Leave it to beavers: Live cameras offer glimpse into nature
The beaver dam live feed has gotten 10,625 views this year with people viewing from as far away as Poland, Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan. The average viewer watches the feed for nearly 10 minutes.
The U.S. Forest Service has run the camera from the Mendenhall Glacier Visitors Center since 1995 and began live-streaming in 2009, according to Natural Resource Specialist Peter Schneider, who runs the feed.
Because of bandwidth limitations, the Forest Service can only stream one camera at a time; they switched their feed from the beaver den to an in-river sockeye feed Thursday.
That’s right, it doesn’t matter if folks were watching from Kazakhstan, because SALMON! SALMON! SALMON! Those beavers will just have to get out of the way and let the real stars have stage time.
And speaking of a Forest Service who’s willing to push beaver aside to save the ‘widdle fishy’, check out this story from Colorado.
Forest Service seeks public’s input on Fryingpan trout restoration plan
The U.S. Forest Service is eyeing an ambitious seven-year plan to restore native cutthroat trout to the upper Fryingpan River watershed and eradicate whirling disease, and the agency wants public input on the endeavor. In a lengthy statement released Friday details the Aspen-Sopris Ranger District’s plan, which includes constructing stream barriers and a 20-acre reservoir; the use of a “fish toxicant”; construction of a quarter-mile, temporary road; and possibly using explosives to remove beaver dams.
“Native cutthroat trout are no longer found in most of their historical range due to non-native fish invasion, habitat loss and disease,” the release says. “Recent research has revealed several lineages that were formally unknown in Colorado, including a lineage of Colorado River cutthroat trout native to the Roaring Fork watershed.”
The portion of the plan “to assure a complete eradication of non-native trout and whirling disease” would involve the administration of the chemical Rotenone by Colorado Parks and Wildlife. Rotenone is an organic plant-derived pesticide and is the most commonly used fish toxicant in the nation, the statement says.
“Once complete elimination of trout from the entire watershed above the barriers is confirmed through sampling, the stream would need to remain fishless until it is confirmed that [whirling disease] has been eliminated from the system,” it says.
The second phase would include trapping beaver families or colonies and relocating them in Little Lime Creek “to the extent practical.”
Because you know how bad beaver dams are for trout. And how good pesticides are for them. I mean why shouldn’t the federal government spend our tax dollars poisoning fish and terrorizing beavers on the off chance that it will let them eliminate ‘whirling disease’ which was probably triggered as a response to some pesticide anyway? Makes perfect sense to me.
Sheesh!
We’ll be planting trees this evening with some children and Suzi Eszterhas as part of a photo needed for the Ranger Rick article. (Of course it’s the worst possible time of year to plant trees, but Jon will probably rescue them afterwards and save them in the garden until winter rolls around again.)
Our friend at the Jeff Arnhorn nursery of Livermore chose some wonderful specimens and even delivered them himself. When he dropped them off he saw Mario’s Mural and was very curious because Mario happens to be doing construction work for his mother! (Mario told us earlier that painting doesn’t pay the bills and has to do construction as well.)
Is there a smaller world than the beaver world? I do not think so.
