Category: Educational

Rewildling Beavers

heidi08 Beavers, Educational, Environmental September 22, 2013

Grey Owl: Canada’s great conservationist and imposter

One hundred and twenty five years ago, a great conservationist – and imposter – was born in East Sussex. Known as Grey Owl, he was one of Canada’s first conservationists and is said to have saved the Canadian beaver from extinction.

Two years later, after a long trapping season, he trapped a mother beaver and the kittens were left in the lodge to die but Anahareo convinced him to take the baby beavers home. The episode led him to stop trapping animals and begin his writing and conservation work, warning of the dangers of the logging and fur industries and how they threatened Canada’s native beavers with extinction.

There’s a nice new article from the BBC on Grey Owl which begins to have a sense of proportion about his relative accomplishments versus his completely unimportant ‘fraud’. Go read the whole thing and begin to appreciate what a remarkable man this was who understood so much of nature, ecology and beavers at a time when everyone else was thinking the ‘disposable forest box would never run out of tissues or trees’. Among my most treasured possessions is a book signed by Grey Owl. I came across his remarkable story when I found this picture when I was working on “The Sacred Center”. I was as intrigued as I could possibly be.

For the record, I’ve yet to tempt a beaver into my canoe, although I haven’t given up hope. Here’s the best moment of the 1999 David Attenborough film on his life, who had attended one of his lectures as a boy.

Now for something to read on my Autumn Vacation at the coast where I had the strange fortune of seeing my very first beaver.

Paradise lost? Our memory of nature is in tatters

The Once and Future World, By J.B MacKinnon

Human beings are shortsighted by nature. We experience our brief lives as vast expanses of time, even with a knowledge of history measured in billions of years. Our attention spans are in tatters because of smartphones and tidbit media, and it’s harder and harder to find sustained moments to just look at the world beyond our screens.

The shortsightedness, and the bee thing: Both figure into Vancouver writer J.B. MacKinnon’s new book, The Once and Future World. MacKinnon likes to keep nature close. With Alisa Smith, he co-wrote the bestselling 100-Mile Diet, which helped to launch the local eating movement. He also wrote the narrative for the NFB’s online wildlife surveillance documentary, Bear 71.

Here, he advocates for an even deeper connection to the land we live on, and a longer knowledge of what we take from it. The Once and Future World argues that, when it comes to natural ecosystems, we are continuously forgetting what the Earth really looks like, and as such have forgotten what it is capable of. It is one of those rare reading experiences that can change the way you see everything around you, recommended for anyone interested in anything that lives and breathes.

MacKinnon’s book has a place in a wider movement called “rewilding.” The term is a slippery fish. It can refer to a conservation approach that favours restoring large-scale wilderness areas and connecting them, to protect the habitats of so-called keystone species – animals, like elephants or beaver, which play a role in engineering their ecosystems. It can mean the reintroduction of native species to an area from which they have disappeared, such the return of grey wolves to Yellowstone National Park.

It’s curious to think of Martinez beaver rally as a peoples quest for wilderness in their own neighborhoods, and interesting to consider what might have awoken in me when I began watching our beaver family closer. The book will be released on September 24th and you can pre ordered your copy here. You can bet I will be quoting the best bits for your enjoyment.

Birthday Presence

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental September 20, 2013

Way back in June you might remember that I wrote about a study released in the Journal of Human Wildlife Interaction called Toward an understanding of beaver management as human and beaver densities increase. I had a lot to say at the time about what I thought was a slanted study that worked hard to present the very hopeless argument that would add pressure to overturn the voters decision in Massachusetts.

