Category: Who’s blaming beavers now?

Beaver Snark

This was apparently Mike Callahan’s first professional job ever. It has required additions over the years.

Editorial: Northampton’s lake beavers test conservation creativity

The beavers of Fitzgerald Lake are proving themselves formidable foes of the Broad Brook Coalition, which for years has been trying to regulate the level of the lake and protect a dock used by visitors to this conservation area on the north side of Northampton.

Last month, members of the coalition and a company called Beaver Solutions rolled out what that firm’s owner, in a display of dark humor, called “Plan D.” The beavers pretty much made sawdust of Plans A through C.

Sheesh, you tried four times in 20 years to solve a problem? I’m pretty sure that’s a success that most of us would envy. My Dad used to bring a carburetor with us to switch out on vacation every summer! You have Mike 10 miles away who can tinker when you need to. And in the mean time the beavers have been a ROUSING success at keeping other beavers away with their territorial behavior and increasing inverterbrates with their digging which has fed an expanding fish and bird population. I feel a certain Shakespearean tirade coming on…

What, rouse thee, man! thy Juliet is alive,

For whose dear sake thou wast but lately dead;

There art thou happy: Tybalt would kill thee,

But thou slew’st Tybalt; there are thou happy too:

The law that threaten’d death becomes thy friend

And turns it to exile; there art thou happy:

A pack of blessings lights up upon thy back;

This is a great “count your beavers speech” but people never listen do they? Romeo sure didn’t.

This time, the coalition went big. To keep beavers from reaching an underwater outlet drain that controls the lake’s level, coalition volunteers hauled 20 tons of traprock out to the drain, which Michael Callahan of Beaver Solutions had already caged in with chain-link fencing.

No easy task, to be sure. The rocks rode out to the spot aboard specially devised rafts. Volunteers standing up to their chests in the lake painstakingly moved rocks down around the base of the fencing, hoping to create a lasting barrier to beavers that had been tunneling under the fencing to reach and clog the drain.

Plan C, a few years back, involved placing rebar around gaps in the underwater fencing. Beavers kept fighting back, though, and Callahan cooked up the idea of hauling in 40,000 pounds of rock. He is cautiously optimistic. Only time will tell.

Callahan might want to start working on Plan E.

Ya ya ya. Beavers build dams. It’s a thing.

You’d miss them if they we’re gone. Trust me.

Transformative

heidi08 Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 15, 2015

One of the nice things about my unofficial unpaid beaver publicist job is that things drop sometimes into my mailbox that I wasn’t expecting. Like yesterday when a preview copy of Sarah Koenisberg’s documentary short on beaver reintroduction in three states arrived. It was sent with a note from a student of Mary Obrien who said Mary wanted me to have it because of all the “Transformative work” I do and to let them know if we wanted more copies.

Transformative? Me? You mean like a beaver?

It was gripping and informative, under 15 minutes long, starting with a segment on Mary and beaver reintroduction in Escalante, then a conversation with Michael Pollock about beaver reintroduction in Bridge Creek Oregon, and then Kent Woodruff and the Methow in Washington. There were lots of other voices I didn’t know before, basically saying the similar wonderful things. These animals can be our allies. Let them do their jobs and work as partners in the important job of saving water and restoring streams.

I wish I could share it but they won’t be releasing the online version for another 2 weeks. I promise to put it up just as soon as I can. For now I’ll just tell you the Very Best Part:

I watched the credits all the way to the end of course and guess who paid for it? The Grand Canyon Land Trust (of course) AND Trout Unlimited.

Now will someone please tell Georgia?

TALKING TROUT: Beavers – the good and bad

Sometimes beaver dams can be detrimental to fish habitat. Low elevation trout streams such as all the trout streams in Floyd County warm quickly in summer. When the water temperature gets too warm in a trout stream the Georgia Department of Natural Resources will discontinue stocking trout until the water cools, which is usually late in the fall. The DNR rarely stocks streams in the fall or winter so it is usually the following spring before the creek will get a fresh batch of trout for the anglers to catch.

