Beavers or Social Ambasadors – Page 23

Back to school

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Beavers or Social Ambasadors, Educational September 8, 2010

Did you see our nice article in the Gazette? Apparently beaver art is officially launched! Monday’s school board meeting will start with a short presentation on the mural by EBAG artists FRO and Randy. Hopefully we’ll generate more interest in the beavers – their impact on the habitat and the community. It’s a busy night. I can’t be there (day job!), Jon can’t be there because he has to do a “beaver tour” which someone bought at the silent auction. FRO and Randy will carry the night and Kathi will be there in her ‘school board capacity’. Worth A Dam is apparently in high demand at the moment.

Speaking of which I got a nice response from the columnist in the Missouri Bambi-myth article saying he was actually pro-beaver and ‘never lose your passion’ (!) and then a cordial letter from the trapper in question whom I had never written. He explained that they do use flow devices in public lands but offer only trapping on private property. He assured me that they offered information about wrapping trees and told people that trapping was a short term solution. I’m not sure why writing an unknown woman who had never contacted him was a good use of his time, but there it is.

To tell the truth, the website has been getting a weird amount of traffic lately. I got an offer to host adds for pay and a threat for an international lawsuit for writing about a certain iconic-bra-appearing product. I did what I could to talk my way out of both for the time being. The really exciting news is that beaver-friend and Worth A Dam benefactor Scott Artis is going to begin an upgrade to the site Sunday. Site designer Michael Cronin taught me as much as he could before he moved away, but he never taught me how to do an upgrade. Now technology has moved forward without us and this website is like a tricycle on the freeway. Hopefully we’ll get new wheels soon. There may be moments of the look of the page changing but don’t worry, we’ll be excitingly upgraded and restored eventually!

Children + Beavers = Civic Art

heidi08 Beaver News, Beavers or Social Ambasadors, City Reports, Educational, Environmental, featured September 3, 2010

Children’s Mural Available for Display

Worth A Dam is proud to present the children’s Mural for Alhambra Creek. This colorful and engaging diptych piece was created by a hundred young artists at Beaver Festival III in downtown Martinez and is now available for loaned display. FROgard, of the East Bay Artists Guild, painted the background with help from Randy Stansberry, based on graphic artist Libby Corliss creek map for the area. FRO provided guidance, instruction and a little judicious editing to help the mural come to life.

Each segment is 36″ x 48″and the pair should be hung in tandem. Imaginations were allowed to flourish letting each child share his or her own vision for the beaver habitat: a close look at the artwork shows that in addition to the green heron, baby ducks and beaver family, there is even a pirate beaver with a “hook” claw! One pragmatic child painted a golf bag with a ‘hole in one’ just in case dad would like to play a few rounds at the Beaver Park.

The hidden treasure of Martinez, CA is revealed not just its famous beavers but also in the delightful and caring children that respect Alhambra Creek and its wildlife. Funds and materials for this mural were donated by generous supporters and it is the hope of the children, the artists, and Worth A Dam that it will be seen around the downtown area in Martinez, inspiring each of us to see the wild beauty of the world around them.

If you would like to display the mural in your office, foyey, stairwell or gallery, contact Heidi Perryman at (925) 283-4499 to make arrangements.

This notice went out as of 3:00 pm Wednesday.As of 9 pm last night we already had expressed interest from the superintendent of schools, the Contra Costa Bar Association, and Superior Court. Worth A Dam is feeling like Scarlet at the ball! Thanks FRO and Randy for your outstanding work on this project. Thanks Mitch Wagner (long time hero of another very famous beaver case) for the generous donation. Worth A Dam promises never to let generous donations go to waste!

Laws of Nature

heidi08 Beaver News, Beavers or Social Ambasadors, Creative Solutions, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers August 20, 2010

So last night the beavers got a pretty special visitor in the Who’s Who of environmental education. John Muir Laws (‘Jack’) drove out from San Francisco for a special beaver viewing and introduction. He brought his sketch pad and board and sat under the willow trees on the bank to draw the beavers as they swam about obligingly. Jack is a firm believer that seeing and drawing nature is the best way to truly understand it, and he dismisses the commonly held belief that artistic ability is a ‘gift’ rather than a pursuit.

He heard the ‘epic tail’ of the beavers salvation and the story of the exciting sheetpile vista that greeted him. Then he was treated to a tour and the remarkable sighting of GQ strolling over the beaver dam in all his attractive prowess. While he settled to watch the constantly unfolding story of three kits navigating the waters on their own, families with wide-eyed children poured down to watch Jack shared his excitement with them by passing along his expensive binoculars for a closer look. Jacks illustrations are the last word of Bay Nature Magazine and his drawings of our beavers will appear in the October issue.

