Did you ever have one of those friends that never listened? Whatever project he happened to be working at the time on he never wanted advice, or read instructions, or learned from your or your uncle’s experience. He wanted to figure it out himself, and was blessed perhaps with more testosterone than sense. He waived off your advice installing the sprinkler system, putting together the table saw, and laying the foundation. He was the original do-it-yourselfer and didn’t take kindly to guidance of any kind.
Even though he could have used it lots of times.
I think this must be what Bakersfield is like, as they enter their 7th year of beaver challenges, eschewing all the help that has been directed their way. They had their first big beaver drama around the same time as we were facing ours. Folks got pretty engaged and there was enough media attention that the Beavers sports team in Oregon actually gave support of some kind. I would love a FOIA to learn what happened to those original beavers, but of course they promised that they weren’t trapped just ‘discouraged’ and the media likes to pretend that its the same beaver, coming back, every couple years.
Nearly two years after we left him, having felled eight trees at Truxtun Lake, the fabled bike path beaver is back on the gnaw at the Park at Riverwalk, and making a winter home near the Bright House Networks Amphitheatre.
Recreation and Parks Director Dianne Hoover says the beaver, or beavers, have damaged three Oak trees during the past two weeks, and have felled 11 bay, crape myrtle and redbud trees, costing the city around $550.
Don’t worry. Dianne knows just what to do. She’ll solve it herself and not pay attention to any of that silly advice from those crazy beaver lovers in northern California with the swear word in their names.
In response, city crews have wrapped the bottom three feet of the trunks of more than 30 trees at Riverwalk in green nylon netting that resembles chicken wire, or a very small-gauge chain-link fence.
The device has a better than 90 percent success rate, a parks employee said, at convincing beavers to eschew trees.
90% protection! My goodness! I had to look up this fine product and see how it worked. There are several versions on the market, and sells at height of two and three feet as protection against rabbit, deer, hare and woodchuck. I haven’t seen any that claims to be proof against beaver. Because that would be a very stupid promise unless you lived in one particular city where ridiculous things are routinely believed about beavers.
“They go through and gnaw around and leave a spike, so we had to remove those for safety reasons. We think they’re coming from Kern River Canyon and migrating down. That’s what we think, but we don’t really know for sure,” said Hoover, who described the city’s efforts as “trying to live in harmony with all.”
Crews have dug out the tree stumps at Riverwalk because they’re a hazard.
Thank goodness they acted in time to prevent those trees from coppicing on their own. What with that explosion of nesting habitat who knows what could of birdlife could have cluttered up their precious bike path?
Beavers spotted in Bakersfield, no new tree damage
