Category: Who’s Killing Beavers Now?

Some things never change…

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Massachusetts Trapping Law, Who's Killing Beavers Now? February 4, 2013

Massachusetts is making news again by introducing bills to ‘unshackle itself’ from the voters trapping repeal of 1996. Apparently legislation that overturns the will of the voters is common in the bay state, because no one’s acting shocked.

Bills to revisit old trapping laws for beavers

As beavers chew through more territory in Massachusetts, several bills before the Legislature this session would revisit a 17-year-old state law barring many methods of trapping and killing these and other types of animals.

The proposals include better tracking of how many beavers are trapped annually and a repeat effort to repeal a state law banning many types of traps, including the leg-hold trap.

What a great idea! Bring back leg hold traps! Hey, why stop there? Why not bring back the guillotine and the rack too! Apparently Massachusetts is so crowded with people that they need easier ways to kill beavers and coyotes. All these pests aren’t going to kill themselves you know. Of course being as its packed with people it’s probably packed with pets too, right? Maybe they better offer one of these while you’re at it…

Catch and release: Dog owners learn how to free pets from traps, snares

HELENA — Michelle Jenicek loves walking her dogs along the creek near her house in Bernice in Jefferson County. She knew a neighbor set traps for furbearers, but it wasn’t an issue for her — until the day her 143-pound dog was caught with his neck in a snare.

Since the entire article doesn’t contain one mention of our old friend Herbie, I have to ask did Mr.Bergquist use up his indefatigable brand? Or is he on vacation, fishing for dolphins in the Bahamas?

The Massachusetts Trappers Association supports lifting the ban. President Malcolm Speicher said modern traps can catch animals without causing painful suffering.

“A lot of people can’t comprehend how the technology has changed, because in their mind it’s the old barbaric method,” Speicher said.

Now there’s a man who’s learned his lines! Not like that slacker from DEC last year who accidentally let it slip that the traps slowly drown beavers and caused Amherst, NY to stop using them! Well, Mr. Speicher hasn’t learned ALL his lines yet. He certainly doesn’t know when to stop talking.

Speicher said trappers want to see other restrictions lifted. For example, trappers are not allowed to keep beavers killed under emergency permits. With beavers caught in regular trapping season, trappers can sell or barter pelts, meat and castor glands used to make bait and some perfumes, but not other parts of the animals.

“I have people that always want skulls,” Speicher said.

Brace yourselves….

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Who's Killing Beavers Now? February 2, 2013

Orrington sues landowners over beaver dam failure that damaged roadway

10009961_H9760697-600x400[1] — The remains of a beaver dam near Swetts Pond Road in Orrington. The dam broke in March, causing flooding along the road. Buy Photo

This was the worst beaver news I ever reported on, and will remain the cautionary tale for the ages. The unfortunate land owner wanted to keep his beavers, and the dam washed out causing massive road damage a decade ago. The city asked the landowner to eliminate the beavers, but the land owner refused and hired someone to install a flow device. (Last year David Wilkins posted on the beaver management forum that Skip had been saddled with the job). But hard Maine winters had rusted out the filter, the landowner didn’t notice, and the beavers had plugged the pipe again causing the pond to get bigger and bigger. This apparently escalated until last year there was another washout.

Can you guess what happens next? Now the city is suing for damages because ‘they told the landowner to get rid of those beavers and he didn’t comply”.

The town also is claiming the Pelletiers agreed to fix the problem after the 2001 flooding and filed an additional claim on Dec. 13.

“The additional count alleges that the Pelletier defendants agreed to the installation, maintenance and monitoring of certain equipment designed to reduce or eliminate the hazard of a subsequent breach,” the motion to amend complaint states.

A device called a “beaver deceiver,” which resembles a culvert and is designed to control the water level, was installed after the flooding a decade ago, but over the years the beavers filled the device with sticks and it eventually failed, the town manager has said.

“We watched the deceiver start to fail and watched the water start to get higher,” Pelletier told selectmen shortly after the breach last year.

