Category: City Reports

Happy Mistakes

heidi08 City Reports, Creative Solutions, Earth Day, Environmental, History March 2, 2017

One of the artists who donated to the silent auction (Sara Aycock) sent tiny little business cards that were SO adorable I had to go see about designing our own. Turns out they are ‘mini’ cards designed by MOO, about half the size of a regular card. Right now you can design 100 for under 20 and chose a different back design for EVERY ONE. I ordered the cheapest kind just to see if I liked them.

So I picked four different designs with three each of Cheryl’s great photos on the back. They arrived yesterday and were AMAZING – but there was a mistake on the logo. I wrote them and they’re reissuing for free. Which means we have 100 adorable unusable business cards to use as an art project. Hmmm…

Now I’ve been trying to think up our Earth day art project and hadn’t yet hit on an inspiration. It’s the beavers 10th anniversary in Martinez and I wanted it to be special. But of course not too complicated for kids and volunteers and not to expensive for us. And nothing we’ve already done before. I already came up with a giant card folks can sign wishing them Happy Anniversary. Wasn’t there something that could be done with these perfect little photos?

LOCKETS!!! Little photos of things you love go in LOCKETS!!! A little locket kids make themselves…and can wear on a string around their necks at the event so everyone can see them. One side could be a photo of our most beloved beavers (beautifully printed on card stock from my failed cards), and the other side should be a photo of something that represents Martinez….since the two are “Married” forever more…..

Beavers and Martinez…hmmm…(You know I considered a photo of the mayor just because I’m troublesome that way)….but I really wanted something more wholesome.

Something that represents Martinez…and it’s for an Earth day celebration at John Muir’s House….and he’s the greatest conservationist and beavers have been called the original conservationists….I think we have a match made in heaven!

We even have all the supplies left over from other art projects! Glue sticks, scissors, card stock, string, and lovely keys to your heart. I’m so excited I’m wearing mine right now. This is the perfect way to say “Happy Anniversary” to our beavers. And its all because of a lucky mistake.

Which the beavers kind of are anyway.

Beavers to the Rescue?

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Environmental, Who's saving beavers now? February 27, 2017

Right before the glorious beaver conference, this article appeared discussing the benefits that beavers provide to manage flooding. It stars Derek Gow who was one of the headliners in Oregon’s first days. It’s pretty hard to argue with solutions that promise to save you laying sandbags. Even the fisherman hate to clean up after flooding, I bet.

Wild beavers could be brought in to stop flooding in the Forest of Dean

Beavers could make a return to the wilds of Gloucestershire for the first time in hund of years to help environmentalists stop a village flooding. The Forestry Commission are considering releasing the large toothed animals into a brook above Lydbrook in the Forest of Dean as part of efforts to protect the village which was badly flooded in 2012.

Trials have shown that beavers can create dams capable of retaining about 1,000 tonnes of water which would otherwise cascade down to villages like Lydbrook which runs along a natural valley leading down from the Forest of Dean to the River Wye.

As well as holding back water, the beavers are also said to increase biodiversity in woodland areas with some claiming their activities can help many rare species thrive.

Forestry Commission chiefs have invited expert Derek Gow to tell residents in Upper Lydbrook and Lydbrook how experts believe putting beavers into Greathough Brook in the Forest could help halt water gushing down the hillsides.

Mr Gow told the Financial Times: “For years, the whole idea of reintroducing beavers has been bogged down by myth and nonsense. It’s not as though we are looking at reintroducing a Tyrannosaurus rex that eats children. “People have the idea that because beavers have huge teeth they chop their way through forests like furry chainsaws, but they’re a creative, not a destructive, force.

“They open up the river banks to many other species: plants, butterflies, beetles, amphibians and fish. These are the building blocks of life, the species that support others.”

“Beavers have been managing water for millions of years; they’re adapted to do a far better job than us,” he said. “We can no longer pay to maintain flood walls and flood defences so beavers are a rational option when it comes to water management and flood control.”

There has been a proliferation of plants, butterflies, dragonflies, frogs birds and Devon Wildlife Trust say the only wild colony allowed in England has encouraged tourists to flock to the area to see them.

