Category: Who’s blaming beavers now?

Those Nobel Prizes are a SMOKESCREEN

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now? April 20, 2016

Beavers Returning to Sweden’s Capital Can Be a Dam Nuisance

Walking along the Swedish capital’s famous shores and canals, you can see its presence in the gnawed trunks of large willows, surrounded by fresh wood chips, and the stumps of damaged trees cut down with chainsaws.

The Eurasian beaver is back.

Though the furry urbanites had an ideal base to explore the city, it took decades for them to get established in Stockholm.

“From the late ’90s to 2011, we didn’t see very [many] beavers … about three or four a year in the whole Stockholm area,” says Tommy Tuvunger, who, as Stockholm’s viltvårdare, or game warden, is tasked with keeping tabs on the city’s wild residents.

In the last four years, “the population has exploded.”

But the beaver boom has a negative side: The rodents have done extensive damage to the city’s trees.These teeth-carved trees are a safety risk, especially in a city with so much green space.

“People are going there with small children, walking dogs, jogging,” Tuvunger says, adding that a gust of wind could bring a weakened tree down on someone.

In addition, there have been two reports of beavers biting people in Stockholm—one of which occurred after a man took a picture of the animal with his phone.

In their efforts to keep the public safe, Tuvunger and his colleagues have shot about 10 beavers over three years. (See “Killing Wildlife: The Pros and Cons of Culling Animals.”)

“Keeping a very low profile, we use silencers, so the public don’t know what were are doing,” he says.

That’s right. Arguably the smartest country on the entire planet, that takes it upon themselves to hand out awards for the most brilliant scientific minds across the globe, kills beavers for chewing trees with a SILENCER because they can’t possibly discourage chewing by wrapping them and they don’t want to upset the public.

It’s not surprising that Stockholm’s beavers have bounced back, the experts say.

“Beavers are like all rodents—they are really good at reproducing. If they have a good environment and good opportunities, they do well,” Jennersten says.

If the sight of Castor fiber swimming around in central Stockholm is the ultimate proof of success, Hartman is heartened by this latest chapter in its comeback story.

I’m tempted to hate the author of this story very much, but when I read those sentences back to myself it occurs to me that he might be deliberately not getting in the way of the Swedes making themselves look bad. Not because he agrees with them – but because Mr. Owen assumes the public won’t. You know, kind of like that famous Sarah Palin interview.

Anyway, this was an annoying way to start the day, which is already annoying because of the unecessary mural delays and the first reviews coming back on the urban beaver chapter – one of which edited MY section with a red pen and said it was “Poorly worded“.

Hrmph. Poorly worded!

Lets cheer ourselves with some good news, shall we?

Poplars popular with Seine River beavers

The beaver is one of the few species on Earth that modifies the environment to suit its needs. Unfortunately, the beaver’s needs sometimes bring them into conflict with people — especially in cities.

Beavers cut down trees for one reason — survival. They use large branches to build dams across streams. This creates a beaver pond, where the water becomes deep enough for the beaver to survive the winter. They use some branches and mud to build a lodge. The lodge has a central chamber where they are safe from predators.

Beavers also eat the trees’ inner bark. They stockpile branches in a food cache at the bottom of the pond. While beaver eat many aquatic plants during summer, their main winter food is the inner bark of trees. Their favourites are aspen, poplar, cottonwood, willow, birch and alder. Beaver do not hibernate, so the pond must be deep enough for them to swim from the lodge to their food cache beneath the ice.

My advice to anyone living near the river is to wrap the bases of the trees that you treasure. A few dollars of mesh can protect your $140 tree. Hardware cloth (with a square mesh) is tough enough to deter beavers.

Don’t wrap every tree. Wrap some of the larger trees and newly planted trees of all sizes. Leave the rest for the beavers. After all, the beaver is a Canadian icon.

This year, let’s celebrate the beavers that share our urban rivers. Take pictures of the amazing river engineer that we commemorate on the “tail” of our nickel. Post them on the Save Our Seine Facebook page. Volunteer to wrap some trees or join the SOS team as a 2016 River Keeper (job posting on the SOS Web site).

Did you know that Winnipeg was smarter than Stockholm? Fantastic article and fantastic idea for encouraging folks to appreciate urban beavers. Now a final piece of better news to cheer those of us waiting impatiently for better days. Jon took these photos yesterday down stream. Sure starting to look familiar isn’t it?

The sound of the other shoe dropping….

heidi08 City Reports, Environmental, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now? April 13, 2016

Admittedly, all that happened on the mural yesterday was that money changed hands and discussions about first steps were made. The good news is that we have our ‘Whereas‘ contract which Mario needs to sign and return, and public works is supposed to contact me today regarding the power-washing. Nothing gets done without starting I guess, so I’m not complaining.

