Category: Who’s Killing Beavers Now?

The unfinished thought

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Who's Killing Beavers Now? September 13, 2014

A beaver lodge sits next to the partially drained pond, water from which was used to control dust from construction of a golf course near the Trinity River Audubon Center.

Editorial: Drained Trinity pond drains confidence

The work recently went off the rails when contractors began draining an environmentally sensitive pond in an effort to control dust elsewhere.

This pond is a gem of the forest, where threatened wood storks like to fish. The contractors hired by City Hall siphoned it like a swimming pool. A witness, Ben Sandifer, said he saw fish huddled in the mud and remaining water with their backs exposed.

Assistant City Manager Jill Jordan wrote that, while officials agreed to let contractors use water from the pond, they “never realized the contractor would be so insensitive as to attempt to drain an entire pond.”

Right, because contractors are usually such sensitive souls. I know mine went through a whole box of kleenex watching nature programs when our shower was installed. This is what you did to the Audubon center? This is bad even by Texas standards.

The good news is that folks are mighty upset about it, so there’s a good chance something might change for next time. Too bad for the beavers and the wood storks though. I guess someone else will have to deliver all those babies to dallas?

(Have you ever seen a wood stork? They are deeply striking birds with featherless black heads and great long beaks. Here’s a photo I took in the everglades. You can bet something enjoyed an all-you-can-eat sushi buffet with all those huddled victimized fish – and we know it wasn’t the beavers!)

Now, is it me or has the Huffington Post finally maxed out on beaver innuendo?

Nobody likes a stinky beaver.

Just ask the people of Cumming, Georgia, who had to endure the filthy stench of rotting beaver carcasses, after one resident allegedly left them in a parking lot.

Police are fingering Chad Artimovich, 43, as the lead suspect in the case. Artimovich was arrested Aug. 23 after customers of a TitleMax complained about decomposing beaver carcasses in the parking lot, WSB-TV reported last week. Responding officers found several large bags full of maggots, fluid and rotting beaver, which gave off an “atrocious” smell, they said.

Get it? “Stinky beaver”, police are “Fingering” the suspect. Isn’t that hilarious?I mean if you’re a 12 year old boy?

Less funny is the tail bounty offered in Georgia that leads to someone knocking off a few beaver, snipping free their reward hastily in the parking lot, and hurrying off to collect their 13$ a tail.

No word on when the Huffington Post will be reporting on that.

Oh, and speaking of wasted publications and and incomplete thoughts, how about Nina Keenam columnist for the Andulusia Star News in Alaska whose burning curiosity drove her to exhaustively research beavers – during which effort she determined they were BUSY.

Beavers worthy of ‘busy’ slogan

What animal do some people consider the “outstanding engineer of the wild” and the mammal next to man that alters the environment most to suit its needs? If you answered “a beaver,” you were right.

When I covered meetings of the Covington County Commission for The Andalusia Star-News, one of the commissioners often related stories about beavers in constant battle with his road crew. He said beaver dams caused flooding along county roads and bridges. As fast as crews destroyed a beaver dam, the beavers reconstructed it the same night.

Beavers are definitely clever and persistent. I learned that beavers cut down trees, gnaw off the limbs, cut the main trunk into the right size, and dig canals so it can float to the dam site. Then it plasters the logs together with mud.

I would say that the expression “Busy as a beaver” rings true.

I can just imagine those late nights of study, drinking iced coffee and charcoal biscuits next to a pile of ruffled volumes that lead you to this stunning conclusion. No wonder you didn’t have time to talk about how important they are to salmon, or wildlife, or rivers. Your considerable research skills were already consumed by the jaw-dropping discovery that beavers are “busy”.

Another difference between Iowa and Washington

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 11, 2014

News and Weather For The Quad Cities –

Neighbors Want Solution For Beaver Dam Flooding

Just up the creek from where the water is backing up is a beaver dam, possibly more than one. It’s just north of Interstate 80 near the Davenport Municipal Airport. A resident who lives nearby and is dealing with water on her family’s land took some pictures. The problem is that the dams aren’t on her property and it’s been a struggle to get something done.

“It’s been going on since April. We’ve had water up to our knees almost,” said Lindsay Andrews. She says last year there was barely any water in the creek at all. Now there seems to be a bit of a beaver problem.

“We’ve seen a couple of beavers. My mother in law seen one. We watched one swim upstream not too long ago,” said Andrews.

Their dams are leaving stagnant water and a muddy mess in area her family mostly uses for recreation but on a regular basis.

“We used to do cookouts, can’t do that. Kids used to ride the trails, can’t do that,” she said, “the bugs are a big concern… Safety is a big concern with the kids.”

My god the horror. Our kids haven’t been outside in 5 months because we’re terrified of the westnile-virus mosquitoes or some such nonsense those rotten beavers have brought into our bright green fertilizer-ruined stream. I have only written about beavers in Iowa once before in 8 years of coverage so that means they aren’t even enough of an issue to hit the news cycle. I’m honestly not hopeful for these beavers, but I dutifully posted my comment just in case some landowner wants to be in touch about options.