Ugh. Things don’t look good for our heroes. But if I was their attorney I’d demand to see records of all the phone calls or emails the city sent to the landowner saying the pond was getting bigger. And if I were Mike or Skip I’d be drafting a ‘flow device installation‘ informed consent statement right about that I had every future landowner sign. It would say in big red letters “I have been informed that flow devices require yearly inspection to assure successful operation. Extreme weather conditions may make more frequent inspection necessary.” There would be a little space for their initials and signature. And I would keep it on file for just this sort of occasion. Sigh.

Did I mention I hate this story? And hate, hate, hate the chilling effect it will have on the installation of flow devices for years to come? For once I’m glad that more folks don’t read this website. Nothing to see here, move along.

No word yet on when all those lawsuits will come for the devastated fish populations caused by too few beaver dams. You think I exaggerate?

CPUs

heidi08 Beavers, Who's Killing Beavers Now? January 30, 2013

CPU stands for “Catch Per Unit” of effort. Tidy description eh? It is an actual measure used in actual research and actual population monitoring. See when the CPU gets lower we can infer the population is dropping. And when the CPU is more productive that means the population is rising. The unit in question is most often time. How many hours did it take for you to kill that many animals? Apparently our government agencies charged with stewardship don’t actually need to spend hours tracking or monitoring the population to understand these complex trends: We just need to ask the folk who are catching them how hard they had to work! Hey, why use time at all? It’s so ephemeral and who wears a watch anyway?

Why not BPU’s? (Number of beers consumed.)

Although used most often for fish, it was discussed in Oregon applied to beavers as well. See the CPUs for beaver are going down in Oregon, which lead to a voluntary moratorium on trapping in some parts of the state. I assume the CPUs for beaver are going up in Massachusetts, which is why folks always complain the population in the state is exploding.

Of course it doesn’t take into account the variability of Effort or Motivation or Skill. A place with trailing interest in/understanding of beavers could produce a low CPU and a place where everyone loses their collective minds when one is seen (Like MA for instance) could produce such a fire alarm effect that their CPU could be quite high. Not all beaver trappers are created equal.

In case it wasn’t clear, I don’t much like the statistic, or the idea of using murder rates as a way of tracking population. But I do like this one odd fact.

The CPU for Martinez California plummeted in 2007 to exactly zero.

Now for something completely different, I was sent this video yesterday by our old beaver friend and photographer Glenn Hori.

Dis-amenities

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers, Who's Killing Beavers Now? January 28, 2013

Mapping beaver habitat amenities and dis-amenities: Spaces of human-beaver predation in Oregon

One of my favorite presentations at the conference was this from Sonoma State’s own Jeff Baldwin. Jeff is a member of the California working beaver group, and worked with Suzanne Fouty on his doctorate. He attended my Valley of the moon lecture in Sonoma and is an all around great guy. His talk was about identifying specific sites where beaver would thrive, and contributing factors to understanding why certain places were inhospitable.

Remember that, (in what my line of work would call a ‘schizophrenogenic policy’) Oregon beavers are a protected species on public lands and classified as a ‘predator’ on private lands so they can be killed with out permits or records. Relocation is legal in Oregon but in its early stages, and the requirements involve getting permission from land-owners up and down stream for 5 miles in both directions of where they were introduced. Also, it is not legal to ‘hold beaver family members’ while the entire colony is being trapped to aide in relocation of the family unit, so family members get separated and the corresponding survival rate isn’t great.

He appropriately mentioned that cougar, coyote, and bear habitat were not great places for beavers to thrive, but then added that certain human-populated areas were actually much more dangerous (“Unless, he said, you had a guardian angel like Heidi there“). (Nice!) He pointed out that the unique Oregon laws that allow un-permitted killing of beavers on private land includes leased lands as well. This includes some government lands, regional parks, all soil and gas sites. He took the time to map out just how much of Oregon was beaver-killable and how much was safe. And safe was a very small portion.

It’s hard work being a beaver.

Add to this the fact that only a limited portion of ‘safe’ includes water access and you can see that beaver numbers are going to be limited. Which is why certain regions always seem to have beavers and certain places, which could have beavers don’t have any safe passage for beavers to get there, so they never seem to have them. Which is why, by inference, the beavers continue to come back to Martinez even though we have dam washouts and train whistles and garbage.

