Category: City Reports

Red Letter Day for Beavers!

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions August 5, 2009

Back in the murky grip of winter, when Californians were waiting for the temperature to drop and East Coasters were trying to remember what the earth looked like under its white blanket, beaver friend Mike Callahan of Beaver Solutions in Massachusetts was hatching a plan. He wondered about making a series of DVD’s to train willing people to do sensible beaver management. His idea was to create something accessible and hands-on enough to be used by public works crews and maintenance workers across the nation.

He thought about learning to make the video himself, and asked me if I could help. I told him my video expertise ended at the three minute mark, and I had no experience (or even computer space for!) longer projects. I suggested he talk with some of the wildlife groups in his area, who might have a videographer already as part of their own marketing. Mike talked with the Humane Society and Audubon who were very excited about the project and directed him to apply for the AWI Christine Stevens Grant. Which he did, arguing convincingly that teaching cities to take care of beavers would take care of waterfowl, take care of amphibians, take care of muskrats and minks and otters and improve water quality.

His request had a familiar personal history section that I hadn’t known before, involving his and his wife’s early days as compassionate B&B owners turned volunteers who were trying to save some beavers in their area. They brought in Skip Lisle to help and Mike spent time training with him. You know of course that beavers change things: it’s what they do. Soon Mike’s compassion became a passion, then a career and the B&B was sold and the business of Beaver Solutions was born. It’s a pretty interesting story.

Anyway, back in murky January, he composed his request and he waited.

He waited a long time. Winter is an idle time for a Massachusetts beaver man, with months that he couldn’t get in the water at all, followed by months that he just wished he couldn’t. Last night, after 8 months of waiting, Mike finally got the news.

His grant was awarded! To the tune of 10,000 dollars! Since it didn’t exactly fit the requirement for the Stevens award, the money will be taken from another source, but they said it was a very worthy project and now he can move forward. Just in time for his trip to Juneau at the end of the month when he’ll be helping the mendenhall glacier beavers (remember them?) not wear out their welcome.

This is big big beaver news. If the training series was cheaply available around the country, there would be far fewer excuses for directors of city works everywhere. We are so happy for Mike, and we really couldn’t be more pleased for beavers.

[youtube:http://youtube.com/watch?v=3Bk2RF3j9fg]

Memories

heidi08 City Reports July 7, 2009

Wednesday’s city council meeting was almost of beaver vintage. It was SRO packed full of teachers and parents and city workers. A sea of orange caution t-shirts lined the first three rows of chairs and sat there ungraciously while old ladies stood at the back. In silent pauses you could hear the sound of children playing on the porch while they waited for their parents. Patient-looking women with classroom poise passed around tupperwear containers of chocolate chip cookies.

At that first body count everyone should have known how the meeting would end. A room beyond full of people willing to share cookies is a dangerous thing. The city should have just unfolded its hands and wrote out the check right then. Superindentent Rami Muth (who inherited woes she could not have possibly imagined) stood up and gave an impassioned, level, persuasive speech for the city to unclench its purse strings and help MUSD maintain the important 20-1 teacher ratio for K-3. She spoke so well the room was silent when she left the podium. A few of us clapped like it mattered and the room burst into applause.

The first speaker was an 11 year-old boy whose mom had gotten a pink slip. He bravely took the podium and started to say how important that school had been to him. He promptly burst into tears as only an 11 year old boy can. His mom came to stand with him. He finished his comments through sobs and then took his seat.

Game. Set. Match. At that moment the city should have just handed its atm card to the crowd and said, is this enough? The meeting was over, the brittle back of “withold” had been fractured by the gentle persuasion of “give”. I knew how it was going to end. (To be honest, I may have cynically wondered how that boy felt about beavers because he would be a powerful weapon if carefully used….) Still the city insisted on protocol and the meeting wore on.

I will say our City Manager, from the very get-go, seemed to know which way the wind was blowing. Before the meeting there was a deal in the works for the school to pay back a loan through turning part of one of their playgrounds into the Corp Yard for the city, (ostensibly so the then-vacated area next to the beavers could be used to make another 4 story senior center). The City Manager began by saying that the idea wasn’t possible, because of hazardous materials, etc, and looked at the council as if he had told them this before. It reminded me of the story I heard about his hiring. When asked about handling the beaver issue in Martinez he had apparently shaken his head and said knowingly, “You are never getting rid of those beavers. Better just face it”.