The only other comment is about how dynamite will fix things, so I ain’t hopeful.

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A better use of our time is the youtube account of Ben Dittbrenner, who’s dissertation on beavers and climate change was mentioned a couple days ago in the news. He wrote back after my comment and said that he is thoroughly enjoying this part of his work, and his close contact with the beavers. He’s particularly struck by what a mollifying effect their adorable presence has on even the most hardened maintenance crew.

Of course Worth A Dam knows all about that. Remember the crane company that put in the sheetpile?

You should subscribe to Ben’s youtube account right away so you see the cool stuff he encounters during his project. I just wish data collection on MY dissertation looked like this!

Published on Sep 2, 2014

This video is from our animal husbandry facility. Beavers are temporarily housed as part of the Skykomish Beaver Project. The goal of this research is to relocate nuisance beavers, which would otherwise be killed, into headwaters of the Skykomish River Basin to stimulate habitat improvement and climate change

Plot Thickener

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beaver Rehabilitation, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 9, 2014

We haven’t heard much from Devon lately on the great beaver trapping from DEFRA. If you’ll remember, a slew of citizens and farmers came to the meeting asking that they be allowed to remain.

DEFRA took this opportunity to blow off the meeting and pick up the traps instead. We heard they haven’t been too successful at catching any quarry, and it is looking like the good guys were winning this round. At least by default.

I guess DEFRA thought it was time for this.

Don’t allow beavers to upset our freshwater ecosystem

There seems to be a movement in this country to re-introduce species that have long been extinct, of which the beaver is one of many. These people will support their argument by declaring the beaver has only been extinct for 200-300 years. Not so. It became extinct in this country in the 12th century. As Derek Gow says they are great engineers building dams and constructing homes in rivers and streams from trees they have felled. Derek says they create wetlands. I do not think so. The likely outcome is more floods. Surely we have had enough floods in the last two years without additional problems caused by beavers.

Do not upset the status quo – the freshwater habitat in this country is a fragile ecosystem. Much damage can be done by reintroducing an alien species which the beaver is. We as humans do not have to feel guilty just because we were instrumental in the destruction of the beaver all those years ago. The world has moved on, so has our country and our rivers.

The beaver should be considered an alien in this country just like the grey squirrel, coypus, mink and Japanese knotweed. The damage they can do is too great to take the chance.

Those who put these animals in the River Otter should help the Environment Agency trap them – act now before it is too late.

Alien beavers! Thank goodness the West Morning news printed this ANONYMOUS letter before it was too late! I wonder who penned this thoughtful treatise? (Mr. George Eustice, don’t be so modest!) You should go read the whole thing because it contains a lovely passage from HBN Hynes which makes beaver restoration sound very heroic – and then argues ‘we can’t STAND this much repair in our rivers’! I especially like how it warns us of what’s to come and ends with the recognition that the government trappers have absolutely no idea what they’re doing and need assistance.

(The good news is that I see this morning another very popular badger cull is coming so they’ll have something else to keep them busy for a while.)

Your pro-beaver comment is needed now. I’m particularly of mine.

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And just so you know not all of Europe is ignorant of beavers, I got this from Duncan Haley this morning.

The Voronezhsky Biosphere Reserve is pleased to invite you to take part in 7-th International Beaver Symposium! The symposium will take place in Russia, Voronezh, September 14-17, 2015

Organizers of symposium:

MINISTRY OF NATURAL RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

Department of State Policy on Environmental Protection

Voronezh Region Government

Russian Research Institute of Game Management and Fur Farming

Voronezhsky Biosphere Reserve

The seventh symposium! And before you start thinking this event is exactly as old as our beaver festival, it’s actually much older, since it’s held every two years. You might remember back when Skip Lisle was invited to the one in Lithuania and our beaver friend Alex Hiller met him there.

Can’t wait to see the lineup for this one!

This headline could be from the book of Genesis

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 8, 2014

Hydrologist Andy Bryden (left) and wildlife biologists Molly Alves and Jason Schilling release two captive beavers into a lodge they built earlier on Forest Service land near Skykomish on Wednesday. A team with the Tulalip Tribes worked with state Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. Forest Service to relocate six beavers found near Duvall.

Beavers brought here as part of an effort to improve ecosystems

SKYKOMISH — On a rainy Wednesday, a small team hiked into the woods near Skykomish hauling three heavy cages.Their destination: a creekside pile of cut branches and sticks. Their cargo: a family of six beavers.

The first cage was lined up with an opening in the pile of wood, which is actually a lodge built by the team the previous Friday. The cage was opened and the matriarch of the family, weighing 50 pounds, was gently encouraged into the lodge.

Once she waddled in, one of the team called out, “Mama went in,” and a small cheer went up.Mama beaver was followed by one of her young, then the cage was removed and the lodge entrance blocked to prevent the beavers from leaving while the next cage was lined up.Within 10 minutes, the entire family — mother, father, three subadults about one year old and one kit — was in the lodge, the entrance blocked with a log.

