers. I assume that’s true for other states as well.

There are two primary justifications for such extensive trapping. The first is that beavers have historically been regarded as “nuisance” animals, largely because of their damming behavior. When beavers clog culverts, the channels that run under roads, it often results in the flooding of roads and other properties.

The second justification derives from the department’s embrace of trapping as a recreational activity and primary wildlife management tool. In 2015, trapping proponents persuaded IF&W’s legislative committee to rewrite Maine statute to require the department to use trapping as a key basis for managing the state’s wildlife.

Another correction based on our reviews of depredation permits, is that the vast majority of depredation permits are sought for damage to landscaping. In fact there’s even a comment to the article that mentions tree damage. There are far more landowners who own trees than culverts I guess. So it’s a more common complaint. In California the deniens of beavers killed as ‘nuisances’ dwarfs the fur trapping numbers. That may be slightly different in Maine, but I doubt it.

A rapid evolution in our understanding of beavers and their value is eroding these justifications. Beavers are a keystone species; they create ecosystems that nourish a multitude other animals and plants. The marshes and meadows they build create ecological stability. With more than a third of freshwater fish and amphibians in the U.S. either extinct or at risk of extinction, the wetlands beavers produce have unrivaled potential to reverse these accelerating losses.

Along with the evolution in understanding of beavers’ contributions to healthy habitats, high quality flow devices – Beaver Deceivers, for example – have also evolved in recent decades.

When these devices are well-designed, well-constructed, and professionally installed, they prevent flooding, keep beavers and their benefits on the landscape, and offer long-term solutions to human/beaver conflicts at significantly lower cost than road repairs and beaver trapping. When such devices are not employed at conflict sites, beavers have to be destroyed continually. This approach is not only costly, it precludes the formation of the fertile habitats that support a rich and diverse assortment of wildlife and plant life.

In short, removal by trapping is not a lasting, economical, or ecologically-smart solution; any emptied beaver habitat is soon resettled, and the never-ending cycle of conflict and killing simply begin again. IF&W is not unaware of the benefits and effectiveness of flow-devices. The department has, in fact, stepped up its promotion of non-lethal solutions to beaver/human conflict through their use.

This is obviously my FAVORITE part of the letter, and the best wording I’ve seen on the subject. Good job Karen, you hit all the right notes. And it sounds a lot like Skip so I’m assuming they know each other. The column goes on to talk about the humane concerns about trapping, but in my considered opinion THIS is the power part. Just leave out the compassion next time Karen, and go straight for the economic value. People are inherently selfish and listen closer when their pocket book is involved, I promise.

Any Maine citizen who would like to share comments or concerns about the proposed beaver trapping season can express their views at a public hearing on Aug. 29 at 6 p.m. at the Augusta Armory, Room 209B, 179 Western Ave., Augusta. The Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife is also accepting written comments on the season until Sept. 8. Comments can be emailed to becky.orff@maine.gov.

That’s a formal cue to send some comments about how well flow devices work and how beaver problems can be managed. You know I will! Right after I send Karen a note to thank her for this nicely written reminder.

As a naturalist.com

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and water, Environmental, Who's blaming beavers now? August 22, 2017

Now if you all had a question about beavers you’d ask me, right? And you know even if I didn’t know the answer you’d trust me not to make it up or pretend that I knew but take the trouble to find the right person who did. You know I’d never ask someone who knew nothing about the subject matter just because he’d say what I expected to hear because that would be foolish. Nature specializes, and if you want to know about jaguars you go to the jaguar expert, right?

We’re not quite as confident about the beaver education of “Ask a naturalist.com” run by Tom and Kate Pelletier. They maintain a fairly glossy website where they answer questions from readers in mostly accurate ways. Tom is a writer and Naturalist and Kate is the editor of the site and Operations Assistant for the Nature Conservancy. I believe at one time they lived in Massachusetts not very far away from Mike Callahan, but I’m thinking their beaver knowledge is not exactly top notch, based on the answer to this recent question:

Can I swim with beavers?

