THE BEAVER CLUB CELEBRATES EARTH DAY

heidi08 Earth Day, Flow Device Installed, Who's saving beavers now? April 23, 2021

Here’s a beaver origin story for you. Stop me of you’ve heard this one before.

In the beginning Skip Lisle taught Mike Callahan to install flow devices. Skip later taught Jake Jacobsen of Washington public works, Glynnis Hood of University of Alberta, Amy Cunningham of Wyoming and Sherri Tippie of Colorado. In between all that Skip came to Martinez, saved our beavers and made this story possible.

Meanwhilewhile Glynnis taught her students and did research proving that flow devices work and save money, Sherri taught Jackie Cordry who was working in Colorado Park District at the time. and Amy taught her friends at the wilderness federation in Montana.

At the same time Mike taught Mike Settell of Idaho, Jakob Schokey of Oregon, Ben Dittbrenner then of Washington, and went on to found the beaver institute which teachers many students from many states and four countries every year.

This interview tells you something about how far their efforts have gone.

Earth Day Special: The Beaver Coalition

As we honor Earth Day 2021, the theme running through today’s KBOO programming is the impending climate crisis, and its affect on our home planet. And we’ll be introducing you to people and organizations who are working to protect our environment, and all its inhabitants.

On today’s show, we focus on one of those inhabitants, a species of great importance especially here in the Pacific Northwest. I’m referring to Oregon’s official state animal, the beaver.

SALMON SEZ “WE LOVE BEAVER!”

heidi08 Beavers, Earth Day, Educational April 11, 2019

April 20th is the John Muir Birthday – Earth day celebration. We’ve been doing what we can to get ready for it and the many hundreds of children that join our activity. This year we wanted to emphasize beavers importance to salmon, so we’re creating a banner that can be used in the children’s parade at the beaver festival. The idea is that kids would will pick a button with either species out of a hat and then draw that species on a 6-foot table runner. By the end of the day we should have something truly splendid, covered in memorable children’s artwork. The complete banner will be mounted on poles so it can be carried in the parade. Here’s how the banner looks before the kids decorate it. We used leftover tattoos from Coyote Studios to get them started.

Of course no American child lives past the age of 10 without having to play at least ONE game of “Simon says” – so I thought “Salmon sez” would be very familiar. There will be various beaver/salmon puppets hanging around the tent where kids are working and some images to get them inspired. This poster came out very cute so I think it will be on display as well.

As you know, the best way to get adults to pay attention to a new idea is to have them watch their children drawing it for 15 minutes. And maybe for them to snap a photo of their child in the parade featuring said idea very cutely so that the photo gets sent to grandparents.

Works for me.

I’ve been chatting about the idea with Dan Logan from NOAA Marine Fisheries in Santa Rosa who will be joining us again for this years beaver festival. He was asking me about the fish population in Alhambra Creek and who was monitoring it. I told him about our informal photos and playing ‘name that fish’ with Peter Moyle over the years.

He laughed and said he had to be careful with that game, because one time a man asked “can you tell a steelhead and a salmon apart if I send you a photo?” so of course, fisheries biologist Dan answered, yes I can.

Then the man sent him a FILET.

Earth day is always fun and exhausting, and there is so much to see and do. If you want to join the fun you should stop by and say hi, or lend a hand!

BEAVERS IN THE CLASSROOM

heidi08 Earth Day, Educational April 18, 2018

So the beaver festival is officially approved in Susana Park and our use fees have been waved, We were hailed as doing a wonderful educational thing, and we’re officially off to the beaver races. Hopefully city staff will unlock the bathrooms and hang the banners for us in the park and not turn the sprinklers on the day Amy starts chalking!. Our blue shirts arrived yesterday and they are lovely so we also have that going for us.

Next hurdle: Earth Day! I just found out that we are down by one volunteer so I’m seeing about recruiting another. It’s usually a very busy all-hands-on-deck kind of day, so it would be great if I could give Jon and Leslie a little back up.

I just heard this from Sarah about last night’s premier:

Squeeeee!

The premiere was sold out! With people packing the lobby wishing they could get in! And people loved it! The reaction to your scene especially was SO GOOD! I’m ready to start coordinating the screening in Martinez. I’ll keep you posted! Thanks!
Sarah

Wow wow wow! This is a pretty auspicious news and a great way to debut a beaver film. If it works out I think the screening will be at the Empress theater in Vallejo on the Thursday before the festival. Stay tuned, I’ll keep you posted as I know more. In the mean time congratulations Sarah!

To get us all in the mood for Saturday here’s a nice letter about the benefits to children of a green education.

Letter: Huge educational opportunities at new elementary school

Before people dismiss Doyon as a location for one new school, I wish to present some facts that everyone should carefully consider. First, it’s the open space. For a town that values open space, what is better than having over 17 acres for the children of Ipswich?