Beavers play an important role in maintaining stream health. Their dams help maintain a consistent base flow of water in streams so that it doesn’t all flow downhill in one springtime deluge, an important consideration in eastern Washington where many streams run dry in the summer.Beaver dams also retain sediment and help to reduce water temperatures in streams, making them healthier for salmon and other fish

Another beaver triumph for Washington state which is the beaver Mecca from which all wisdom flows. I am really happy to see our friend Ben Dittbrenner right at the center of it. He’s one of two folk who replaced Jake Jacobsen as watershed steward in Snohomish county. Jake was my very first beaver advisor, and Ben had lots of chances to learn from the master. He and Jake are both working with Mike Callahan on the adapted flow devices for fish passage. We first met Ben at the 2013 State of the Beaver conference when he joined us for a quick lunch before our talks.

Ben Dittbrenner is a Ph.D. candidate in forest ecology at the University of Washington working with the Tulalips on this project. Dittbrenner said this work will also help prove a theory in his dissertation.

“What we’re hoping to show is that the beavers can be used to reduce the effects of climate change,” Dittbrenner said.One of the major impacts expected from climate change in the Pacific Northwest is warmer water at higher elevations. That will lead to less snowpack, and therefore less water from snowmelt in streams in the summer, presenting risks to salmon and fish habitat.

Beaver activity resaturates the land, however. Stored water migrates downstream more slowly, and often through the water table, which keeps the temperature down.Beaver activity has also been shown to correlate with more stream meanders, more shady spots, and overall more diverse ecosystems, Dittbrenner said. In other studies, juvenile coho salmon were seen in higher numbers in streams with beavers.

“Beavers and coho go hand in hand, or foot and tail,” he said.

Great work Ben and colleagues, and I can’t wait for the day when the work beavers do in smart cities that learn to live with them gets such a glowing article! And that, ladies and gentlemen is why Washington is the beaver beacon for the world.

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California, on the other hand, has a LONG way to go. I got back some preliminary data from our statistical analysis of the spread sheets we did on the 254 depredation permits issued in the past 20 months. Apparently we have an “OUTLIER”.

Ya think?

Goliath, meet David

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 3, 2014

Ottery Town Council pledges support for wild beaver family to remain in the River Otter

OTTERY Town Council has pledged its support for a family of beavers, whose future hangs in the balance, to be allowed to remain on the banks of the River Otter downstream.

At the full council meeting on Monday, September 1, there was a unanimous vote among town councillors for the Department for the Environment and Rural Affairs (Defra) to leave them be.

Ottery ward member, Councillor Roger Giles had requested that the council discussed and gave its backing to the beavers and proposed that the council ask East Devon MP Hugo Swire, to insist that DEFRA return the beavers to the river as soon as they have been tested.

Defra say catching East Devon’s beavers could take months after rumours the wild animals are now in Honiton

Pass me the popcorn. Something tells me this is about to get very, very interesting. Just imagine the kind of civic pressure it would take to get the Martinez City council to give a unanimous vote to support the beavers. They never even voted to tolerate the beavers. Devon must be a hotbed of public beaver-protection about now, with farmers keeping an eye on their lands and hurrying beavers along when ever the government trappers lumber into the area.

Councillor Claire Wright, independent member of East Devon District Council, said there was “general bafflement” in the area as to why they should be removed.

She said: “Human beings were responsible for the extinction of beavers in this country several hundred years ago because they were hunted for their fur, so it is now our responsibility to do what we can to support beavers’ reintroduction to our rivers.

“And they are good for rivers too, helping with water purity and they are completely vegetarian, so are no threat to small animals.

“The decision to let them stay should be made by the community, not by officials from London. There is a lot of support locally for them remaining on the river and general bafflement about why Defra would want to remove them. There needs to be a full consultation before any decisions are made.”

Someone pinch me, I think I’m dreaming. City government fighting the feds over the benefits of beavers. I hope I don’t wake up before it gets to the good part. Even if, God forbid, this doesn’t end well for these particular beavers, it’s put the issue in the public eye and dramatically made a point. Beavers are good for creeks. And Anglers are wrong.

The Angling Trust has been campaigning against moves to introduce beavers to England because of the damage that they can do to rivers, migrating fish runs and the potential spread of diseases.

Mark Lloyd, chief Executive of the Angling Trust, said: “Nowadays too many people seem to want to see ‘rewilded’ mammals introduced to our landscapes, but we must re-build damaged river ecosystems from the bottom up, not from the top down.

“Urgent and concerted Action is needed to restore habitats and fish populations in our rivers rather than irresponsible re-introduction programmes.”

Of course you know what’s really happening. The UK can’t protect fishermen interests from dams or culverts or sewers or water quality or power plants. They can’t keep fish alive by reducing pollution or human waste or global warming. But dammit they CAN get rid of those pesky beavers. That’s something right?

Obviously Worth A Dam offers all our support to the Animal Health and Veterinary Laboratories that are doing the actual trapping. Here’s some helpful advice for your hunt.