Category: City Reports

Beaver Reality Bytes

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental April 9, 2012

web_mon_facts_j_1393068cl-8 — Jill Mcqueston: The Globe & Mail

It was the moment of the big release! And then nothing happened. I opened the cage door expecting a frantic flurry and all I got was the feeling that I just acquired a new pet. While the three of us sat side by side on a knoll overlooking rolling farmland and a winding river, I felt a rare serenity.

This is a fun article. I like almost everything about it. She explains that at the time she was living on a 60 acre fish hatchery in Quebec. (That made me think of the Methow Project.) (Of course the irony is that if more people tolerated beavers Quebec wouldn’t need a fish hatchery in the first place.) The good-hearted writer was bothered by a beaver whose dams threatened to flood her home, so after months of painstakingly removing them by hand (only to have them instantly rebuilt) she decided to call in a trapper. The trapper promised to live trap the beaver and take it to someplace wonderful, but the night before he came she realized that might be the afterlife.

She woke up early and emptied the trap herself.

We paid big bucks for the assurance that the little guy would be safely trapped and transported in a cage to a “beaver heaven.” But that morning I had the sinking feeling that the “heaven” in question would be the biblical kind. Disguising myself with a baseball cap and a man’s jacket (I knew the neighbours would not approve of my impending actions), I hauled out the wheelbarrow. I summoned a strength I didn’t know that my skinny arms had in order to lift the heavy cage, complete with the captured critter, onto the wheelbarrow. After covering the cage with a blanket, Gypsy and I set off with our charge along a dirt road to find a release spot.

I had always thought that there were two kinds of people in the world. The kind who were sensitive and caring about all that was vulnerable, and the kind who were not.

She uses the incident to comment on moral relativity in human responses to animals, and show how compassion is always a little expensive. True, but I can’t help but wish that rather than spend time musing on the moral lessons of her past she had used the Google to find information about beaver management. Relocating one beaver is not likely to solve her problem, but a properly installed flow device would.

The irony of course is that even though she is working so hard to take care of this beaver, relocating him with no family members in a strange land is likely terminal anyway. Not to mention she probably has a family of beavers on her property, so she won’t have solved her problem OR saved his life.

I dispatched this to the Globe and Mail, let’s hope if they don’t print it they at least send it to her for next time!

Almost the Right Answer

Ms. McQueston’s lovely article communicated a thoughtful regard for wildlife and I wish I was lucky enough to be her neighbor. I would have told her about the use of proven, inexpensive flow devices that can safely control pond height and prevent her home from flooding. Maybe I would have explained over coffee that beavers are a keystone species and create habitat for birds, fish and wildlife that she can enjoy for years to come. Over the back fence I could have told her how the dams raise the water table, prevent drought and improve water quality. Later when we were alone I could explain how very unlikely it is that all her problems were caused by a single beaver, and that the remaining family is likely expecting new kits in the summer. I would pat her hand and say this was a noble effort but since beavers are highly social animals (and very territorial!) relocating a single family member is usually a prolonged death sentence.

Since we’re sadly not neighbors I can only hope that she reads this and continues to look for better solutions next time.

The Importance of Being Vernal

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Educational, Environmental, Who's Killing Beavers Now? April 5, 2012

1332813077_e31e[1] — Roseville resident Cynthia Schiada photographed the pond that developed behind Woodcreek High School in 2006. The pond dried up about two years ago, after the city had a beaver dam removed.

Roseville’s beavers shape landscape

Roseville resident Cynthia Schiada photographed the pond that developed behind Woodcreek High School in 2006. The pond dried up about two years ago, after the city had a beaver dam removed.

A few years ago, a pond existed behind Woodcreek High School to the delight of Roseville residents.

And who did they have to thank? The Roseville beaver population. But these creatures often wreak havoc on the natural ecosystem, or go against city planning, by building dams.

Excuses people make for killing beavers: #21,936.

I thought I’d seen everything in my five years as beaver crossing guard. I mean I’ve seen people say they need to kill beavers to protect trees, protect roads, protect salmon, protect nesting birds, and protect water quality, protect erosion and protect banks. But I’ve never seen this before. Roseville has risen to a new level on the beaver-phobic meter.

“The dam (in Kaseberg Creek) went unchecked for some time and the area was inundated with water,” Castelluccio said. “As a pond formed it began to hinder vernal pools in the area.”

Mr. Castelluccio is doing something very special here and I feel we should all take a moment to appreciate his work for the open spaces of Roseville. By using the term “vernal pools” he is employing a principal strategy in crowd management: “appearicus intelligentius obscura” in which the speaker invokes some word or phase the listeners will not understand to give the appearance of explaining his behavior. Nice work!

