Beavers Devon – Worth A Dam

WMN Letters: Beware! This could lead to beaver fever

These dog-sized rodents get great PR from the so-called environmentalists who support them. But do the same people ever remind us of increasing attacks on humans by beavers in Europe, leading to the death of a fisherman just last year? Or the number of pet dogs, some husky sized, killed by beavers in Canada?

Do you want your children playing in streams or kayaking on lakes where there will soon be potentially aggressive beavers?

Can you possibly read this man’s letter to the editor without hearing this soundtrack? I surely can’t.

They block watercourses and love using bridges or culverts to form their dams. At a time when river maintenance is such an issue, can anyone suggest to those farmers and homeowners, suffering flooding, that a further impediment to water flow is a good idea?

These giant members of the rat family naturally urinate and defecate in the waters they inhabit. Their faeces carries giardia, micro-organisms which lead to the severe intestinal sickness, giardiasis, which is better known as beaver fever. Cases soar in areas where beavers share water with summer recreational activities. In the South West this would mean that not only will those enjoying our lakes and rivers be at serious risk but so will those using all the beaches where that water discharges across the sand.

After these rats flood your city and attack your dogs and children, they’ll ruthlessly poop in your water and give you disease! Are you really sorry we killed off these menaces in the 1400s? I don’t believe the author missed a single alarm bell. He says his name is Jonathan Batchelor, but I have to wonder if that’s a pun – is it possible that someone named batchelor really writes letters against beavers? We’re in danger of moving from Music man right to Professor Higgins territory.

(And if that really is his name, I for one can’t understand how a the ladies of the UK let this sweet catch slip through their fingers!)

Now for some good cheer from our old friend and burrowing owl guru Scott Artis. Scott is the driving force behind Urban Birds. If his name sounds familiar it should, it’s at the bottom of the page as the re-designer of this website. He apparently has endless talents he can’t wait to try. Where’s the beaver cartoon, I ask you?

Finally, today’s donation comes from Brooke Stone Jewelry, an artist in Eugene Oregon.

Get your check book ready for this lovely sterling silver beaver print and go like her generosity on facebook!

Remarkable introduction to Devon Beavers Beaver project from the Devon Wildlife Trust. This is as good a way to introduce beavers as I can think of, and the delight in the announcers voice when she actually SAW the first beaver brought tears to my eyes. I promise you that this recent BBC video is well worth your time. (It was processed and put on youtube by our old friend Peter Smith of the Wildwood Trust and he added his own special additions for the Free Tay beavers.) Enjoy!

Meanwhile, our historic prevalence of beavers in the Sierras paper(s) will appear in the next issue of Fish & Game which is now online. Now we are hard at work at part 2 which is beavers in coastal streams. There was a conference call this week with the key players in that project and Brock and Kate were able to secure funding from the Nature Conservancy for the Sonoma part of that research as part of their larger ‘bring back coho campaign’. Check out this finding from the Fort Ross library of an account to general Vallejo in 1833:

The next valley we crossed is situated three leagues from Bodega. It is called Sayomi. Sayomi has an abundance of year around water and is surrounded by well irrigated lands with timber. About four leagues onward is found a valley called Liuantiyomi. Its creeks form large marshes which are filled with beaver, unlike other places where only vestiges of them remain because of the foreign hunters. Liuantiyomi is located west of the valleys of Santa Rosa and Jaquilliyomi, and appears to have the best environment for the founding of a town.

Of course once he received that report Vallejo was off to see for himself, so we have his translated report as well! We’re close to pinning down the exact location, somewhere between Sebastopol and Occidental as a league was ‘as far as a man could walk in an hour’ but it makes for a exciting detective novel. Although not as exciting as this ‘false lead’ which I found in a this report from father Manuel Venegas 1739 after his trip to some islands in Baja California:

With regard to amphibians, many beavers are also found around the island. Since these sleep in the sea close to the beach with their feet skyward, to hunt them, the Indians trap them while they sleep. They go into the water, knock them on the head with a stick, and with a line of cordage drag them to the beach already dead. Other times, they kill them with their arrows, when the beavers come to shore, or get very close to it.

Don’t you just love the idea of beavers as amphibians? Or sleeping with their feet in their air? Sadly as much as I enjoyed his account he was obviously talking about Sea Otters even though he used the spanish “Castores“ and everything. Clearly the word “beaver” just meant “Furry animal whose coat I wanna sell” and it could be applied everywhere. We’ll keep looking!

And a reunion at the beaver dam last night with several Worth A Dam members gathered to see the kit emerge from above the primary dam. Did he have a sleepover with his aunt to give his parents the night off? Apparently Moses said he’s seen it before, but its the first I’ve heard of it. Nice photos from Cheryl