This study revisits the Massachusetts beaver issue and the least-liked voter decision apparently in the history of the world. A 1996 referendum that indicated folks wanted it to be harder to kill beavers cruelly. This is vociferously blamed for ruining every sense of balance the state had previously developed. Even beaver defenders thought the the referendum had ‘tricked’ the voters (although how straight forward are most ballot issues, I ask you?) Once it was passed, alarming reports filled the air like spring pollen. Authorities said the population subsequently exploded because even though you could still use lethal techniques and even though you could use the old methods as long as one of 9 tiny conditions were met, it still took five minutes more time to kill them than it used to and that created anarchy. (Folks in the bay state are very busy and obviously no one has 5 more minutes to spare killing beavers.)

Hence the article, which is based on public attitudes towards beavers and a questionnairre that got mailed to folks who complained about beavers (and for appearances sake, some folks who didn’t) in 2002. Surprisingly, the folks who DIDN”T COMPLAIN didn’t return the survey as much as the people who were mad. (Gosh!) And the two groups said admittedly different things in general, but the researchers knew just how to handle this conundrum to get the results they wanted.

Well, at the time I had so much to say about the article that I wrote the editor who invited me to write a response. Which I faithfully did and which I was just mailed the proof of yesterday. Meaning response will appear in the Fall issue of Human Wildlife Interactions! My article will be followed by a rebuttal in much the same way as a pinata might be dangled to be whacked by a group of small children, but regardless of my inevitable thwacking, the will be an article about flow devices and how they worked in Martinez published for all the world to see. Flow devices will appear in a Peer Reviewed Journal which I believe will be a first.

I’m very, very happy about this. Oh and since I’m turning 4 feet old today, I thought we all deserve some of this. It’s the best beaver birthday cake EVER!

ṱ’ek:e

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers September 18, 2013

Working with Beaver-A Dam Good Idea!

Wednesday, October 9, 7:00-9:00pm

Presentation with Kate Lundquist of the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center and Edward Willie, Educator and Pomo Indian This presentation is in association with Pomo Honoring Month and The Pomo Project.

$10 at the door. No RSVP necessary.

Heron Hall, Laguna Environmental Center, 900 Sanford Road, Santa Rosa, CA 95401

You might recognize Kate from our last two beaver festivals, the most recent paper we’ve been working on regarding beavers in coastal rivers and the OAEC but the new face presenting with her will be Edward Willie, of Pomo descent and eager to add his voice to the team. He is an artist, herbalist and native ecologist currently furthering his education in permaculture. Pomo territory stretched from the Pacific Coast, along the Russian river and on to Clear Lake. We know the Southern Pomo had a word for beaver ṱ’ek:e (N. ALexander Walker, personal communication, 2011-01-23) Beavers appeared in their Coyote legends and learning more about beaver in the area will be very important for ultimately restoring those streams to support salmon.

Expect very good things from their presentation in October.

Beavers: Past, Present & Future

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, History September 17, 2013

Do you remember that game you’d play at school where someone whispers something into the ear of the child sitting next to them and the message goes on around the circle until the last child says what she heard aloud? There’s usually a l0t of giggling and no repeats so that by time it gets to the end the message transforms from “Every day I ride my bike to the store” to “Emma’s mom looks like a whore” or some such nonsense. Well that’s what I thought yesterday when I saw this headline in the New York Post.

Beaver waste can be used in baked goods, sweets

Beavers anal secretions smell similar to vanilla and can be used in baked goods and sweets, according to the Swedish National Food Agency.

These secretions are “WASTE” in about the same way as if you were a human organ harvester and found you had some teeth and extra bits left over. They certainly aren’t WASTE to the beaver. They are essential for his daily survival and something he would never part with willingly. The term WASTE refers to the industry who has already killed the beaver and sold the fur and has extra bits left over. It is coy to use this term and just wait for it to get misunderstood.

Just as expected, I saw these headlines later in the day:

Beaver dung can be key ingredient for vanilla flavor in baked goods

An adding insult to injury from the Complex city guide:

This is what happens when you let Rick put Cheryl’s lovely photo on Wikipedia. It means AACUI. For the record, this is what beaver dung really looks like, and I don’t think anyone will be flavoring anything with it any time soon unless of course they’re making sawdust sandwiches.