So how many nails is that in the city’s coffin (coffers?) SRO, cookies, crying and City Manager. There were more. The biggest came from the city workers union representative. The orange shirts were there because they objected to the city refusing to open its reserves to pay them, but agreeing to do so for the school district. They felt that the city giving up this money meant further cutting down the road. It reminded me again of the beaver subcommittee when one night their actions of allegedly ripping out the dam was up for discussion. News of the damage had hit the papers and the director was very upset about it. That night a similar sea of orange lined the back row to show solidarity.

On Wednesday they were a wave that couldn’t read which way the tide was turning. Instead of earning brownie points by gallantly standing up to offer their chairs to little old ladies in the back, (which would have allowed them to stand on strapping young lad display at the wall), they hunched their shoulders and ignored the entire room. Their representative got up and described how he had graduated from larger classrooms and turned out fine. With ear-splitting tone deafness he suggested that parents needed to volunteer in the classroom. (You could literally see the hair stand up on the backs of all the parents and teachers necks.) He pointed out helpfully that grades k-3 were not that important and its not like they were teaching the kids Calculus. I wanted to say sit down! Stop helping these men! Someone hand that man a cookie so his mouth is full. You are doing your union no favors.

One of our more colorful regulars called it like it was when he got up to accuse the city of playing both ends against the middle. “These guys work hard, they deserve to be compensated.” He argued. “And these teachers have important jobs and they deserve to be protected.” His accusation was hard to question, “You guys do this all the time. You make different sides fight each other. The truth is you can do this all, and you should.”

Even the obligatory public comment that questioned why a city could spent 300,000 on BEAVERS (goodness our beavers are greedy) and not on its children, wasn’t too upsetting. It, like everything, was fairly well articulated and impassioned. The Virginia Hills dismissive man who suggested that the city money should not go to the district where only half of Martinez residents are enrolled was countered by the mayor’s own admission that for years the city has paid for crossing guards in that district and never for MUSD.

It reminded me most of the beaver meeting because the community tipping point had been reached. What I mean by that is that there are regulars at city meetings, like the colorful speaker, and the city is used to lying in front of them. Then there are semi-regulars at some city meetings, of which I have unwillingly become one, and the city would prefer not to lie very much in front of them, (although they will if sheetpile is involved). And then there are those rare meetings full of people who have never been to a meeting before, who believe in their trusting hearts that the council represents their interests. The city HATES to be caught lying in front of them. And when they show up, the outcome is always predictable.

I’m reminded of Abraham Lincoln…

You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.

The vote was 4-1 to award the school the loan. Chocolate chip cookies all around!

Beavers of the Commonwealth

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Environmental October 24, 2010

Today representatives Greene, Atkins & Garry will be considering the addition of 131-80 B which will allow recreational beaver trapping in half of the state. Long time beaver friend Mike Callahan will be there to testify on the value of using flow devices to manage problematic behavior. New beaver foe Laura Hajduk, introduced by the slanted NYTimes piece last week will be there to talk about their horrific population explosion and exaggerate their heinous furry crimes. It should be the episode of “boston legal” you don’t want to miss.

Yesterday she spoke at the University of Massachusetts Wildlife Conference.

Recent changes and projected trends in management of the “overabundant”: beavers in transition from resource to pest. Jennifer E. Strules, Laura Hajduk, Robert D. Deblinger, Kiana Koenen, and Stephen DeStefano; University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

The title tells you everything you need to know about this bit of beaver slander. I can only assume the word “overabundant” is in quotation marks because they know it’s a lie. Obviously the lecture was a disappointing collection of exaggeration and distortion, of the quality that one might find from say, oh, a city council member—not from public officials charged with protecting the state’s wildlife.

Mike’s kinder, gentler (read: saner) talk is tomorrow morning. It is encouragingly titled:

The best management practices for resolving beaver – human conflicts: the use of innovative flow device technologies, scope and limits. Michael W. Callahan, Beaver Solutions.

No quotations marks necessary. Good luck Mike!

Context for the NYT beaver article

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Massachusetts Trapping Law October 24, 2010

I had wondered what kind of lagging news cycle had prompted last week’s story in the NY Times. Remember the poor beaver-besieged city of Lexington and its frustrated civic protectors? Why does Massachusetts get its own cover in the NYT and not Wyoming or North Carolina? Turns out the CONTROVERSIAL (read: much- whined-about) ban on conibear trapping introduced in 1996 131-80(A) is up for revision on tuesday.