Common knowledge associates giardiasis and beavers so closely that people often call the disease “beaver fever.” However, it’s not clear that beavers very often contaminate people with Giardia. In fact, it seems that Giardia species tend to specialize. So the Giardia that most commonly infects beaver is different from the one that infects people. However, most Giardia have some ability to infect organisms other than their primary host, and you can find human-type Giardia in beavers. But the evidence suggests that when it is found in swimming waters and in beavers, the most common source of the human-type Giardia is not the beavers but people. Typically, it’s from untreated sewage that gets into the water or from fecal matter washing off people when they are in the water. For that reason, health officials recommend that people with diarrhea stay out of swimming waters.

When I asked Lihua Xiao, who is Chief of the Molecular Epidemiology Laboratory/WBDP of the Division of Foodborne, Waterborne, and Environmental Diseases for the United States Centers for Disease Control, for his opinion about swimming with beavers, he said flatly “I would not swim in a pond where beavers are active.”

First of all, just because it rhymes doesn’t mean its true. Yes beavers can cause Giardiasis just like any other mammal, and most mammals, as it happens, aren’t too particular about not pooping in the water. But they don’t carry it MORE. To be fair, he does go on to describe a study which showed that muskrats carried the disease far more commonly than beavers. BUT he accompanied it with a photo of a nutria which he only just recently changed when it was pointed out to him in by a reader in May two years after this article appeared. Which begs the question, naturalist?

If you do decide to swim in your beaver pond, you should, as much as possible, avoid swallowing the water, and you should never drink untreated surface waters. The recommendation is to boil or use filters that specifically say they will remove Giardia. The cysts of Giardia and Cryptosporidium are somewhat resistant to chlorine, so don’t count on that. Boiling and filtration will also kill or remove most other waterborne diseases and parasites at the same time, including any worm-like parasite.

Do you think Tom has read any of the humorous articles from beaver researchers in other countries that point out that it’s only ENGLISH speaking nations that associate beavers with beaver fever because of it’s only in our language that they rhyme? Do you think he knows that the biggest risk of swimming is for dogs when folks let them swim too close to their families in June and July when they are protecting kits? Do you think he’s ever seen this photo of beaver expert Sharon Brown doing this?

I’m going out on a limb and saying the answer to these questions is NO. He does end the article with a reference to a Washington state website on living with beavers, but that is small compensation after talking to the foremost researcher on infectious diseases who, last I checked, knew bunk about beavers.

Might I suggest that the NEXT time someone asks you a question about beavers you talk to a beaver expert? Oh and here’s a helpful way to tell muskrats and nutria apart.

Franklin Fumbles Frantically

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? August 4, 2017

We have visited the town of Franklin, Massachusetts before. The town is the site of the very first library in America, created by the donation of books from Benjamin Franklin himself. It has a beautiful 136-acre nature reserve that it recently decided to turn into a formal park. And guess what’s there mucking up all that nature? Obviously the town is unaware of it’s patron’s affection for the animal. Or how he cast them as the noble creature that bravely fought the British. I wonder if someone like me will write them and tell them.

Franklin: Beavers raising water, worries

FRANKLIN — Local officials are weighing what to do with a colony of beavers whose natural handiwork threatens an earthen berm at DelCarte Reservation off Pleasant Street.

An expert from ESS Group, an environmental engineering firm, walked around the ponds and other parts of the reservation on April 7 looking for signs of beaver busywork. After discovering that the critters were indeed making themselves at home, ESS installed a motion-activated camera for 13 days.

Four beaver lodges were found along the shoreline, two of which appear to be in use. One dam in the area is blocking water flow from the upper basin to the southern basin. The dam is flooding trees near a berm on the upper basin, or pond, according to an ESS study. That could be a problem if the berm continues to flood.

“There are undesirable conditions which, over time or during a large rainfall event, could lead to erosion of the earthen berm and potentially impact its structural integrity,” ESS reports.

ESS recommends removing the dam but first clearing trees from the berm. Beavers would use those trees to rebuild their dam. If the problem continues, experts suggest trapping and moving the beavers elsewhere.

The study also suggested the town employ a dam safety engineer to inspect the berm to ensure it does not erode.

“Keeping a berm stable is not too much money,” said ESS Vice President Carl Nielsen. “Building a new berm is very expensive.” The Conservation Commission will discuss the results beginning Aug. 10.