Nature is the best way to nurture pupils with special educational needs:

“The results showed that students with higher exposure to greenness show better academic performance in both English and Math. More research along these lines is needed in additional locations and with more extensive academic performance data among various grades to determine the effects of greenness under different education systems.”

Walking the halls of Doyon means seeing joyously happy rows of puddle boots outside of classrooms, and it means that the students get to come home throughout the year with the stories of venturing outside to study ferns and frogs, learning about the critical importance of vernal pools, and the native flora and fauna of our town.

Frog eggs are carefully collected from vernal pools, which are then sent to every student in every second grade class in the district, so that the children can see the eggs hatch into tadpoles, and transform into frogs, before releasing all of them into the same pond in which they were spawned.

They get to see beaver impounded wetland, and they gain an understanding of stewardship.

Doyton has dedicated teachers who go beyond the classroom, using their location to offer unique and priceless hands-on learning to their students.

Heck I’m sold. We have certainly seen first hand that beaver/nature education is a powerful way to open up a child’s mind and get them to learn from the world around them. Go read the whole letter, it’s really well written and could be the subject of the next five posts. Thanks Erika Turner for reminding us why green education matters.

GOOD NEWS ON A SUNDAY

heidi08 Earth Day April 15, 2018

After yesterday’s downer It’s a relief to remember our rule of “Only good news on Sundays”. And plenty of good news! Starting with Tuedsday’s meeting at the PRMCC where we will officially ask permission for the beaver festival in Susan Park. (Don’t even make me laugh thinking they could say no.) The very first time I presented to them they were a tough crowd, now they love us, so I’m not worried. (Much)

Then Saturday is the huge John Muir Birth Day Earth Day event. And that is always a fantastic day for beavers and their supporters. This year we are letting kids illustrate three of our banner lamp post flags for the festival. We cordoned sections off for them to color in, and collected wildlife buttons leftover from our Mark Poulin activity a few years back in a container for them draw at random as payment and inspiration.

There are always plenty of volunteer artists at our booth, and poor Leslie and our stalwart volunteers usually work their eager beaver tails off.

You should plan on being there, especially because there will be over 50 environmental booths and it’s a fantastic way to support the planet and celebrate the green spots in our community, This year’s conservation award winners are sure to impress an our good friends at Safari West are among them. So make plans to be there and stop by and say hi!.

We’ll be right by the creek as usual.

Tory MP Nigel Evans furious after Royal Mail shuns Brexit to release stamps with endangered animals instead

A final burst of good news comes from our good friends in the UK where instead of issuing a nasty Brexit stamp like the post office was pressured to they issued a series of new endangered species stamps. And guess who is number one?

Aren’t those lovely? I can’t wait to inherit some from Jon’s willing friends or family.

And finally we have another donation to the silent auction. Which was very timely because it coincides with the 2nd quarter issue of Bay Nature describing it’s creation. It is the current edition of “Nature in the city map” by author Mary Ellen Hannibal and others featuring amazing illustrations by Jane Kim showing the wild wonders of San Francisco.

Together, the five maps are meant to encourage city dwellers to see nature as something that can be found right in their neighborhoods,

I don’t know about you but after I’ve learned what to look for I’m tempted to frame my copy and hang it on the wall. It’s that beautiful.

A glorious day

heidi08 Beavers, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Earth Day, Educational, Environmental April 23, 2017

Yesterday was an extravaganza of beaver support from a huge Earth Day event at the John Muir House. The activity of creating a ‘Martinez Loves beavers’ locket was so popular that we ran out of our 150 supplies by 11 and had to restock by sending Jon home to get backups which we nearly ran out of all over again. The beaver anniversary card was hugely popular and literally signed by hundreds and hundreds of people. Including two city council members.

Our volunteers were hardworking, cheerful and thank goodness had the stamina to keep up with demand. Champion Leslie Mills maintained her inviting cheerfulness long after the rest of us were worn out and ready to pack up the day. As always, Cheryl’s great photos recorded glory perfectly.

Our beaver as Ecosystem posted was a big hit, John Muir and the park superintendent wore their locket all day, April an Alana did beaver puppet shows in addition to drawing some amazing beaver art, and someone told me that they had learned all about beavers from reading friend Rob Rich’s article in the Earth Island magazine!

I talked to a woman who had attended my talk in Portland, children who knew more about beavers than I did when they moved into Martinez, a teacher who worked was the colleague of the mother of the artist doing our art project this summer, and someone who reported seeing a beaver in San Ramon creek! I thought you would appreciate seeing some photos of the wonderful, jubilant, exhausting day.

I was planning to share the cool beaver pendants we were donated for the silent auction, but good lord I’m still tired an that’s enough good news for one day. Mean while Brock Dolman and Kate Lundquist of the OAEC were marching for science!