Showtime!

heidi08 Beaver-themed merchandise, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, featured, Festival June 4, 2014

THE BEAVER BELIEVERS | a documentary

The urgency of climate change provides an unexpected opportunity for new partnerships and creative solutions in watershed restoration.

This inspiring yet whimsical film captures the vision, energy, and dedication of a handful of activists who share a passion for restoring the North American Beaver (Castor Canadensis) to much of its former habitat and range. Although this goal might seem esoteric or eccentric, The Beaver Believers shows us how this humble creature can not only help us restore streams and watersheds damaged by decades of neglect, beaver can also show us how to live more harmoniously with nature in an era of destabilizing climate change.

When beaver come into a watershed, they transform the stream system to meet their own needs for food and security. In so doing, their dams and ponds also create the conditions necessary for many other species to thrive. It’s a kind of generosity that is born of self-interest yet results in flourishing for all. What better metaphor to take to heart as we face the challenges that climate change brings?

In the end, our film is about much more than beaver and the people who believe in them, it’s about a new way of understanding our watersheds and our role in nature. By “thinking like a beaver,” we can create more bountiful ecosystems and more plentiful water resources, while also providing for our own needs and enriching our human communities at the same time. Beavers can show us the way and do much of the work for us if we can just find the humility to trust in the restorative powers of nature and our own ability to play a positive role in it.

Say hello to the launch of the new documentary ‘the beaver believers”. If it all looks vaguely familiar it should since they were filming last year at the beaver festival. They’ve been hard at work interviewing the other players and now are ready for film. Won’t you send them a little support to get post-production moving along? It couldn’t be easier and they have some adorable thank you gifts. I got the DVD of bloopers and out-takes because THAT’S what I really want to see! (Suzanne Fouty stepping in a cow-pie, or Sherri Tippie swearing like a sailor! hahaha) Go choose your own and show the world you’re a ‘beaver believer’.

Did you notice Cassy and our own Beaverettes in the promo? You better go watch it again. Go check out their slick website to see how it all fits together. I can’t put my finger on it, but this girl looks kinda familiar.

Carmel-by-the-beavers

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Environmental, featured, Festival May 24, 2014

There’s a great read this morning on beavers from the nearly 100 year-old Pine Cone in Carmel. This energetic reporter started out by contacting me last week, and followed up with Rick, our coastal paper and some requisite heavy weights at Fish and Game and the Forest service. It’s a very good article. Reading through it sounds like he really listened to what I said.

Aren’t you excited? Can’t you tell already that this is going to be a very good read? Oh yes, that second paragraph could only have be written by talking Heidi, because I’m a girl with a regional beaver overview.

Well not the city exactly – but thanks for the mention! He really goes head to head on the nativity issue when he talks to Tom Murphey of the USFS who says they don’t belong in the watershed.

Somebody’s been doing their homework! And talking to Rick obviously. The whole paper is obliging filled with the non-arguments of the “beaver-bad” school of thought, the gaping holes in which are repeatedly and cheerfully shown. I was worried when we checked in one last time on the phone. He said he had to present ‘both sides’. But one side clearly has research and resources and arguments, while the other sidehs….what exactly?

Hurray! Worth A Dam gets a mention! As a final note it is pointed out that the reintroduction of beavers would require an Environmental Impact Report, to which I say that’s fine.

I remember a certain lawsuit won at the appellate level that says the removal of beavers should too.

Beaver Success

heidi08 Creative Solutions, Educational, Environmental, featured May 17, 2014

In the wake of the recent beavermentary I thought I’d would baste you in the afterglow of some other beaver triumphs. First in Scotland where the historic Knapdale trial has been called a resounding success.

Scotland wild beaver reintroduction trial ‘an outstanding success’

The reintroduction of beavers to the wild in Scotland for the first time in 400 years has been an “outstanding success”, according to the team of ecologists that brought them back.

The four pairs of beavers reintroduced in Knapdale five years ago have produced 14 young, engineered 18-metre-long dams and lodges the size of double garages and significantly boosted tourism.

Monitoring of the UK’s first ever licenced mammal reintroduction programme finishes at the end of May, after five years evaluating the impact of the species on the local environment and the potential to attract tourism. The results will be presented to Holyrood, which will make a decision on the future of beavers in Scotland next year.

Simon Jones, project manager of the Scottish Beaver Trial, said the project had been an “outstanding success” that provided an opportunity to study the ecology and biology of an animal that has not been seen in Scotland for more than 400 years.

Return of beavers to Scotland a success

“The Scottish Beaver Trial is the most exciting and groundbreaking wildlife project that I have worked on in my 15-year career within nature conservation,” states manager Simon Jones on the project’s website .

It’s worth emphasizing this is a *re*introduction.

Fast forward to recent times, and ecologists realized that the loss of the beaver was, truly, a loss. Because it had once occupied an ecological niche, its absence left a vacuum. Wetlands (and their associated creatures) that once relied on the engineering prowess of the beaver no longer had fresh dams flooding new areas. The beaver had played an important role.