What absorbed my day primarily was the PTSD flashback triggered by the release of a very negative staff report from Mountain House discussing the fate of the beavers and their water-ruining ways. You know how it is: 15 pages of alarm and acronyms so that the whole problem sounds so complex you really shouldn’t worry your pretty little head about it. And an obviously manufactured possible ‘compromise’ offered with such a HUGE price-tag on it that everyone will want the beavers killed. Honestly, I thought the days of panicked research were behind me – but after an afternoon of labor I managed to issue a fairly intelligent response to their ministerial hysterics. This sentence was, of course, my chief motivator:

“It is clearly evident that in controlling the sequence of repairs and the financial burden that follows, beaver removal is the only option.”

It’s actually in moments like these that I’m happy that beaver relocation isn’t legal in California. The only real power that can motivate enough public backlash to get this staff report challenged is the distaste people feel about killing things that are in their way. If there was an option to just ‘move’ them into someone else’s way, and folks could fantasize that they’d done the right thing because the beavers would be happier in the forest or whatever – support would dry up pretty fast. Here’s my response if you’re interested. I’m sure there are all kinds of typos. Their report was given to me at 3 pm and I was pounding out my response until 7.

The MOST interesting part of this report to me was the part where they say staff already had an ‘expert’ come out and advice them about the beavers in 2011. Hmm. I’m laying a finger aside my nose and predicting that we can GUESS who that ‘expert’ was. The same ‘expert’ that advised our public works that flow devices always fail.

Fit for a Prince [Island]

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Dispersal, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? April 6, 2016

Prince Island in Calgary AB Canada sits smack in the middle of the Bow river which starts in the Rockies and ultimately empties in the Hudson Bay. It is a treasured slice of nature in the middle of the city and the site of many festivals and events. It also a roadstop along the highway for many a dispersing beaver when winter thaws enough to let them be on their way. In 2013 the area suffered such dramatic flooding that no one was worrying about beavers. Now, they have found the time.

Beavers causing Calgary tree troubles

“We’re trying to determine how many are out there,” said Tanya Hope, parks ecologist with the City of Calgary. What has definitely changed as a result of the 2013 flood is how Calgary’s rivers flow and where the beavers are congregating as a result of fast and slow sections of the Bow and Elbow.

This year, wildlife experts say the water-loving animals are far more concentrated than before, and appear to be hoarding themselves in different areas of the city than before the flood, which basically wiped the river map clean. “The lodges are much closer and they seem to be clumping together,” said Hope.

“On Prince’s Island, for example, where we used to have just one beaver lodge we now have three.” That means up to 18 beavers — including adults, older offspring and kits — can potentially be found gnawing down trees in the area.

That’s a lot of teeth — and because many of the areas impacted have no prior history of beavers, there’s no wire in place to protect the trees from this post-flood population, which if its anything like the beaver community prior to 2013, could number in the 200 range.

The result is extensive devastation, with reports being filed with Calgary 311 of up to 20 and 30 trees being felled in a given area.

So they think all that flooding flooded the beaver population too, because now new lodges are cropping up everywhere and more trees are getting eaten. I mean supposedly more. I haven’t seen an actual graph of how many trees usually get felled in the spring. (I mean these are government employees, they could do that.) But the article begs the question, does flooding make beavers breed more, or tolerate neighbors more?

Dr. Science says ‘no’.

Then how do you explain the new lodges? Appearing in clusters around the river. Apparently there used to be just one on the island and now there are three!

Dr. Science crosses his legs and gets ready for a long answer. “New lodges don’t mean new beavers.” He explains. “Just because a new lodge appears doesn’t mean a new family has moved in. Just like a new home on the block doesn’t mean the neighborhood has increased. Families move from one home to another just like humans do. Especially after huge flooding events that can fill a lodge with mud or parasites. Also, teenagers sometimes build ‘frat houses’ where they can live on their own but still close enough to mom and dad to get rescued when they need it.”

In the bad old days, the city might have tried to protect the trees by eradicating the buck-toothed pests, but in this enlightened age, Calgary does what it can to live with the animals, destructive trapping being a last resort for forests in danger of being ruined forever.

Beavers are now understood to be a healthy part of an ecosystem, and their activities can help humans too — such as the dam at Prince’s lsland, that helped protect a storm water pond from being swept away during the big flood.

Instead of a beaver cull, trees are wrapped with wire, pipes are built under known dams so the city doesn’t have to knock them down, and Calgary is currently testing a new beaver-deterrent spray that can be applied to a lot of trees in a very short time.

And on Tuesday, the city released a video for private property owners along the rivers, showing them how to wrap their trees to prevent loss to the roving rodents, which include so-called “transient beavers” which are just passing through the city via the rivers.

To keep the beavers from starving, the city only protects 80% of trees in a healthy forest, leaving easily replaced and regrown timber for food and rodent construction projects. Those landscape-altering endeavours are what made Hope go from just studying Calgary’s beaver population, to really admiring the animals for their cleverness and ingenuity.

“I think beavers are amazing, and they are the only species apart from humans that can completely change the landscape around them,” she said.

“We definitely want to work to keep them here in Calgary.”

Dr. Science is happy about that.