Representatives Green, Atkins and Garry are going to discuss adding 131-80(B) to the provision.

to conduct a limited pilot program to determine the most effective way to achieve a healthy and balanced population of beaver. The program shall be limited to the following counties: Berkshire; Essex; Franklin; Hampshire; Middlesex; and Worcester.

A pilot program? That doesn’t sound so bad. What are they piloting? The reintroduction of Conibear traps to deal with a recovering beaver population that has become inconvenient. Well still, that’s only 6 counties, what percentage of the state is that? Nearly half.

Wait a minute, the NY Times article described some really bad problems, that need to be dealt with right away or they’ll affect public safety, and its not like 131-80(A) had an exceptions for extreme cases…

The above provision shall not apply to the use of prohibited devices by federal and state departments of health or municipal boards of health for the purpose of protection from threats to human health and safety. A threat to human health and safety may include, but shall not be limited to:

(a) beaver or muskrat occupancy of a public water supply;

(b) beaver or muskrat-caused flooding of drinking water wells, well fields or water pumping stations;

(d) beaver or muskrat-caused flooding of a public or private way, driveway, railway or airport runway or taxi-way;

(e) beaver or muskrat-caused flooding of electrical or gas generation plants or transmission or distribution structures or facilities, telephone or other communications facilities or other public utilities;

(f) beaver or muskrat-caused flooding affecting the public use of hospitals, emergency clinics, nursing homes, homes for the elderly or fire stations;

(g) beaver or muskrat-caused flooding affecting hazardous waste sites or facilities, incineration or resource recovery plants or other structures or facilities whereby flooding may result in the release or escape of hazardous or noxious materials or substances;

(h) the gnawing, chewing, entering, or damage to electrical or gas generation, transmission or distribution equipment, cables, alarm systems or facilities by any beaver or muskrat;

(i) beaver or muskrat-caused flooding or structural instability on property owned by the applicant if such animal problem poses an imminent threat of substantial property damage or income loss, which shall be limited to: (1) flooding of residential, commercial, industrial or commercial buildings or facilities; (2) flooding of or access to commercial agricultural lands which prevents normal agricultural practices from being conducted on such lands; (3) reduction in the production of an agricultural crop caused by flooding or compromised structural stability of commercial agricultural lands; (4) flooding of residential lands in which the municipal board of health, its chair or agent or the state or federal department of health has determined a threat to human health and safety exists. The department of environmental protection shall make any determination of a threat to a public water supply.

Oh.

So you mean every single complaint made in the article was covered already as an exception under existing law? Which meant those beavers could have been killed by Conibear traps anyway? Gosh, it almost seems like somebody is lying to fish and wildlife and pressuring their representatives to take unnecessary action under the pretense of public safety.

Say it with me now, “I’m sure glad that never happens here!”

Drop Representatives Greene, Atkins and Garry a note to let them know what you think about the commonwealth backing out of its progressive and humane restrictions. I did.

Beaver Matriarchy

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, City Reports, Educational May 28, 2010

Photo: Cheryl Reynolds June 18, 2009

Beaver colonies are discussed as Matriarchies, meaning that the oldest beaver has the central role in colony stability and management. If the female is lost the colony will relocate and start over somewhere else. Female dispersers go farther afield than males for just this reason; they understand a colony will grow around them and they want to make sure they have adequate food supplies. Certainly we observe mom with the most important work in our colony, bearing and nursing the kits and mudding the lodge for comfort and safety.

I remember back when Mary Tappel was first advising the city and the Gazette (now two editor’s ago) reported her saying female beavers produce kits “for 50 years”. I called giggling to point out the typo, and RIchard assured me that it was no typo, but that this was what he had been told by Ms. Tappel directly. Curious about my reaction, he called her back to verify, and with some hemming and hawing she was able to shorten the number to thirty-five.

!!!!!!

For the record, beavers are sexually mature enough to breed sometime after their second year, and their entire life span is about 15 years. I was able to find record of a beaver in captivity living for 19 years, but that was the Rip Van Winkle of beavers. In ideal circumstances, a female may produce kits for twelve (12) consecutive years.

Don’t feel bad, City of Martinez. Your expert was only 76% inaccurate. The other 24% was right on the money.