Newly elected Lydbrook councillor Sid Phelps supports the idea of putting beavers in the brook which runs down to Lydbrook and said: “They have not been wild in the UK for hundreds of years but I understand that they can support the ecology and wildlife of an area and are very effective at alleviating the fast flow of water which can lead to flash flooding.

“I’m not an expert on hydrology but I’m very interested to hear what the Forestry Commission have to say about what it would mean for Lydbrook.”

Residents have been invited to a meeting at Lydbrook Memorial Hall on March 9 2017 at 6.30pm. Officials at Forestry Commission declined to comment or give details of the scheme saying they wanted to talk to local residents and parish councillors first.

The paper is already in your favor, Mr. Gow. I suspect the townspeople to be at least open-minded to your suggestions. I, of course, get nervous about promising beavers can slow down floods because, despite what the engineering report told Martinez a decade ago, dams aren’t concrete and they function best when helped by many many other dams dotted along the stream. Which reintroduced beavers won’t have after 500 years. They still washout and need to be rebuilt after the water settles. Which could all take enough time to inconvenience a homeowner.

(In fact one of the talks I eavesdropped on at the conference was by Vanessa Petro from Oregon State University talking about their research on beaver relocations. She observed that “beaver dams were ephemeral” and in dynamic areas like Oregon were shown only to last around 2 years.)

Hmmm 2 years? Alhambra Creek is a pretty flashy stream, and our own primary dam washed out frequently but was rebuilt religiously for 6 years. The secondary dam (which became the primary) was rebuilt for 8 years. I wouldn’t classify either of them as ephemeral. I asked Vanessa whether her study addressed the washout and rebuild of dams, or just classified all washed dams as ‘ephemeral’. She said that their data did not cover the history of the dam or its destruction and rebuild, which is what I suspected.

Beaver dams are ‘ephemeral’ in the same way that mowing lawns is ephemeral. The work done has to be repeated over and over for long term effect.

Which still is no guarantee that rebuilt dams will necessarily prevent flooding. But, (to quote the famous-chicken-soup offering-Jewish-mother) “It can’t hurt“. I wish Derek every luck at his upcoming talk, and am so sorry I had to miss him this year. In the end, it’s kind of like cleaning your room because you are looking for a misplaced 20. There’s no guarantee you’ll find the missing cash, but I really don’t think there’s a bad reason to clean your room or re-introduce beavers.

Talking to the beaver opposition

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Ice, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? February 25, 2017

Adrien Nelson of FBD didn’t make it to the conference this year, because he had work to do in Langley. And reading this you can tell he does it so well.

Fur-Bearers weigh in on Gloucester beaver trapping

The Association for the Protection of Fur-Bearing Animals is urging the Township to use alternative beaver management methods, after a dead beaver was found inside a trap in Gloucester last month.

Rather than trapping beavers — which according to Adrian Nelson, wildlife conflict manager with the Fur-Bearers, has only a 16 per cent success rate — a “long term solution” is using flow devices, such as pond levellers or exclusion fences.

Pond levellers are large pipes that allow water to flow through existing beaver dams, while exclusion fencing prevents beavers from accessing culverts or bridges.

“This is not new technology; they have been around for over 20 years, they are incredibly successful,” Nelson told Township council at its Feb. 20 evening meeting.

“When they are implemented properly we have a success rate of between 90 and 97 per cent, and that is over a 10-year period.”

The devices cost $400 to $600 in materials and take two people about half a day to install. They require maintenance twice per year, which usually consists of removing debris or garbage build-up. Nelson said the devices are much more cost-effective than repeatedly calling in trappers, or taking apart dams.

The Fur-Bearers also offer free training programs to municipal staff on how to implement and build the systems properly, having successfully worked with Mission, Coquitlam, Bowen Island, Surrey, Richmond, and even the Township of Langley.

Coun. David Davis, who has dealt with beavers on his farm many times, said he is concerned that during a rain event, a pipe through a beaver dam may not be able to handle the water coming through, and flooding would result, causing damage and costing the Township a lot of money. He believes in some cases, the beavers have to be removed.