Now for some good beaver news from the Economist of all places.

All creatures great and small

Biodiversity, once the preoccupation of scientists and greens, has become a mainstream concern. Liberal helpings of growth and technology are the best way of preserving it, says Emma Duncan.

Part of the reason is pragmatic: as man has come to understand ecology better, he has realised that environmental destruction in pursuit of growth may be self-defeating. Rivers need to be healthy to provide people with clean water and fish; natural beauty fosters tourism; genes from other species provide the raw material for many drugs. But man also finds it troubling to think that as the only species able to marvel at the diversity of creation, he should be responsible for killing it off.

Well, okay it doesn’t mention beavers AS SUCH but it’s exactly the kind of article you hand to the frowning politician to get his attention before you give him the article that says beavers create biodiversity. Go read the whole thing, and make a beaver comment. Maybe we can sway the Economist into sniffing out this report for example.

____________________________________________________

Now credit Cheryl for finding this great film of reintroducing beavers in 1938 in Idaho. Allow me to remark wistfully that not only did America used to know that beaver dams prevent erosion and silt buildup, we used to help them by making starter dams! It starts out with a nutria farm but trust me, it gets better.

Speaking of Nutria, yesterday a friend of the Scottish free beavers saw my picture from the beaver mistaken identity post and wrote me a helpful note on facebook explaining that the photo was actually a nutria not a beaver.

Sigh.

Gosh, someone should probably write something about that sometime.

Autumn Approaches

heidi08 Beavers or Social Ambasadors, Educational, Environmental September 16, 2013

If you were standing on the bridge last night you could feel that little nip in the air that told you autumn is approaching. You would have heard the shrill chirp of the circling osprey who is counting his days before migration. You would have seen a handful of yellow leaves fall into the water and thought briefly of the Hau flowers in Kauai, that begin their hyacinth morning dressed in yellow and then drop gracefully into the water where they ripen first into orange and then a deep scarlet by nightfall.

And you would be marking your calendars so you remember to join us for this: 1240459_10151846003023958_1177210572_n Cornerstone is a magically elegant place just about 40 minutes from Martinez at the easy edge of Sonoma. It’s artistic shops have amazing things that we probably can’t afford to buy but are very fun to look at, and its lush gardens might be the sight of a wedding for a politician’s daughter or some important corporate event. But on October 20th it will be the home of the SECOND ANNUAL NATURE & OPTICS FESTIVAL, planned by our good friends Tom Rusert and Darren Peterie of Sonoma Birding. Naturally minded folk will travel from the edges of the earth to see the 40 nature exhibits, 8 artist displays and 10 sponsoring Optic companies who will teach you personally what binoculars or equipment would best suit your needs. And in addition to sponsoring the event, the good people of Pentax, Zeiss or Swarski will pay the sales tax of any optics purchase you make that day. You can bet Worth A Dam will be there talking beavers to the wine tasting crowd and we couldn’t be happier to see yet another nature festival in the Bay Area. Last year they expected about 300 attendees and wound up with a thousand. This year who knows what could happen?

Oh, and when you see Tom and Darren be sure to tell them congratulations. The great state of California allowed them to get married this year, and I’m thinking that their continued happiness is a very good thing for beavers.

Yesterday was “beaver madness at the dam”, with a almost full cast of six characters on stage including the three new kits, our 2012 kit (who’s now a yearling), the ever-attentive new mom dad brought home in 2011 and an uncle (step-uncle?) who is one of the three 2010 kits our original mom had before she died. This uncle beaver is apparently less eager than most, and stayed behind after his siblings had dispersed. Here’s he is coming to see what’s going on. Only dad didn’t make an appearance last night, but he is a cautious beaver and we never known when he’ll show. If you can steal an evening some time in the next few weeks before it gets cooler, I wouldn’t miss the chance to see the family in person.