It’s all fun and games until somebody loses a beaver

heidi08 Dispersal, Who's blaming beavers now? April 2, 2016

*LEAVE IT TO BEAVER – St. Albert resident and owner of Mission: Fun and Games John Engel had a run-in with a beaver late Tuesday night, which sent him to the hospital for stitches.*

Beaver versus bike

After a long day at Mission: Fun and Games, Engel was cycling home along his usual route on the Red Willow Trail system. He reached the underpass for the Perron Street bridge around 11:30 p.m. when something bolted out of the shadows and across his path.

“It was under my tire almost immediately,” said Engel.

The wheel went left; Engel went right, falling hard on his elbow.

Cursing, the business owner spotted a large dark mammal on the pavement next to him. It was that bucktooth symbol of Canadiana – the beaver – that had wedged itself under the front tire of Engel’s bike.

Stunned, Engel watched the animal pick itself up, and once again bolt – this time down the embankment and into the Sturgeon.

“I heard the splash into the river and I knew it must have been a beaver,” he said. It appeared unhurt as it swam away.

When he went to check in at the Sturgeon Hospital’s emergency department, he told the triage nurse that he had a collision with a beaver on his bike.

The nurse turned to Engel’s wife with a smile: “What did he say?”

“A beaver,” said his wife.

The triage nurse then asked Engel if he’d been drinking or if he was taking any medication.

Ba-dump-ump!

It’s not bad enough that dispersing beavers have to contend with cars, mounties and drunken Belarusians trying to pick them up for a photo, now they have to worry about the whizzing cyclists too! I guess if you’re biking home beside a waterway, you should keep the potential for a beaver collision somewhere in mind. Which reminds me, Jon crossed paths with Bob Rust (maker of the wattle beaver, the giant inflatable beaver, and other wild inspirations) and he’s working on a beaver-cycle for this years festival.

I can’t even imagine.

Drawing attention to the Housatonic

heidi08 Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Who's blaming beavers now? March 29, 2016

The Housatonic is a 150 mile long river in Massachusettes that eventually flows into CT and out to the sea. It has suffered an even more than many industrial rivers suffer, with PCB’s and Mercury leading the charge. In parts has been restored, with flyfishing and outfitters that will rent you a boat, in other parts it is deeply scarred. And that’s what Denny Alsop wants to draw attention to.

It was nearly 30 years ago that Denny first made this journey to demonstrate the need for clean waterways. Companies like GE that were pouring waste into the water have mostly been regulated into submission now. But the entirety of the work remains undone, so he decided to repeat the paddle.

Actually looking at that long pole and the short canoe it’s more of a punt than a paddle. But I’m sure the water is too shallow in places. He’s stopping to meet with student field trips along the way and headed towards meeting at the capital in Boston. The river has new obstacles since he visited it last. But he’s using those to his advantage too.

Environmentalist, canoeist Denny Alsop makes a local stop

For the past week, he has been paddling along the lower Housatonic, the area dubbed “Rest of River” in a cleanup plan south of Pittsfield that has been mandated by the federal Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA is requiring industrial giant General Electric to rid the river of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a man-made compound believed to cause cancer in humans and wildlife.

General Electric used PCBs in parts of its machinery for decades until the substance was banned in 1979. The company disposed of the substance into the Housatonic. The EPA has ordered GE to undertake a $613 million cleanup of the river by dredging portions of the riverbed and shoreline. GE is presently fighting this action on various legal, logistical and technical grounds

Alsop had an enjoyable, if exhausting, day at Muddy Brook Elementary School in Great Barrington on Friday, where he spoke to students there about conservation.

“That was fun,” he said. But when he began paddling again, Alsop discovered there had been some changes in the course of the river since he had been there last.

“The river had changed a little since the last time I’d been there,” he said. “The beavers had built a dam, and rerouted the river, and I ended up dragging my canoe across the grass to another part of the river. I’m still sort of recovering from that.”

Alsop’s journey takes him, he said, to vistas the experts don’t always see.”

One thing he’s seen is proof that one of the potential solutions forwarded by General Electric is unlikely to work. GE has advocated for a shallow dredging and capping on that stretch of the Housatonic.

But Alsop said he saw evidence of intense beaver activity along the lower Housatonic shoreline. Beavers, he noted, dig several feet into the riverbed and riverside and bring up silt and sludge to create their dams.

“You can see the beavers have excavated several feet into the silt,” Alsop said.

Alsop said he believes that GE’s scientists are aware of what he calls “the beaver problem.’

So GE dumped chemicals in the river and is now proposing they will repair it by dredging the top 3-5 inches of contaminated soil. Denny noticed that there are some residents on the river that dig deeper than that. And I’m sure you can guess who I’m referring to. Maybe GE will helpfully say, that’s okay we can just kill them but I’m hoping Denny has other ideas.

I hope Denny makes a point of objecting, and explains how beaver work can help clean their damaged river – even if the ungrateful beavers do make him portage now and then. Beavers do assist river restoration, but after decades of pollution no one is usually eager for the help. Because beaver digging exposes evidence of their damage they would prefer remained buried forever.