Specific Oregon question: I understand that land can be privately held but aren’t waterways and submersible lands public? And, by extension, don’t the beavers that live in those waterways belong to the state? And why don’t you have to get permission from landowners 5 miles up and down stream to be allowed to trap beavers?

What is the Public Trust Doctrine?

This doctrine of law provides that the State of Oregon holds submerged and submersible land in trust for the benefit of all the people. The general public has a right to fully enjoy these resources for a wide variety of public uses including commerce, navigation, fishing, and recreation.

And beavers.

Two to One Ratio

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Who's Killing Beavers Now? January 11, 2013

What’s that old saying? ‘One step forward two steps back’ Well as of this morning we officially have that beat, with three beaver articles from three different states, one ignorant and two wise! Again they are unrelated, although even the negative one mentions that they checked the website for Beavers:Wetlands and Wildlife, mostly to laugh at it but you know what Gahndi said…

Buckleigh neighborhood eager to get rid of beavers

Pests causing damage to pond in Buckleigh neighborhood

Right now, you can easily see four dams beavers have created in the Buckleigh neighborhood pond. “This is a huge problem for us because we can’t let the beavers continue to destroy the trees and the pond,” says Shaw. This has been a growing problem over the past four years. “When it rains the water level really rises in the pond.”

Where to begin? Another HOA eager to solve problems by killing beavers? A discussion of the irony that coppicing can’t happen if they fastidiously remove the stumps of every trees the beavers cut? A thoughtful analysis of the covariance of states that regularly kill beavers AND accept FEMA monies for drought relief?

No, lets start with their problem solving skills and leave it at that.

The beavers are challenging the HOA on every front. Traps have not worked; folks who tried to hunt them have not been successful, either.

More night vision goggles for Buckleigh! A case of beer and a carefully placed copy of Three Against the Wilderness and maybe these hunters will get some new ideas.

In fact let’s start the hunters off reading THIS article.

Beavers do world of good

Rick Brockway writes a weekly outdoors column for The Daily Star.

Although beavers can cause problems, they really are wonderful animals that are vital to nature. The American Indian called beavers the “sacred center” of the land because they create such rich, watery habitats for other mammals — turtles, frogs, ducks and birds. I’ve taken many fish from beaver ponds and shot loads of ducks as well. As the Indians discovered, the beaver pond was a source of food and water.

It’s so much fun to sit along a beaver dam in the evening and see what’s happening out there in nature. The beavers swim by, heading off to work; deer come in to drink; ducks spread their wings as they reach land; and even brook trout rise for flies near the water’s edge.

Guess whether I already wrote Rick to thank him for his column and say that beaver problems were actually pretty easy to solve? Good guess! Well, when sportsmen spread good news about beavers we are always happy!

And when politicians do it we are ecstatic!

Op-Ed: Restoring waterways is crucial

The cleanup of the Bronx River helped blunt the impact of Hurricane Sandy.

The tristate area is only beginning to recover from the destruction wrought by Hurricane Sandy. As we assess the damage and how we prepare for a future storm, it is worth noting that work by local communities, government and nonprofit groups to restore and stabilize the city’s local waterways may well be part of the answer.

In the meantime, the Bronx River cleanup provides a national model for a new federal Urban Waters initiative designed to stimulate local economies, create jobs and protect Americans’ health by revitalizing waterways in underserved areas. The return of two beavers suggests that restoration is now taking on a life of its own.

This is a nice Op-ed that describes how the natural restoration of the river helps absorb and mitigate some of Sandy’s more damaging effects. He even talks about how recovered oyster beds can help.

Oyster restoration work by groups like Rocking the Boat protects—and could further protect—urban shores from storm impacts by solidifying our natural infrastructure. Oyster beds can slow powerful waves and, working with marshes, sand bars and other features of the coastal landscape, provide greater stability and defense to shorelines.

Oh and just in case you don’t recognize the author, this Op-ed is written by representative Jose Serrano who got 30 million to clean up the river, was discussed in Audubon and National Geographic, and is the inspiration for this: