Fire and water is there anything more primal? As you know beavers can help with both. This new film from Dr. Ellen Wohl and her student Julie Medeiros is a great way to talk about the later. Please enjoy and pass along.
Julie and Emily? Colorado sure is producing some amazing beaver researchers! I can’t wait to see what they both do next.
Jon and I were busy yesterday with some potential beaver hosts in Sussex, who were sent our way by the the good folks at the Beaver trust. Alistair and Diane Gould operate a ‘course fishing’ escape with a stream “Furnace Brook” in Sussex that they dream might one day host beavers. You can see how perfectly they’d fit in.
The area in the 16th century was part of the Wealden Iron industry, and its use dates back to Roman times. The Goulds now are treating it as a sustainable paradise for fishing and education with the goal of healing any scars that were made over centuries of use.
The Goulds were visiting their son and grandson in San Francisco and wanted to learn more about living with beavers. Maybe someday soon you’ll be reading about them on the news. They were also thrilled to visit the John Muir historic site nearby.
Not all that far from Furnace Brook by American standards, a famously successful beaver reintroduction just occurred at the Holnincote estate on the other side of the base of the country. This was a project of the National Trust and has been roundly promoted to see if the beavers can help with flooding. This is from the Guardian, but believe me its been EVERYWHERE these past few days.
‘Drivers of change’: beavers released on National Trust land to ease flooding risk
The aim of releasing a pair of beavers on to National Trust land at the Holnicote estate in Somerset is to ease flooding and increase biodiversity. “It’s an exciting moment,” said Ben Eardley, the project manager for the National Trust at Holnicote, as the female beaver found a bramble-covered ledge to hide away in. “The beavers will shake this place up, they’re a real driver of change.”
In time, Eardley said, the beavers will thin out the trees in their 2.7-hectare home, bringing in more light and with it more flora and fauna – birds, invertebrates, other mammals. Another big hope is that the dams they build will slow the flow of water, easing the risk of flooding downstream.
