Whew! Things are back to normal. The solar unit needs insurance, I woke up at 4 and my email has completely stopped working. That seems more like it. While I try and manage radio silence if you need to reach me try this. Mean while there’s still plenty to talk about.
Starting with our 
friends Wyominguntrapped. They have some pretty heavy hitters as partners, including the Forest Service. The beaver awareness project website was launched yesterday and looks awesome. The program director said yesterday that her dream was to have their own beaver festival one day.:-)
Following several meetings between the Forest Service and Wyoming Untrapped in which the benefits that beavers have to the forest were a topic, an idea was formed that would bring together many community partners and would help to reestablish populations of beavers on National Forest Service land.
There is a lack of tolerance for beavers as well as a lack of public awareness of the benefits that beavers provide ecologically. Beavers are an integral keystone species that gets little attention by wildlife managers but have substantial, positive impacts to the ecosystem. Increasing knowledge and a love of beavers in children will increase the understanding of this unique species which will lead to a growth in tolerance and co-existence with this valuable, beneficial species. Students will gain scientific knowledge about hydrology, ecology, biology, and engineering using hands-on solutions to real-world problems. Students will gain knowledge of careers by meeting members of the community to whom they are rarely exposed.
Go to their website and check it out, but there are a few special treasures I want to focus on today. In addition to our lovely poster and links to this site they have some fantastic footage by Filmmaker Jeff Hogan. If his name sounds familiar it should because every single PBS or BBC documentary you have seen of the region uses his work. And with good reason. This footage complete took me by surprise.
I’ve been doing this every morning since Bush was president. I’ve watched 25 beavers grow up and 5 beavers die and seen things I never expected time and time again. But this blew me away. Seriously. Watch it.