But beyond this initial obfuscation, Mr. Castelluccio is in fact waging a second battle intended for the more informed citizens of Roseville. Initially outlined by the famous case of EPA v Everything, the principal of this technique is to claim that something wild and inconvenient interferes with something else that’s more important but slightly less inconvenient, thus trumping the need to protect nature by promoting the obvious need to destroy it.

Vernal pools are ephemeral puddles of water during the winter and spring collected over hard substrate that won’t allow moisture to seep in. Since they are spontaneous, unconnected and temporary, they do not have fish, which makes them a fairly excellent place for certain frogs and salamanders to lay their eggs. Later when they dry up they become fertile patches of rare wild flowers or plants that are unique on the terrain.

They are a real thing, and an unique ecosystem with their own defenders, such as Vernalpools.org which explains their role and will even lead you on a tour of some better examples. They are a rapidly shrinking resource in California and their dwindling numbers have been repeatedly litigated and the subject of much alarm. By invoking this precious resource that an open space manager is charged to protect, Brian justifies removal of the beaver pond with “spotted owl” alacrity.

Never mind that the city of Roseville has probably bulldozed over half dozen vernal pools in the last 30 minutes – never mind that beaver ponds are essential to thousands of species, many of them rare or endangered — never mind even that raising the watertable could theoretically cause more and different Vernal Pools to be formed. I am reminded of the very special beaver shooting at a local reservoir in which they said the killing was necessary to protect the ‘red-legged frogs’.

Put two environmental groups in a jar, shake the jar, and keep them busy fighting each other while you build another parking lot.

Well, Roseville I hope your calculators are working. Because I want you to count every species in that beaver pond and assign a numerical weight to its value that takes into account both its rare nature, its relative importance to other species, and its visibility factor that allows it to be appreciated and enjoyed by residents – all times 4 because beaver ponds are there every season. And then do the same thing for your rare fairy shrimp or marsh grass and sit down at a city council meeting and say these are our choices. Because supporting one ephemeral aspect of nature does not prevent you from being responsible for the less temporary parts.

Roseville has begun to monitor beaver dams with GPS to determine if the animals return to prime locations. There are 70 miles of creeks in the city and 2,000 acres of preserves. When determining whether to remove a dam, the city looks at potential problems. Do they flood bike trails or roads, cause erosion of bridges or harm infrastructure? Do they pool up water causing oak trees to go underwater and die?

“In an urban environment, we take all those things into consideration,” Castelluccio said.

I’ll bet you do.

Beaver Chorus

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Educational, Environmental April 3, 2012

Looks like the Pittsburg zoo is doing a spring wildlife month, where every day in April they are releasing an educational film about an animal. Guess what gets top billing?

Out of the Wild: The American beaver

Welcome to “Out of the Wild,” a daily series from The Tribune-Democrat, working with the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium. Every day in April, we’ll introduce you to a different North American animal – with information about each species’ habitat, behavior, diet and unique or interesting features.

Not a bad choice for your first effort! I’m not sure you clarified the ‘debate’ about whether beavers harm or improve the environment. You made it sound exactly like the ‘debate’ on whether the glass is half empty or half full. Tell me a real reason people think beavers harm the environment and then we’ll have a ‘debate’, but let me warn you, beavers are excellent debaters!

There’s good news across the pacific coast, starting with the 30th Annual Salmon Restoration conference this week in Davis. Registration is closed but there will be a convergence of beaver friends making implicit and not so implicit arguments about the role of beaver dams. Oh and Chuck Bonham the new director of Fish & Game will be giving one of the opening addresses so you know this message is getting to the right ears.

Should Streams be Managed as Drainage Networks or Habitat Networks?

Michael M. Pollock, NOAA,

Northwest Fisheries Science Center

Ooh Ooh! I know! Call on me! The whole thing will start off with a bang when Brock gives a talk focused on salmon and beaver…I’m apparently not supposed to say anything but since no one really pays that much attention to what I say I will pass along his description…

Also – SRF is gonna be fun – we have my beaver focused talk on Wed., we have Michael Pollock talking, Eli, OAEC WATER and Sanctuary Forest/Mattole will all be tabling together at Friday night’s poster session – so beaver-palooza will be in full swing that night – and for your ears only there is rumor that on Sat., night of the banquet there will be a skit featuring a face off debate between a human large woody engineer and a beaver all sizes of wood engineer!

Back story: creek people used to ‘clean up’ woody debris by hauling it away, and then found out that it was VERY important to the food chain and fish. So now they are busy ‘installing woody debris’ themselves. Of course we all know who would happilydo that for free, but there is a running argument whether it’s better to install debris or let beavers do it (because you know beavers are so icky!). Here’s Pollock’s slide on the issue. LWD stands for large woody debris and ‘smolt’ are baby salmon. Oh and Eli’s poster presentation will include my slide on the different types of flow devices so we can promote effective beaver management!

Hope someone films the skit I’m not supposed to have written about! I’ll make sure to tell you all about it!

Brock also let me know that he will be Keynote Speaker for the Eel River Symposium later this month. The lineup looks amazing and since we know their are beaver on the Eel it would be good to teach people why they’re useful.

Not to be outdone, I just heard from Leonard Houston of the Beaver Advocacy Committee in Oregon that he has been asked to be on a beaver panel this month for the Oregon Desert Association coming up in September in Bend. Preach Beavers to the Desert, Leonard!

What else? Oh the charming city of Nashua of the infamous beaver incident printed my letter to the paper today. Non-suscribers can’t read it, but I’ll give you the text.

It’s stunning to me that in the entire community of Nashua there is apparently not anyone who recognizes that a young, dispersing beaver is trying to get to the water and will likely be hit by traffic if not assisted. Exposing school children to this heartless failure is unfortunate. This could have been a powerful opportunity to show children what communities can accomplish when they work together and how good it feels to help each other or another species. Instead it was a flurry of morning activity ending with a pointless death. Dispersal of young beavers seeking their own territory happens every march, and Nashua should learn from this event and have a plan to deal better with it next time.

Saving Beavers: Patriot Version!

heidi08 City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers March 30, 2012

Wildlife specialist and University of New Hampshire Cooperative Extension associate professor Matt Tarr surveys the flooded land near a stream by the Cooperative Middle School during a walking tour with members of the Stratham Conservation Commission.

STRATHAM — An overachieving band of beavers have dammed a babbling brook outside the Cooperative Middle School, turning it into a proliferating pond that threatens to encroach upon the school’s ropes course.

“These guys have been doing what they’ve done for years, it’s part of their cycle,” Tarr said. “But they are chewing all the way around the trees which can kill it. Some of the bigger ones can handle it… but some can’t survive with their roots inundated with water too long.”

I read the article this morning with trepidation, expecting at any moment to hear that the beavers were not long for this world. Conservation Commissions (despite the ironic naming!) aren’t always champions of beavers and wetlands. Would the school realize that beavers on their borders were an asset? Would the community take time to see the forest for the trees? Taking my cue from lady Macbeth I ‘screwed my courage to the sticking place’ and bravely read onwards…

Tarr explained that the beavers will expand their dammed area so that they can swim closer to their source of food, which in this area seems to be white oak, greenbriar and hazelnut. “That’s why trapping them out of here won’t work,” Tarr said. “This is a relatively new dam and if the habitat is right, they will move back.

Trapping won’t work? What’s that you say? Matt! Sit down and let’s talk about it. Here, have the comfy chair. Go on…tell me everything.

Tarr explained that to draw down the water, they can install “flow devices,” which are commonly three-sided boxes, or perforated pipes that will drain through the dammed area. Beavers are stimulated to build their dams by the sound or feel of running water, and many of these pipes prevent the beavers from hearing the water drain out and creating a permanent drain in the dam.

Wow, Matt! Great idea! Are you sure you’re not from Martinez? You could be our brother from another mother! You might need some new info on flow devices because perforated pipes are so last decade, but your heart is entirely in the right place! And look at this

“From a habitat standpoint this is phenomenal,” Tarr said. “The wildlife education aspect is great.”

From New Hampshire we disperse a little farther East to Maine where this was the letter to the editor this morning in the Bridgeton News.

Beavers

I guess word is out that the Town of Bridgton is looking at sprucing up Shorey Park with native species because, to the joy of some and consternation of others, Castor Canadensis (the North American Beaver) has moved in. Apart from their charismatic personalities, beavers are a keystone species that improve water quality and play a crucial role in promoting a biodiversity that includes fish, amphibians and birds.

As someone who is enamored with the idea of having wildlife living in close proximity to humans but also aware that it is just a matter of time before the Bridgton’s Downtown Beavers cross paths with humans, I think it is advisable for the town to be proactive in seeking solutions to this potential conflict of interest.

Perhaps we should consider what the city of Martinez, California (population 40,000) did when beavers took up residence there. In October 2007, the beaver dam was posing a flooding hazard and the beavers were given a death sentence. However, a huge public response pressured the City Council to form a “beaver committee” to look into the possibility of coexistence. County flood control engineers, property owners and environmental groups along with local beaver advocates teamed together to create a win-win solution for both humans and beavers. Beaver Deceiver International from Vermont installed a flow device that manages dam height and maintains safe water levels. In a nut-shell, the “Castor Master” is a flexible tube that moves water from upstream to downstream and tricks beavers into believing that their dam is operating to their industrious busy beaver specifications.

The Martinez beavers have their own website and YouTube videos. A children’s book, titled “The Comeback Kids, The Martinez Beavers”, raises money to pay for re-vegetation and an on-site interpretive program.

