Readers of this website will know that I am a devoted fan of Lizzie Harper a botanical illustrator from Wales who has donated to our festival in the past and is the illustrator for UK audubon. and the national gallery, and created amazing wetlands illustration that I frequently reference and borrow from in my beaver creations. It is my fondest dream that some day soon Wales will allow beaver reintroduction and Lizzie Harper will be tapped to do a beaver ecosystem illustration for the Welsh Beaver Trust or Cardiff University or some big spending patron that we all benefit from. Well this weekend in my annual hunt for beaver illustrations I came across this:
I was of course over the moon that is until I tore off to her website and found that it was an illustration for a book in 2022 and bears this description:
Beavers Castor canadensis with beaver dam. Illustration based in Tierra del Fuego, where introduced beavers have damaged the closed ecosystem. Illustration from The Hidden Universe: Adventures in Biodiversity by Alexandre Antonelli
Good lord. So close and yet so far. I was kinda wondering why it looked so bleak. I guess know I know why. They are still beautiful illustrations. I guess she has to practice on something. It might as well be the notoriously bad beavers of Chile while she’s waiting…