Adrien is working hard in Langley to remind the city to do the right thing. Which they have done before but suddenly think might not work. And of course the council is making it as difficult as possible for obvious reasons. I feel these opponents have been well matched. And when I saw this letter to the editor I went so far as to say OVER matched. You will understand why.

Letter: Many humane options exist for managing beavers

Editor: I read the recent article in the paper (the Times, Jan. 18) about this wetland and the beavers, and thought I would send you this photo of my children Finley, 8, and Ruby, 5, with the beaver lodge in background and their art.

My children have joined Earth Rangers along with 100,000 other children across Canada and one of their missions was to speak with an elder about living with wildlife and do an art project.

We read about how the beaver represents wisdom. The beaver uses the gifts and knowledge it was given by the Creator to build a healthy and strong community.

In that process, it makes wetland habitat so we call them wetland superheroes.

This land was taken out of the ALR with the agreement that this area would be left as green space. With all the money that the government is putting toward wetland conservation, it would be a shame to lose this wetland and the beavers that made it.

I understand that there are many other management options that people could be using other than constantly killing them.

Well, all I can say is between Melissa, Ruby, Finley and Adrien, the stubborn city council doesn’t stand a chance. Keep it up! It takes a huge amount of protest to earn the right to inconvenience city staff, as we learned first hand in Martinez. They just hate being inconvenienced. Never mind, don’t let that stop you. There’s plenty of more child beaver artists where that came from if you need them. We should know.

One of the talks at the conference I wanted to hear the most was Lorne Fitch of Cows and Fish in Alberta. In fact we thought it was important enough that he be there that Worth A Dam paid his travel expenses and the Leonard Houston hosted him at the hotel. Unfortunately my fearless live recorders had to leave early yesterday to get back to Portland, but Journalist and soon-to-be author, Ben Goldfarb was kind enough to film the talk with his phone. This is an imperfect recording, but you can hear most all of what he has to say and see most of his slides, so I’m enormously grateful for the effort. Lorne represents the very best at involving the community and meeting disbelieving ranchers exactly where they are. If you have stubborn folk you want to persuade about beavers, (and who doesn’t?) he is the speaker you need to hear. I will try to get a copy of his ppt slides when he gets safely home. The first moments of the video are bumpy but it gets better so stick with it.

Can a ‘planned community’ plan for beavers?

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Environmental, stupid solutions, What's killing beavers now?, Who's saving beavers now? February 18, 2017

Reston Virginia is one of the first and most well known ‘planned community’ in the world. It has libraries and swimming pools and gutters all in the precise location for the maximal living experience. And now it has made sure it will have designated beavers as well.

Yesterday they launched a swanky new beaver page on their website and today this article was released. Because these things shouldn’t be left to chance. Not sure exactly where posies and butterflies fit in on a beaver web page, but I think we need to grade on a curve here.

Reston Association Working to Manage Beaver Population in Glade Area

Beavers have long been a part of the Glade Stream Valley, but Reston Association is working to make sure they don’t cause destruction for nearby residents in the form of damaged trees and flooding.

“It would be hard to find a better example in Reston of a healthy, diverse, native ecosystem than the two beaver wetlands (Glade Valley and Bright Pond),” reads information provided by Claudia Thompson-Deahl, senior environmental resource manager. “Reston’s beaver wetlands are one of the few places in Reston where nature is able to thrive despite all the surrounding suburban pressures.”

Beavers, however, bring a “dramatic change” to the surrounding environment, so Reston Association has developed a beaver management policy.

Oh those pesky beavers and their darned ‘changes’. How’s a city of 58,404 to cope? Planning is the operative word here. It was planned by Robert E Simon, named for his initials and launched on his birthday in 1964. (I’m not kidding.) You can imagine how some unplanned beavers just throw a big monkey wrench in their best laid plans – making them gang aft agley, as it were.

According to Thompson-Deahl, additional fencing is being installed to keep Glade beavers out of residents’ yards and off wooded slopes, and many individual trees have been protected with wire mesh to safeguard the pathway.