One such creek that has a beaver dam that warms the trout stream is Johns Creek. The Coosa Valley Chapter has spent thousnds of man hours making improvements at Johns Creek. We have improved camping areas, protected stream banks and in addition to installing trout stocking tubes we have worked regularly to improve trout habitat in the stream. Just this weekend we worked with the U.S. Forest Service placing “large woody debris” in the stream to improve trout shelter and increase the macro-invertebrate (insect food that trout eat) habitat. We also did temperature monitoring at several locations at the stream. This temperature monitoring has been on-going for several years now and will continue for several more.

A major portion of Johns Creek originates from a series of springs at the Pocket Campground. There are several beaver ponds downstream of the campground. I have checked the temperature above and below the beaver ponds twice this year and the water upstream from the ponds the temperature has been 58 degrees both times. In August the afternoon air temperature was 85 degrees and the water below the dams was 69. Just yesterday, a cool day, the water below the beaver dams was 68.

Any temperature above 70 or so becomes closer to the critical level of trout tolerance. We need to keep a record of stream temperature levels if we want to keep a healthy population in the creek.

Moving the problem in Wyoming

heidi08 Beaver Rehabilitation, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Dispersal, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 12, 2015

Sherry Guzzi of the Sierra Wildlife Coalition sent this yesterday. Her sister lives in Jackson Hole where the documentary will be having its American debut.

Nature club to screen movie about beavers

55e612e68b74c.image — Drew Reed of the Wyoming Wetland Society releases one of two beavers into a wetland in the Gros Ventre in 2009. The film “Beavers Behaving Badly” documents Reed’s catch-and-release work. It will be screened tonight by the Jackson Hole Bird and Nature Club.

On Tuesday the club will present wildlife filmmaker Jeff Hogan’s one-hour documentary “Beavers Behaving Badly,” a BBC production. The screening is in conjunction with the club’s regular monthly meeting, 6 to 8 p.m. at Teton County Library.

The film explores the importance of beavers in the area’s ecosystem. Valley biologist Drew Reed is documented over the course of a year relocating beavers from private land where they were a nuisance to public land where they can create wetland habitat that is vital to wildlife and people.

“The film shows an ecological project come full circle,” said Bernie McHugh, a dedicated birdwatcher and secretary for the club. “Once the beavers are relocated to public lands all throughout Teton County they can help restore wetland, notably for trumpeter swans.”

Ah another feel-good solution! Move the problem out of our creeks and streams and throw them into the mountains! Maybe they’ll survive and do some good and maybe they’ll die or get eaten by a coyote but either way it’s a win-win for us. Because nothing is going to be nibbling our hedgerows.

Drew seems like a nice enough fellow, and his intentions seem of the right kind. But I’m a little worried that a grown man whose job it is to solve beaver problems that doesn’t spend any time building flow devices or protecting culverts. He also shockingly says that he’s never seen a beaver chew through “netting” before (???) or eat grass (!!!). So I’m going to assume his beaver information has room to grow. Here, I’ll help get him started. This is a yearling chewing grass.

If you can’t make it out to Jackson Hole for the premiere, you can watch the whole thing online here. The title alone set my teeth on edge for most of it, but there’s some lovely video and footage of a beaver making a scent mound which is worth the price of admission by itself. Another attempt to copy Jari Osborne’s hard work, I’ll warrant. Drew is no Sherri Tippie, that’s for sure.

BBC.Natural.World.2014.Beavers.Behaving.Badly… by i-teach-U

Let me know what you think. My strongest impression is that Jackson hole is an insanely beautiful place with a lot of beaver sissies for residents. But that’s just me.

