A sizzle of umbrage has poured from the colder climes of our Canadian cousins. I have had a delightful time wading through the marshes of national outrage, and collecting the best bits to share with you. Let’s start with this fantastic video from a well known travel blogger.
This amused me too, from the National Post.
Love the graphic! I was especially pleased with Paula Simons post for the Edmonton Journal. In addition to her spirited defense of the beaver character…
The beaver is smart, industrious, creative. They are natural engineers, whose dams literally shape and change our landscape. They are builders. They are survivors. They thrive all across Canada, from the harsh northern wilderness – to the urban city core. And, how shall I put this – they can be viewed with affectionate irony. Polar bears inspire terror and awe. Beavers inspire good humoured admiration and ribald jokes. I know which sense better suits my idea of what it means to be Canadian
she included a repost of an article I somehow missed last year when the world’s biggest beaver dam (visible from space) story broke. It’s an imagined interview with the chief engineer about the mammoth project.
Beaver architect chews over his dam work
Edmonton Journal Thu May 6 2010
Journal Columnist Paula Simons sits down with Mr. Castor Canadensis, chief architect of the world’s biggest beaver dam, for an in-depth discussion on water management, green design and sprawl development. The 850-metre-long dam in a remote southeast corner of Wood Buffalo National Park became an international media sensation this week. It’s more than twice the length of the Hoover Dam. It’s the second-longest dam in the province. Only the 1,200-metre long Old Man Dam beats it.
Simons: Thanks, Mr. Canadensis, for taking time from your busy building schedule to talk to me today.
Canadensis: Please, Paula, call me Castor. Or Cas. We’re not a very formal bunch, up here at the lodge.
Simons: Good to know. So tell me Cas, how did you come to build the world’s largest beaver dam?
Canadensis: This wasn’t a fly-by-night project. We’ve been at this almost 40 years — it’s been the work of generations. We started building around the same time your city council started work on LRT. But we aren’t stop-start builders. We see things through. Slow. Steady. Solid. Diligent. You might say we beaver away at things until we get them done.
Simons: Is this your personal monument? Do you suffer from that common “starchitect” affliction, the edifice complex?
Canadensis: Far from it. This is a group effort, something our whole community has been working at for years. We’re all about legacy, about building for the future. Share the work, share the wealth. That’s our vision.
Honestly, you really have to go read the whole thing. It’s a lot of fun. I wrote Paula an appreciative fan letter and she wrote back stunned that there was a beaver advocacy group in California! Hopefully this is the start of a beautiful friendship, but quotes like these make it all worth while.
Simons: But it seems to me that a project as grandiose as yours is a damning example of sprawl development. What about compact urban form? What about walkability?
Canadensis: Walkability? Lady, if your legs were as short as mine, you’d stop popping off about walkability. Hey, we’ve got webbed feet for a reason. What matters in lodge and dam design is swimmability, and that, we’ve got covered. Compact urban form? Don’t make me laugh. This is big, wild country up here. We dream big. We think big. We build big. Freedom to create, spirit to achieve — we call it the Beaver Advantage.
And, let me add, we built it all without infrastructure grants, loan guarantees, stimulus dollars or bond issues. We never asked some city council to finance our “dam district.” OK, so we built on public land. But it was ours, before it was yours.
Listen, got to get back to work. I think my teeth have grown an inch while we’ve been yakking. I’ve got logs to roll, canals to plan, empires to build, regimes to overthrow.
Simons: Do you have any final words of wisdom for humanity?
Canadensis: Sure. You want something done right? Leave it to beavers. And for heaven’s sake, tell that Justin kid to comb the hair out of his eyes. He’s giving all us beavers a bad name.