The solution then, was logical. Go find some beavers and bring them back to Scotland.

Since then, there’s been a lot of research to assess just how well the beavers have been doing – and how well Knapdale Forest has responded to their presence. The answer on both fronts: Just fine.

It’s all been awesome and wonderful to have so many scientists saying aloud the things we say every day. And the free beavers in Scotland probably wouldn’t have been safe without the legit beaver trial to balance them. I can’t believe I’ve been in the ‘beaver biz’ for so long that I remember being excited when this trial started! Remember we had children place their clay beavers of the map of Scotland during the procession at the 2nd ever festival. I know you’re busy, but you have to watch the video made in 2009 if just to see HOW SMALL the festival was. I can’t believe how much open space we used to have! (Oh and take a moment to fondly remember GTK who filmed this for us and died a few years ago.) (Thanks George)

Wow. I am very, very old. And so are our beavers.

Moving right along, here’s a refreshing headline you don’t see every day, from Missouri.

Beavers have built a dam on an eroding earthen dam in Jefferson County. This photo shows the beaver dam built on top of the eroding earthen dam. (Festus Rural Fire Protection District)

Beaver dam keeping earthen Jefferson County dam from failing, officials say

A beaver dam was just about the only thing keeping an earthen dam on a Jefferson County lake from failing Friday night, and more than 40 homes were under a voluntary evacuation.

The dam is on a six-acre lake on 100 acres of rural, private property just south of Hillsboro and north of De Soto, between Highway 21 and Castle Rock Road.

A resident noticed the issue late Friday afternoon and notified authorities. The Missouri Department of Natural Resources, police and fire officials were at the scene.

“We’ve had scares in the past, but it’s the first time we’ve had an issue of this magnitude,” said Warren Robinson, director of emergency management of Jefferson County.

“We’re just trying to err on the side of caution here, but DNR advised us this dam can go at any minute. The only thing holding this water in right now is a beaver dam.”

It’s nice to see people grateful to a beaver dam for a change. Maybe we should take a photo of this moment to remember it by. I don’t know about you all, but I’m feeling kinda biblical.

Well, did you watch it?

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beaver Rehabilitation, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Dispersal, Environmental, featured, In the News May 15, 2014

In case you were busy or want to see a section again, the entire program is online:

It’s how I got this very special screen grab that whizzed by at the end.

I’m was already happy because I noticed corrections I had made to the script that were actually incorporated! In fact, I don’t think there’s a single thing incorrect in the entire documentary, which is both awesome and rare! Last night I admired Glynnis presentation of science, loved Suzanne and Carol’s wonder at the beaver improvements in Nevada, enjoyed Michel LeClare better in this american version, and was touched by Michelle Grant’s beaver rescue that remained perfectly untouched from the Canadian original. Sherri Tippie stole the show though, and I’m still getting emails from beaver civilians who adored her presentation. This supports my theory by the way, that saving beavers ultimately isn’t about changing minds with science, it’s about touching hearts.

Sherri made such a splash that she’s on Grist today

Dream of cradling a beaver in your arms? Live vicariously through this Colorado hairdresser!

In case you needed it, here’s something to celebrate: You now live in a world where the sentence “I’m a hairdresser and live beaver trapper” has been uttered in earnest. Sherri Tippie is just an ordinary Colorado jail barber who happens to love beavers – so much so that she’s become one of the top live trappers in North America.

But do not for one second presume that she’s some granola-crunching, Tom’s-of-Maine-using hippie:

I am a hairdresser, honey. I like HBO, I want a toilet that flushes, OK? I do not camp out, baby.

You and me both, girl! To witness Tippie tenderly cradle a squirming water rodent as if it were her own child, watch the video above.

There’s another affectionate article from Bloomberg Business week of all places! I’m expecting more to follow.

Large Rodent Tackles Climate Change: Hoelterhoff

A Colorado hairdresser with a fondness for large rodents is doing her bit for climate change, and so can you. Sherri Tippie is the nation’s champion beaver relocation specialist and the sight of her wrestling them into carriers adds to the fascination of “Leave it to Beavers,” which airs tonight at 8 p.m. EST (check local listings) on PBS’s Nova series.

Having nearly died out as hats in more formal times, the beaver seems determined to survive. I trust the encounter of a pathetic moose and an angry beaver will go viral.

The show’s timing is pretty great: Last week, the National Climate Assessment report affirmed that climate change is a fact that can’t be blustered away by simple radio hosts, grandiose columnists and the Washington servitors of the coal industry.

Beavers deploy every cell in their equally tiny brains keeping America fertile and driving developers crazy. In the Rocky Mountains, their structures filter billions of tons of water. When a drought dried out big stretches of Nevada, the beaver-managed areas remained nice and green.

I love to think of all those business men reading about beavers. I’m eager to learn more about the reactions people had to this, so I’d love you to send me your thoughts. I’d be happy to collect and share them. In the meantime, I’m one happy camper.

Tell PBS how AWESOME that documentary was. Leave your comment here.