The Bridgton Economic Development Committee will be happy to know that Bridgton’s beaver colony will be very good for business since the positive publicity generated will bring in more visitors to the downtown area. Martinez is now planning for the Fifth Annual Beaver Festival, “a Dam Good Time” which is a family event that celebrates the relationship between beavers, the community and the watershed.

Obviously, there are many other considerations that have not been included here and that will need to be discussed, but given Bridgton’s multi-talented population that includes town personnel, environmentalists, educators, business leaders, artists and volunteers of every persuasion, we can come together to welcome and celebrate our town’s biological heritage and diversity.

Check out www.martinezbeavers.org/wordpress. It is a very informative and entertaining site with pod casts, videos and resources that will be useful so that we don’t have to “reinvent the wheel”.

Lega Sammut Medcalf

Bridgton

Lega! You are honory Martinez material! Our sister from another mister! Anyone else up for a fieldtrip? The good news is that if Bridgton opens their purse strings far enough to install a flow device you are 3.5 hours away from Skip Lisle and 4.5 hours away from Mike Callahan. She has already arranged a book signing for the best children’s book ever written on beavers who’s author lives in Maine and once crisply explained to me that she only helps non-profits in her state. Oh. Let’s hope she is very busy very soon! And thanks for the great letter!

Beaver Harvest and Everyone’s Invited!

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, History March 29, 2012

That’s been the motto of America since day one apparently. Look at today’s headline from the Sun Chronicle in Maine this morning:

The Pilgrims and the beaver trade

That’s right, the Pilgrims apparently paid for their journey to religious freedom with money they borrowed from the Company of the Merchant Adventurers of London. And guess what was the fastest way to pay them back after those first hard winters? I’ll give you a hint, it starts with a ‘B’.

By 1625, the Pilgrims concluded that the fur trade would offer the most viable means to retire their debt. They were able to obtain a charter from the King granting them rights on the Kennebec River in what is today the state of Maine.

So the Pilgrims built a shallop, a sailing vessel designed for coastal navigation, and set out for Merrymeeting Bay, 200 miles to the north, then up into the Kennebec River. Twenty five miles upriver, at the head of the tide where current and tides mark the extreme of navigable water, they established a trading post at Cushnoc, the site of modern-day Augusta.

The indigenous tribe, the Abenaki, were anxious to trade. They had abundant furs to offer in exchange for corn, of which the Pilgrims were producing a surplus, and other goods. As Governor Bradford put it, “not only with corn, but also with such other commodities as the fishermen had traded with them, as coats, shirts, rugs and blankets, biscuit, pease [sic], prunes, etc.” In exchange for a shallop-load of corn sailed up the river, 700 pounds of beaver pelts came back down. With beaver fur in great demand in London, the Pilgrims were able to satisfy their debts by 1636.

700 lbs of beaver skins. Wow, since the specified weight for an adult beaver pelt was 1.25 lbs that means that the pilgrims paid off their credit card with about 600 beavers on a single stream, plus of course killing all the kits and incidental young that weren’t good for anything. Let’s see, that’s like 56 beavers a year in a 170 mile stretch of river…let’s say 3 a mile….yup that seems about right.

Religious freedom, thrift, hardwork and beaver killing! Now I know just how to decorate for thanksgiving this year! And just to show that beaver intolerance spans the centuries fully from our founding to the modern day, there is apparently a new episode of ‘Duck Dynasty‘ out this week that shows the hardworking Bayou entrepreneurs blowing up a beaver dam. A smart man would think to himself, hey since they make their money selling decoys for duck hunting maybe they would want more to keep the animal that builds conditions that make more ducks – but a smart man would be nowhere near this ambivalent hickfest. Apparently they think the beavers live in the dam! If you want to see the explosion go here but I’m sure you have better things to do.

(Tell me again what A&E stands for because I must have forgotten.)

If you need some good cheer after this beaver killing extravaganza go read this op ed by Karen Levenson of Guelph Canada. She’s the Director of the Animal Alliance in Canada that wrote me last week about starting a beaver festival in Ontario. Enjoy!

Beavers are an environmental asset

Throughout North America, cities such as Guelph are recognizing the critical role beavers play in protecting our environment. Beavers are a keystone species that help maintain healthy aquatic habitat, which supports a wide variety of animal and plant life, thus ensuring biodiversity.

Let’s be proud that Mayor Karen Farbridge and forestry supervisor Randy Drewery are taking a progressive, science-based approach by wrapping vulnerable trees to discourage beavers from chewing. The city can also plant trees that beavers prefer, fast-growing species, such as poplar, willow, birch and trembling aspen, close to the water’s edge to discourage beavers from removing more valuable trees further up the bank and to help stabilize the slope and prevent erosion. An added benefit is when these trees grow back they are fuller, with lots of new growth, providing nesting sites for a variety of bird species.