In the long term, Reston Association staff, with input from residents and wildlife experts, has developed and implemented guidelines for beaver management in the area. The primary goal is to find methods to preserve and protect substantial portions of the stream valley from beaver activity. To do so, staff plan to divide the valley into two sections.

Section 1, designated as a “Beaver Management Area,” will consist of stream valley that runs from Twin Branches Road to the bridge behind Leatherwood Drive that leads to the Hunting Horn Lane Tot Lot.

Section 2, running from Hunting Horn Tot Lot to Soapstone Drive, will be managed as a wooded stream valley.

Section 1 contains residential property, utility easements and recreational facilities. With that in mind, according to Thompson-Deahl, fencing and pipes will be used to protect those areas. Three-foot wire-mesh fencing will protect and areas threatened by beaver activity, in the attempt to ensure continuous tree cover between Twin Branches Road and Soapstone Drive. In addition, over 100 Bald Cypress trees have been planted, with wire-mesh caging around each one.

In Section 2, beaver activity will be discouraged with fencing and stream gates. According to provided information, beavers in that area “will be removed” by a licensed trapper if the discouragement fails.

According to Thompson-Deahl, beavers provide positive attributes to the ecosystem including a reduction in stream erosion, reservoirs of water during period of drought and freeze, and the creation of wetlands that support a large amount of plant and other animal life.

Don’t get us wrong, we like nature. In the appropriate areas and as long as it goes according to plan. We are a civilized people, and wild things just need to behave less wildly. You know how certain home owners associations won’t let you plant purple zalia’s or put up a flag on any day besides the 4th of July. We just want our beavers in sector 1 to stay behind the fence.

Is that so much to ask?

Which makes me think of the unplanned joys of beavers and their many trials and benefits. Even in Martinez where we worked harder to live with the animals than anywhere it’s not like we ever “asked” for beavers. Or wanted this to happen. It’s not like my life had a big open space that I was hoping beavers would rush in and fill.

But that’s just the way it is, I think.

“Beaver Blitzkrieg”

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Ice, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Who's saving beavers now? February 15, 2017

A true politician knows his audience. He can look boldly into the face of the crowd and describe the exact same actions differently depending on their particular interests. Behold beaver nonviolence!

Nonviolent beaver management focus of forum

BAR HARBOR — Skip Lisle, president and chief scientist of Beaver Deceivers International, will present his nonviolent, creative approach to beaver management at College of the Atlantic’s Human Ecology Forum in the McCormick Lecture Hall on Tuesday, Feb. 21, at 4:10 p.m. The talk is free and open to the public.

Lisle will share humorous informative stories about ways he has found to prevent beaver damage while still allowing the animals to repopulate and rejuvenate different locations, he said. His mission, he said, is to find creative ways for humans to coexist with these industrious, important creatures.

“Beavers are widely considered a pest to eradicate,” Lisle said. “However, they are our most valuable keystone species.”

Frequent dam construction, the felling of trees and the flooding that results from their building habits often damage property and put beavers at odds with people. In many cases, the common solution to this problem is short-term and frequently ends in the death of the animal.

The goal of Lisle’s organization, Beaver Deceivers, is to change this pattern of conflict into one of coexistence. Rather than resorting to a kill mechanism to remove a costly nuisance, he finds ways to protect infrastructure while allowing beavers to improve the health and natural beauty of an area.

Three beaver talks in three days. Skip is doing a “beaver blitzkrieg” in Maine and forcing wisdom upon the entire state with a one-two-three punch. Maybe that should be something we all strive for. Just imagine if all the beaver experts we know in every state committed to three beaver talks in three days, (held say around the international day of the beaver), what a dramatic difference we would make to our wetlands.

(Come to think of it, California is very big, we might need two or three experts.)

“With beaver-human relations, it turns out that long-term thinking, creativity, a nonviolent approach and a commitment to craftsmanship can combine for a great investment,” he said.

Maybe we could even get PBS to air the beaver Nature documentary on one of those days. And children’s authors to do beaver readings at their local public library. Heck, if I’m going to dream – dream big. Maybe there could be a cash prize for the city with the most officials in attendance.

Obviously this map needs filling out, but wouldn’t that be a sight to behold?

Color-IM