Strategically reintroduce native beaver populations back into the dwindling watersheds around LA County, using modern techniques where beaver are “trained” to engineer dams where we want them to, yet leave our infrastructure intact. Beavers are proven to be highly effective at mitigating drought, flash floods, and erosion. As the first major metropolitan area to embrace this cost-effective solution, we would be ensuring a lasting, positive impact on the economy and ecology of our whole region.

Britt Sheflin is a private chef committed to zero waste in the kitchen that uses leftovers to feed homeless on skid row daily. She loves the outdoors and thought that beavers should be part of Southern California’s drought solution. She’s smart, compassionate and forward-thinking.

Britt has a bold, sweeping idea for the drought affecting all of Los Angeles County. BEAVERS. She wants to introduce beavers on a broad metropolitan scale to the polluted waterways of the LA story. And LA2050 could give her the money to do it. Your vote will help her take this project to the next level. And voting is easy.I’m doing it now. Click on the link above or at the vote link at the 2050 site, and signup to receive the email. Then send a response from that email to confirm your vote. And help move beavers one step closer to LA. Here’s the request in her own words.

“Please vote for a grant from the Goldhirsch Foundation and LA 2050 to make Los Angeles County the first major metropolitan area to embrace beaver reintroduction.” work? The proposal page itself covers the details of how we plan to go about reintroducing beaver to LA County, if we win. Any help on the public awareness front is greatly appreciated! We are currently ranked 30th out of 72 in votes and 8th out of 72 for “most discussed”. With a little help, winning this grant is very doable!

I found out about Britt’s formidable plan from Kent Woodruff at the Methow Project in Washington yesterday. We had never exchanged emails or spoken before that, so you can imagine how excited I was to come across this project. Even more so when I read the project description and saw it begins with a quote from ME.

“Any city smarter than a beaver can keep a beaver!”
-martinezbeavers.org/wordpress motto

I’m realizing now what a difference it makes to have beaver voices from outside the regular community. People making a powerful difference in their own front yard and changing the conversation in a dramatic way. People without ‘biology degrees’ or forestry backgrounds. People like chefs (or child psychologists) who stumble upon this issue and use their unique background and skill set to make a difference. If only our old friend Donna Richardson, who worked SO hard to save the Owens Valley beavers, were alive to see this today!

Britt is the ‘wildcard’ Martinez once use to be. Lets welcome her beautiful idea into the world with a hearty round of VOTES, shall we?

Natural flood engineers

Some say beavers are a cheap alternative for mitigation

In the midst of frenzied flood prevention work throughout Alberta, some river ecology specialists are looking to the beaver to protect the province’s watersheds. A group of wildlife management organizations including the Alberta Habitat Management Society (known as Cows and Fish), the Miistakis Institute and the Ann and Sandy Cross Conservation Area are working together on a series of projects to demonstrate how beavers are integral to natural flood and drought prevention and riparian health.

I think I finally understand how Medicine Hat got so smart about beavers! I also realize I’ve been in the beaver biz for so long I re-discoved my comment about how they mistakenly used the muskrat photo from High Country News. (Let’s give credit where credit is due – it was a GREAT article. But lousy photo). I like everything else about this video except the part where it implies humans are needed to determine the appropriate beaver population. Sheesh.

Cows and Fish riparian specialist Kathryn Hull has been involved with beaver management for the City of Calgary since 2007. She says that although Calgary will still trap destructive beavers and break up dams, the city is still quite progressive in managing the animals.

“Sadly for beavers, many of our urban riparian landscapes are really no longer functional ecosystems that can sustain or be resilient to beaver impacts,” she says. “There’s a lot of rock, a lot of rip-rapping being put in along the banks to protect those banks from erosion…. That’s of course a choice and consequence of developing within the flood plain. We’re now having to do this to protect our infrastructure, but of course it doesn’t offer much habitat,” she adds.

Hmm. I know a particular city with sheetpile, rip-rap and concrete where beavers fit in just fine! We should talk.

Another kindly beaver read this morning comes from Charelston. It isn’t as positive as the one from Alberta, but remember, it’s from West Virginia and we’re grading on a curve.

Scott Shalaway: Beaver tales

Though large and common, beavers are seldom seen unless you know where to look. The best time to see beavers is at dusk on a summer evening. And the best place is on quiet water from a kayak or canoe.

Or a bridge in Martinez. This is basically a ‘beavers are fun to watch’ article, but I never discount the value of paying attention, with a very minor tweak interest can turn into caring, and caring can turn into advocacy.

Remember, that’s how I got started.

As the pond grows, the area’s soil chemistry changes and water tolerant trees such as willows and alders, invade. Not surprisingly, the bark and tender twigs of these trees are favorite beaver foods. The pond itself invites wood ducks, black ducks, muskrats, otters, mink, and trout. Fly fisherman value the locations of secluded beaver ponds.

See what I mean?

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Speaking of beaver advocates, I got word this week that friend of this website and general wildlife advocate Donna Richardson died after a riding incident near the iconic Hollywood sign. You may remember Donna was instrumental in pushing the Los Angelos Department of Water and Power in Owen’s Valley to respond to beavers in other ways than trapping. Donna discovered they had been ripping out dams with a helicopter and a grappling hook, inspiring one my favorite graphics of all times. As we strategized about various effective approaches, Donna would often jokingly refer to me as her Best Beaver-Friend Forever. Ultimately her dedication made a huge difference in the outcome. As a thank you for her heroic deeds I sent her a very small beaver chew from one of our many samples. Her partner Alan wrote me this week and said;

One of Donna’s proudest moments in her life came from her successful effort to persuade the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to end its practice of trapping and killing beavers in the Owens Valley. She was inspired by your earlier success in Martinez and she could not have accomplished her mission without the encouragement and support you gave to her. The card you sent to Donna with the wonderful beaver photo and the wooden icon you gave her still remain in the place where she put them, on a small table close to our dining area. They meant a lot to her and they mean a lot to me.

Sniff. Oh, Alan we are so sorry for your loss, and so grateful our beaver paths crossed. Thank you for your beautiful words, and I’m so glad those simple treasures can continue to mean a lot to you. Under other circumstances I might be surprised that I feel such sorrow about a woman I never met, but I have never forgotten this essential truth:

Beavers change things. It’s what they do.

Rest now, BFFF. In your honor I’m adding a new category to the post classifications. I call it “Who’s saving beavers now?”