Every now and then as he worked and watched he would pause and then exclaim “this is SO COOL!!!” a doxology with which certainly none there would object. Jack was invited to see the beavers by some friendly docents at the Audubon Canyon Ranch who had attended my talk at “Close to Home”. He asked my thoughts about what to emphasize and I stressed two things: the impact of the beavers on the habitat (green herons and pond turtles provided backup for that argument) and the impact of the beavers on the community (for which the hushed bright faces of appreciative children provided ample proof.)

All night he remarked on seeing beavers in Tahoe and Montana or Wisconsin but never seeing them like THIS. He enjoyed my observation that these were ADA accessible beavers, which of course they are, but I pointed out the flow device and stressed that any city who is willing to use creative tools could have local beavers of its very own. At the end of the evening he agreed that this was truly a special wildlife viewing opportunity saying that “Everyone in the Bay Area should come here, watch these amazing animals, buy a burrito and visit this town!” – which I’m sure the Chamber of Commerce would love. He also remarked that this was an essential opportunity for teaching stewardship, since people don’t learn to love nature because of what they saw on the discovery channel: they love first what is in their own backyard.

For their part the beavers were in top form and brimming with artistic merit. Just look at the photo Cheryl took last night.

Beaver Kit: Cheryl Reynolds

Before you go, your help is desprately needed by the poor city of Martinez which can’t possibly think what to name the park where 2000 people have attended the beaver festival over the last three years. Gosh, maybe you have a suggestion? Unless we’re calling it “Sheetpile Vista Plaza” or “Drinking-in-the-daytime Park” I can really only think of ONE name that makes sense, and it starts with a ‘B’. But why don’t you write and let them know yours?

Beaver Hub!

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Beavers or Social Ambasadors, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental August 17, 2010

Remember Ian Timothy’s wonderful packaging of his five part claymation series “Beaver Creek” that he offered for the Silent Auction? Well he was pretty happy with how it turned out, too. Amidst the flurry of launching episode V he generated lots of new viewers and interest. I received an email yesterday from Joe Cannon of the Lands Council in Washington State. As you might recall, the Lands Council is the powerful information and advocacy group behind the “Working Beaver Conference” a few years back and the “Beaver Solution” production last year. It also has two Americorp positions teaching beaver management and stream solutions.

My Americorps coworker and I are coordinating a film fest themed on environmental issues and sustainable living. We’re showing several films, including the Imax “Beavers” film, and would like to show Ian Timothy’s Beaver creek animations series shown on your website. I’m so glad you’ve promoted his talents! These episodes are really great, and would be perfect for short segments between films! What would the best way to coordinate getting the DVD from him? If nothing else, I can try to connect with him through Facebook. I’m pretty sure the theater we are coordinating with can show DVD format.

Thanks! Joe

Joe Cannon

Beaver Solution Project Assistant

The Lands Council

So of course I got pretty excited and did a “Ian this is Joe, Joe this is Ian” email. I just hope Ian isn’t so bogged down with the beginning of the school year he can’t get to the post office! An environmental film festival is a great and well deserved honor to add to his resume. You know, of course, there should be an “introduction to the artist” segment included in the series, with some footage of him painstakingly fixing the clay scene, photographing and then moving it a fraction of an inch, and doing the whole thing again. It could show him doing his homework and sitting with his friends at high school and maybe it could say how he got interested in beavers?

Teaching Children

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers or Social Ambasadors, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental August 10, 2010

This morning 30 more children are eager to learn what a Keystone Species is and earn the last of our charms for a bracelet. I’m off to the John Muir Mountain Day Camp to teach about beavers and make bracelets. It is my grand fortune to be there with Frank Helling who cheerfully portrays Muir every year and talks to the kids about his life. Fortune is contagious apparently: he came down with Igor after the 2008 Earth Day event and watched a half dozen beavers with Cheryl Reynolds on hand to explain what he was seeing. He still talks about that magical night!

Since there are less of us this time to go around I thought of a new plan. I’ll do the presentation for the first “tribe”, and ask questions at the end. The lucky 6 answers will become “charm captains” (you know a beaver captain, a salmon captain, a key captain, and so on) and then they’ll go off to make sure the other 9 children ‘earn’ that particular charm. Jon will be there to link them onto a bracelet and the lucky kids will get a shiny souvenir of their day learning about beavers. Meanwhile I’ll be presenting to the second ‘tribe’ and getting new charm captains for the second wave. Repeat this three times. This way the children teach each other and the odds of being remembered go wayyyyyy up.

We had just enough for 30 leftover which means I did 95 bracelets at the festival. No wonder we felt busy! Here’s a nice ‘teaching children’ video if you haven’t seen it in a while.