Sharon Brown of Beavers: Wetlands and Wildlife sends this excellent story, which will be further reported in the next issue of Beaversprite.
Columbus, Ohio Metro Parks Installs a Beaver Flow Device
Using BWW’s “Coexisting…” DVD Staff at Columbus and Franklin County Metro Parks, Ohio in December installed a beaver pipe system in a beaver dam to manage the water level and save some wetlands. When beavers moved into Glacier Ridge Park last year their dam restored valuable wetlands, but it also affected a drainage ditch that served private properties bordering the park. The new flexpipe system, based on plans from Beavers: Wetlands & Wildlife’s (BWW) “Coexisting with Beavers” DVD, allows a compromise that benefits both the beavers and the park’s neighbors. Now the water level can be managed—allowing the beaver dam and wetlands to remain.
Beaver activity is the major natural method of creating and maintaining freshwater wetlands,recently valued at $49,000/acre/year in terms of natural services.* About 90% of Ohio’s original wetlands had been drained by the 1980s, according to the U.S. EPA. In past decades, when beaver dams caused flooding of farms or roads, the animal engineers were eliminated. As beavers return to western Ohio, using flow devices to manage their ponds can help save newly restored wetlands.
Carrie Morrow, Assistant Resource Manager for Metro Parks who coordinated the pond leveler d project said, “many of the parts were available at our park maintenance shops. She added, “Our volunteer Richard Tuttle graciously shared the DVD with us and Andrew Boose, our Forest Ecologist and talented handyman, assembled and built the structure.” Boose was assisted by park technician Mike Bosworth. The dedicated men worked in cold, chest-deep water in December to complete the installation. Later, Andrew Boose’s wife ordered a BWW cap for him, “because the project was a success.”
Richard Tuttle, who gave the “Coexisting…” DVD to the park staff, is an expert on conservation of Eastern Bluebirds. In the early 1990s, he created the “Beaver Hypothesis”— that beaver activity produces the habitat required by many wetland species. Photo by Carrie Wakeman Morrow Andrew Boose and Mike Bosworth install a flexpipe with a cage to protect the pipe inlet in a beaver dam at Glacier Ridge Park. Photo by Annette Boose. Andrew Boose, Forest Ecologist at Columbus Metro Parks, photographs a young beaver.
Costanza, R. et al. 2014. Changes in the global value of ecosystem
services. Global Environmental Change 26: 152-158.
Nice to read about Ohio doing the right thing, and I just got an update this morning from Karen of Mt. Healthy that ODOT might be bringing in Mike or Skip to follow suit. That’s a major improvement in a state that has a very tarnished beaver reputation. We’re going to have to make sure everyone knows how much that’s changing.
A quick bit of HUH? from Crosslake Minnesota where apparently they are unaware that pressure treated wood survives better in water. Hmm metal survives better yet.
Crosslake will make capital purchases, beaver-damaged bridge repairs
The Crosslake City Council chose to move forward with plans to repair the Dream Island bridge, which recently sustained damage when a beaver chewed entirely through one of the pylons.
I guess in winter it’s theoretically possible that a unprepared beaver could exhaust it’s food cache and nibble on a board instead. But honestly do you really think this is beaver blame-worthy? And not the work of some drunk fisherman’s motorboat taking a chunk out of the piling with a side swipe?
Let’s leave MN to their conundrum and get ready for the unbearable gasp of cuteness. Jeannine Schafer of The Neenerbot, an enchanting artist and illustrator in San Francisco, has most graciously agreed to donate one of these for our silent auction. Honestly, that might be the cutest thing I’ve ever seen. Especially the curling feet of the kit on the end. (I think we can officially retire that kitten poster. I would ‘hang in there’ much longer for beavers, wouldn’t you?) Thank you Jeannine for your generosity and remarkable creative vision. If admirers can’t wait until August for the bidding war go here to buy your own:
