We don’t hear very much from Alberta but a lot of smart beaver things start there Glynnis Hood for example teaches and researches at the university of Alberta. The Miistakis institute is in Alberta. And Cows and Fish, who has been doing smart things to educate people about beavers for as long as I’ve been at this rodeo is in Alberta.
They can be troublemakers, but beavers do a lot of good, too
Beavers have been given a bad rap, but they can benefit the landscape — and there are ways of coexisting with them.
“People are beginning to recognize the value of beaver and how they might be able to help us as a society navigate some of the challenges we are facing,” riparian specialist Kerri O’Shaughnessy said during a recent virtual talk hosted by the Pigeon Lake Watershed Association.
Her organization, Cows and Fish, has been working with the Miistakis Institute and provincial officials to help landowners who aren’t so enamoured of Canada’s most famous rodent (which, since 1975, has been the country’s official emblem).
Beginning? Beginning? I’m so old that I remember when the publication of your book “Beavers our watershed Partner” made a resounding tail slap across the hemisphere. We still use the amazing illustrations by Elizabeth Saunders every time we can. Way back in 2017 Worth A Dam paid for founding father Lorne Fitch of Cows and Fish to attend the state of the beaver conference, and present on the outstanding work getting ranchers to cooperate with beavers.
“Beavers have been recognized as important for climate resiliency as they facilitate groundwater storage, increase stream permanence, enhance water quality, mitigate floods, create terrestrial and aquatic habitat, among myriad benefits,” the booklet states.
“Beaver ponds, particularly in dry years like this, have some of the only surface water that we can see. It also influences what we can’t see, underground.”
Ponds not only retain more water on the landscape but can offer protection against wildfires and slow flood water in a watershed, she said.
Yes beavers are pretty darn amazing. You’ll get no argument from me. But I’m happy you’re there with boots on the ground talking sense to folks.
Traditionally, the solution to problem beavers was to trap or hunt them (moving them to another place is illegal in Alberta). But when a beaver or its lodge are destroyed, the problem is rarely solved for long, as another beaver will show up within a few years.
But there are alternatives that are cost effective and can maintain the land around the pond for economic, environmental, and other benefits, said O’Shaughnessy.
One is something called a pond leveller.
It’s a pipe that has an inlet in the pond (surrounded by a cage) and extends through the beaver’s dam. The idea is to keep the pond deep enough so the entrances are submerged while providing an outlet so the water level in the pond can’t get too high to flood property or damage infrastructure.
The biggest problem with pond levellers is red tape, the Miistakis Institute says in its booklet. Sometimes no permit is required but other times “rigorous and expensive requirements” are mandated by Alberta Environment and Parks, says the booklet from the institute (which has been conducting workshops on how to build pond levellers).
There are also culvert protectors, which are simple structures to prevent a beaver from damming a culvert (again a permit may, or may not, be required). Wrapping wire around trees prevents beavers from chewing on them (the wire should be loose to allow for tree growth and be a metre high) and exclusion fences can also keep beavers out of certain areas.
Yes there are these things called SOLUTIONS for these things called PROBLEMS and people who can think for more time than it takes to fire a rifle or call a trapper can use them! It’s amazing how this works out.