I worked longer than I should on this yesterday but was very happy with the result. I really thought Enos Mills’ great writing needed to be revisited, so I selected a few choice lines from my favorite chapter, along with a handful of select photos. I gave up on the idea of having a better voice read this because the timing needed was a little weird anyway and I’m not smart enough to change it. I really hope you watch this. Or at least read the chapter.

A final selfish note urging us all to wish for rain, or at least cooler temperatures to help calm the fray. The Butte fire is burning the hell out of Heidi’s favorite place, and grew so rapidly yesterday the firefighters actually lost ground. The land my parents brought when I was 7 and built a home to retire on for the last 25 years isn’t out of the woods yet. As a child I built and maintained a coral there to keep in my imaginary horses, and it is the place that Jon and I escaped to the snowy night we were married, lo these many years ago. The fire is mostly expanding away from our property but there is one wicked lick at the back that is marching up the canyon towards the wild place I know best in the world, so keep your fingers crossed.

It’s been a year for catastrophes, and sometimes that is contagious.

In which In the Wall Street Journal commits plagiary. Again.

heidi08 Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 9, 2015

Merest coincidence? I’m thinking not. Google how many accusations there are of plagiary against the WSJ, the prominence Worth A Dam has in the recent New York Times articles and interview and the fact that you can’t swing a dead trapper without hitting one of our references on the internet – and I’m going to boldly accuse them of kidnapping. I suppose they could argue that the fact that they added a question mark slightly alters the meaning – thus protecting the use. But sheesh. When people steal from this website why don’t they steal the GOOD stuff?

British Beavers Gnaw Their Way Back, but Are They Worth a Dam?

Yet the Otter’s beavers are multiplying, and the mystery of how the rotund rodents came to Coleridge’s “wild streamlet of the West” has fanned the flames of a national beaver conflict.

That decadelong fight has pitted biodiversity advocates against anglers and landowners, leaving at least a dozen beavers dead and countless willow trees chewed.

Things are looking up for the beavers. Their population has grown to an estimated 212 in the U.K. wild.

And while the government last year decreed that the River Otter’s beavers should be removed, early this year it ruled they could stay, though it didn’t bar landowners from killing them.

431 73 A-hed British Beavers Gnaw Their Way Back, but Are They Worth a Dam? Gone for centuries, toothy rodent resurfaces in U.K. to love, hostility; ‘illegally released’ Mark Elliott of the Devon Wildlife Trust points out a tree along the River Otter chewed by beavers. The Trust says the U.K. has for centuries been ‘suffering from the loss of beaver activity.’ ENLARGE Mark Elliott of the Devon Wildlife Trust points out a tree along the River Otter chewed by beavers. The Trust says the U.K. has for centuries been ‘suffering from the loss of beaver activity.’ Photo: Justin Scheck By Justin Scheck Updated Sept. 7, 2015 8:13 p.m. ET 17 COMMENTS OTTERY ST. MARY, England—When beavers surfaced in the River Otter, Mark Owen smelled a rat. It had been centuries—probably before poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born in this village in 1772—since wild beavers plied the region. In recent years, any local beavers were kept as curiosities or for research, living behind electric fences. Eurasian beaver Eurasian beaver “Nobody, as far as I know, has reported that they’ve lost beavers,” says Mr. Owen, freshwater director of England’s Angling Trust, a sportfishing-advocacy group that wants the rodents removed. His conclusion: “The beavers were illegally released.” U.K. law prohibits introduction into the wild of any animal that doesn’t already live there, even if it once did. Yet the Otter’s beavers are multiplying, and the mystery of how the rotund rodents came to Coleridge’s “wild streamlet of the West” has fanned the flames of a national beaver conflict. That decadelong fight has pitted biodiversity advocates against anglers and landowners, leaving at least a dozen beavers dead and countless willow trees chewed. Things are looking up for the beavers. Their population has grown to an estimated 212 in the U.K. wild. And while the government last year decreed that the River Otter’s beavers should be removed, early this year it ruled they could stay, though it didn’t bar landowners from killing them. Devon landowner John-Michael Kennaway holds a beaver pelt. ENLARGE Devon landowner John-Michael Kennaway holds a beaver pelt. Photo: Justin Scheck/The Wall Street JoURNAL — Devon landowner John-Michael Kennaway holds a beaver pelt. Photo: Justin Scheck

Beaver believers say the species could help restore England’s countryside to something like before medieval policies encouraged exterminating animals that competed with people for land or food. Advocates say beavers fell trees that choke streams and build dams that improve wetlands for fish and other animals.