“From Mass Audubon’s prospective, unless there is a direct conflict, the general message is to leave them alone,” Lautzenheiser said. “Beavers are a keystone species in our ecosystems. A lot of the other animals would not be in the landscape without beavers.”Trapping beavers without a license is illegal in Massachusetts, however trappers can perform emergency trapping at any time if authorized by the town. Beaver populations in the state have fluctuated , and their numbers are now back up where they once were.

“When beavers returned to Massachusetts and other places, it was heralded as a conservation success,” Lautzenheiser said. “I think the negative interactions they have with roads and development, greatly overshadows the value that they have ecologically, which is a shame.”

Mass Wildlife furbearer biologist, Dave Wattles, said that since a regulation was passed in 2001 to give municipal conservation agencies the power to grant emergency beaver trapping licenses, Mass Wildlife has not been able to keep any sort of record on beaver populations. Wattles said his department also has little to no control over trapping license administration. He said he hopes towns will consider non-lethal and practical methods.

The best and most effective method is water diversion pipes, he said. The pipes, also known as “beaver deceivers,” are placed through the dam and into the middle of the pond, allowing water to flow freely through the pipe. This method effectively confuses the beavers, while the water evens out on both sides of the dam.

The pipes require regular maintenance and care to ensure they don’t become blocked. The town of Medfield used that method in 2015 to divert water at the Fork Factory Reservation to prevent flooding on Rte. 109.

In Franklin, flooding has yet to be a problem, and some residents, like neighbor, Karen Baumgartner, of 7 Matthew Drive, are enjoying the natural view from their own backyards.

“Honestly I go down there pretty frequently and I’ve only seen a beaver once,” she said. “Frankly, we love it. We’ve never had any flooding. They kind of joined the ponds together, so we have a water view. … We love the land, and I think that any creature that wants to live there, should.”

The study also suggested the town employ a dam safety engineer to inspect the berm to ensure it does not erode.

“Keeping a berm stable is not too much money,” said ESS Vice President Carl Nielsen. “Building a new berm is very expensive.”

The Conservation Commission will discuss the results beginning Aug. 10.

Conservation Agent George Russell said, “We had a study done that shows there’s a significant beaver population out there, and as usual they’re extremely industrious.”

Options for beaver problems that other municipalities have used including lethal and non-lethal trapping, said Tom Lautzenheiser, central western regional scientist for Mass Audubon.

Kill traps spark an ethical chord for Lautzenheiser, while live-trapping seems nonsensical because once beavers are released, they just dam up some other river.

“From Mass Audubon’s prospective, unless there is a direct conflict, the general message is to leave them alone,” Lautzenheiser said. “Beavers are a keystone species in our ecosystems. A lot of the other animals would not be in the landscape without beavers.”Trapping beavers without a license is illegal in Massachusetts, however trappers can perform emergency trapping at any time if authorized by the town.

Beaver populations in the state have fluctuated , and their numbers are now back up where they once were.

“When beavers returned to Massachusetts and other places, it was heralded as a conservation success,” Lautzenheiser said. “I think the negative interactions they have with roads and development, greatly overshadows the value that they have ecologically, which is a shame.”

In Franklin, flooding has yet to be a problem, and some residents, like neighbor, Karen Baumgartner, of 7 Matthew Drive, are enjoying the natural view from their own backyards.

Poor beleaguered Massachusetts, it’s just Franklin’s bad luck that they ended up with those rare INDUSTRIOUS beavers. And that they are a fully 88 miles away from the man that could fix this in a moment. (Mike Callahan at beaver solutions) And that they are so penny wise and dam-foolish that they think that the law requiring LIVE traps means that the beavers get to LIVE. Hahaha, foolish little children. They don’t realize that live trapping in the bay state means you have to trap them live and then kill them immediately after. No relocation is allowed. And finally, poor little Massachusetts that thinks the beaver population is what it once was.

I wish I had time for more sustained mocking because everyone but the Audubon fellow deserves plenty. But there are things to pack and beavers to festival! And yesterday we got a last minute addition to the silent auction from Johnna Eilers of Utah at Wild Unforgotten. She’s such the artist she even sketched the envelope, as you can see left. The necklace is a simple beaver of hammered silver with tiny cascading turquoise beads and among the most lovely we have ever been given. Go check out all Johnna’s hand stamped, hand sawed creations, because they are breathtaking. She’s a wildlife biologist in the field by day and a talented jewelmith by night! Thank you Johnna!