EMILY AND THE 360 VIEW BEAVER POND

One of the continually interesting perks about maintaining a beaver website is that fascinating people from around the world seem to filter like manna onto your doorstep. Not too long ago I was contacted by Emily Fairfax, a graduate student in geological sciences at University of Colorado at Boulder who happens have a special interest in beaver dams and the water they hold. She has been following this website and even sent her mother-in-law to check out our beaver festival last year. (!) When she made contact she said

“The vast majority of my work has been on how beaver dams change arid/semi-arid landscapes from a hydrologic perspective.’

Her research website says:

My current research focuses on the ecohydrology of riparian areas, particularly those that have been impacted by beaver damming. I use a combination of remote sensing, modeling, and field to work understand how beaver damming changes these landscapes and on what timescales those changes operate.

She especially was looking for stories or anecdotes about how beaver ponds help in fire situations, so I introduced her to some folks and showed her what I had come up with over the years. Which lead me to pay special attention when a recent discussion came up with Lisa Robertson on the Wyoming Untrapped FB page, which brought me to this amazing photo and story by Jeff Hogan.

Jeff is an extraordinary wildlife cinematographer. If you’ve ever watched a wildlife film by National Geographic or the BBC, you have probably seen his work.

This is the kind of thing he captures every day.

jeffhoganfilmsI’ve been filming beavers for 20 years now illustrating the benefits of an active beaver colony and pond. Live beavers are very important to our wild forest lands and watersheds. Far more important than whatever benefit humans may enjoy from trapping these beavers. I believe that a wildlife management plan that allows trapping of beavers is highly irresponsible and reckless! This image illustrates the benefit of a beaver pond in fighting forest fires. Filmed in 2001. Beaver pond is located in Granite Creek.

Now Jeff just happened to be at the wednesday night reading in Teton Wyoming of Eager with Ben Goldfarb and Wyoming Untrapped’s director Lisa Robertson. So Jeff made sure Ben had this photo and I made sure Emily had it too. You can see that the helicopter is scooping water to fight the fire out of the only place it’s available: a lovely beaver pond. You can even see the lodge in the middle.

Beavers make a difference in firefighting, as they do in so many other ways. I’m excited to see Emily’s finished work so we can document just how much. In case all this feels too much like school, take a moment to enjoy some of Emily’s delightful offerings on her website.

You don’t want to miss this. Follow the link to her amazing 360 view of a beaver pond. Go look, I’m serious. It’s so frickin’ cool.

“Visit” a Beaver Pond!

Think beaver dams are cool? Visit one of my favorite ponds via a 360 degree photo I took. It’s the main beaver pond up at Schwabacher’s Landing in Grand Teton National Park! The link can be viewed on your computer in the web browser, in the Google Street View app on your phone, or in a Google Cardboard virtual reality headset!

Beaver Pond at Schwabacher’s Landing

Wyoming Wonders

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and Birds, Beavers and climate change, Beavers and Forests, Beavers and Frogs, Beavers and Ice, Beavers and Insects, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Creative Solutions, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers, Who's saving beavers now? July 22, 2017

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.

Moving the problem in Wyoming

heidi08 Beaver Rehabilitation, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Dispersal, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? September 12, 2015

Sherry Guzzi of the Sierra Wildlife Coalition sent this yesterday. Her sister lives in Jackson Hole where the documentary will be having its American debut.

Nature club to screen movie about beavers

55e612e68b74c.image — Drew Reed of the Wyoming Wetland Society releases one of two beavers into a wetland in the Gros Ventre in 2009. The film “Beavers Behaving Badly” documents Reed’s catch-and-release work. It will be screened tonight by the Jackson Hole Bird and Nature Club.

On Tuesday the club will present wildlife filmmaker Jeff Hogan’s one-hour documentary “Beavers Behaving Badly,” a BBC production. The screening is in conjunction with the club’s regular monthly meeting, 6 to 8 p.m. at Teton County Library.

The film explores the importance of beavers in the area’s ecosystem. Valley biologist Drew Reed is documented over the course of a year relocating beavers from private land where they were a nuisance to public land where they can create wetland habitat that is vital to wildlife and people.

“The film shows an ecological project come full circle,” said Bernie McHugh, a dedicated birdwatcher and secretary for the club. “Once the beavers are relocated to public lands all throughout Teton County they can help restore wetland, notably for trumpeter swans.”

Ah another feel-good solution! Move the problem out of our creeks and streams and throw them into the mountains! Maybe they’ll survive and do some good and maybe they’ll die or get eaten by a coyote but either way it’s a win-win for us. Because nothing is going to be nibbling our hedgerows.

Drew seems like a nice enough fellow, and his intentions seem of the right kind. But I’m a little worried that a grown man whose job it is to solve beaver problems that doesn’t spend any time building flow devices or protecting culverts. He also shockingly says that he’s never seen a beaver chew through “netting” before (???) or eat grass (!!!). So I’m going to assume his beaver information has room to grow. Here, I’ll help get him started. This is a yearling chewing grass.

If you can’t make it out to Jackson Hole for the premiere, you can watch the whole thing online here. The title alone set my teeth on edge for most of it, but there’s some lovely video and footage of a beaver making a scent mound which is worth the price of admission by itself. Another attempt to copy Jari Osborne’s hard work, I’ll warrant. Drew is no Sherri Tippie, that’s for sure.

BBC.Natural.World.2014.Beavers.Behaving.Badly… by i-teach-U

Let me know what you think. My strongest impression is that Jackson hole is an insanely beautiful place with a lot of beaver sissies for residents. But that’s just me.

I worked longer than I should on this yesterday but was very happy with the result. I really thought Enos Mills’ great writing needed to be revisited, so I selected a few choice lines from my favorite chapter, along with a handful of select photos. I gave up on the idea of having a better voice read this because the timing needed was a little weird anyway and I’m not smart enough to change it. I really hope you watch this. Or at least read the chapter.

A final selfish note urging us all to wish for rain, or at least cooler temperatures to help calm the fray. The Butte fire is burning the hell out of Heidi’s favorite place, and grew so rapidly yesterday the firefighters actually lost ground. The land my parents brought when I was 7 and built a home to retire on for the last 25 years isn’t out of the woods yet. As a child I built and maintained a coral there to keep in my imaginary horses, and it is the place that Jon and I escaped to the snowy night we were married, lo these many years ago. The fire is mostly expanding away from our property but there is one wicked lick at the back that is marching up the canyon towards the wild place I know best in the world, so keep your fingers crossed.