Hardly, says angler advocate Mr. Owen. Beaver dams may block trout from spawning in streams like the River Otter, where fish already struggle with river otters, he says. And chewed trees are “a health-and-safety risk for anglers.”

Oh puleeze. The country shouldn’t have beavers because a tree might fall on my friends is not an argument any one older 12 should ever have. Here’s an idea. If WSJ is looking to steal something from this website why not steal the many papers quoted where it says that BEAVERS HELP SALMON AND TROUT. And the part where it says over and over that British anglers are big whiny babies who have their eyes and ears covered when it comes to the actual research and say “lalala don’t tell me I don’t want to hear it!”

Or you know. Do an ounce of research through your OWN WSJ archives and be reminded of that great article about the Land’s Council written a few years back. You know the one that by Joel Millman about how Ranchers are on a waiting list to get beavers on their property because they’re so important for water?

Just so you know. I plan of having new ideas every week. Make sure you keep checking the website to see if there are more useful things to steal.

Trust us – We know best

heidi08 Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, City Reports, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 1, 2015

This piebald beaver can be found on occasion in the Putah Creek Nature Park in Winters, in a part of the park untouched by the ongoing restoration project. Alejandro Garcia Rojas/Courtesy photo

Creek project puts pressure on wildlife

As the Putah Creek Nature Park in Winters gears up to finish a decade-long restoration project, locals are voicing concerns over wildlife that call the last stretch of undeveloped land home.

In 2006, the City of Winters initiated a four-phase project to bring life back to the Putah Creek Nature Park. Since then, the project removed a damaged percolation dam and narrowed the channel along 7 out of 8 acres of the park. As the project moves into the final phase, however, locals are voicing concern over the last, untouched stretch of the park which is home to species of beaver and otter.

While this portion of the creek wasn’t visible before the new, wider pathway was put in during the earlier phases of the project, Hemenway says she’s worried that this final phase will drive away wildlife.

“We keep being told ‘(the beavers) will be back eventually.’ Well when is that?” Hemenway said, of the city’s response to her concerns.

“What we’re seeing now are unforeseen benefits from past phases of the project,” Brydolf said.

Beavers and otters weren’t found prior to the initial channel realignment phase that took place in 2011. Locals such as Caro and Brydolf were hoping the project would be reevaluated in light of the wildlife that have settled in the crook of the creek. Yet at the beginning of the month, they received notice that construction efforts would be pushed forward to the end of June, two months earlier than previously anticipated.

Winters is getting mighty uppity about their creek, and rightfully so. Not only do they have tons of new wildlife, they have a very rare beaver that is making waves from Colorado to Conneticut and beyond. People are beginning to understand that the “great plan” being implemented for Putah creek might not be all that great. I can’t think why. The city manager is obviously brilliant and very sensitive to the needs of wildlife.

City Manager Donlevy said a main reason for otters and beaver in the area is the improved fish populations.

Yes, it’s true, John. There’s nothing beavers like better after a hard day at the dam office than a nice fat trout. (I always suspected that herbivore nonsense was a smokescreen.) I’m sure you know best. It’s reassuring to realize how solidly you understand the needs of wildlife and creeks in undertaking a significant job like this. No wonder you can’t wait to finish. Sigh.

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It’s September and this new design was needed. This should hasten fall along, don’t you think?