Joe Wheaton – Page 6

The Trail from Utah to Martinez

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and water, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Educational October 13, 2014

Hot of the presses I just got word from Mary Obrien that the BRAT (Beaver Restoration Assessment Tool) has just been completed for the entire state of Utah. The complete report and maps are here and I will put a permanent link on the margin alongside the last amazing thing Utah did for beavers, (and the one before that). Here’s a little excerpt from the executive summary.

This report presents the development and application of the Beaver Restoration Assessment Tool (BRAT), a decision support and planning tool for beaver management, to analyze all perennial rivers and streams in Utah. The backbone to BRAT is a capacity model developed to assess the upper limits of riverscapes to support beaver dam – building activities. Both existing and historic capacity were estimated with readily available spatial datasets to evaluate five key lines of evidence: 1) a perennial water source, 2) availability of dam building materials, 3) ability to build a dam at baseflow, 4) likelihood of dams to withstand a typical flood , and 5) likelihood that stream gradient would limit or completely eliminate dam building by beaver. Fuzzy inference systems were used to combine these lines of evidence while accounting for uncertainty.

With this announcement came a note from Mary that two stalwart Utah beaver champions are coming out to San Rafael for the annual Bioneers conference this month. They are going to a soils workshop and would like to meet Worth A Dam and the beavers if at all possible. For the past 5 years they’ve been hard at work letting beavers turn the tiny incised trickle on their land into this beauty. Their beavers have survived the last 5 years on mostly cattails because there are no trees to speak of!

Yet.

And speaking of beavers eating cattails, here’s a video Rusty sent this morning of a Napa beaver doing just that. The green water is pond weed/algae and don’t worry, I just read this morning that cattails are VERY nutritious.

One man’s Trash is another man’s Treasure…

heidi08 Beaver Rehabilitation, Beavers, Beavers and salmon, Beavers and trout, Beavers and water, Who's saving beavers now? October 7, 2014

APTOPIX-Beavers-to-the-Rescue — n this Sept. 12, 2014, photo, a young beaver looks out from a cage at a holding facility in Ellensburg, Wash. Under a program in central Washington, nuisance beavers are being trapped and relocated to the headwaters of the Yakima River where biologists hope their dams help restore water systems used by salmon, other animals and people. (AP Photo/Manuel Valdes) (MANUEL VALDES)

Beavers, their dams put to work restoring streams

Nuisance beavers put to use restoring streams, fish habitat in central Washington

ELLENSBURG, Wash. (AP) — In a heavily irrigated Washington valley where fish, crops and people often compete for water, biologists are turning to one of nature’s best engineers to help restore streams and salmon habit

Landowners typically trap or kill beavers that block irrigation canals and flood homes in the Yakima Valley. But one project is relocating the troublemaking creatures to the headwaters of the Yakima River, where their talent for chewing willows and constructing lodges can be put to good use.

“Beavers can be really destructive, but in the right places, they can be good ecosystem engineers,” said Mel Babik, project manager with the Mid-Columbia Fisheries Enhancement Group, a nonprofit that works to restore salmon populatio

In Washington, Oregon, Utah and other parts of the West, beavers increasingly are being used as an effective, low-cost tool to help restore rivers.

Beaver dams, ponds and other structures add complexity to an ecosystem, slowing the flow of water and sediment downstream. Salmon and other fish take advantage of pockets of slow water to rest, feed and hide.

Yet again we are reminded why Washington State is better than EVERYWHERE else. (And incidentally reminded that USDA was a big liar when they told Kitsap that relocation was illegal in Washington). Joe Wheston the geomorphologist-profeessor from Utah State calls the project “Cheap and cheerful restoration” which is pretty awesome.

Meanwhile, beaver ponds help store water on the surface as well as underground.

“The water stored underground comes out during a time of year when fish need cold water and farmers need it too,” said William Meyer, who coordinates the Yakima Basin water resources plan for the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.

I love the pragmatic good work of Yakima, and it never hurts to remind people that beavers are good for streams. But regular readers of this website will know right away how many ‘nuisance beavers’ I think there are that should be relocated.

Nuisance politicians, directors of public works and property owners – sure. But where would you move them?

Beavers-to-the-Rescue-10 — In this Sept. 12, 2014, photo, a tagged 50-pound male beaver nicknamed “Quincy” swims in a water hole near Ellensburg, Wash., after he and his family were relocated by a team from the Mid-Columbia Fisheries Enhancement Group. Under a program in central Washington, nuisance beavers are being trapped and relocated to the headwaters of the Yakima River where biologists hope their dams help restore water systems used by salmon, other animals and people.

A cautionary tail [sic]

heidi08 Creative Solutions April 24, 2014

Yesterday I got a sneak peak at an upcoming something I’m not allowed to talk about yet, but believe me when I say you will be very, very interested. I sure was. Then it was time to dash off to virtual school with the Bren masters students who had put together a model for beaver dams in the Jemez watershed in New Mexico using Joe Wheaton’s BRAT tool.

IMPACT ON WATER RESOURCES IN THE JEMEZ WATERSHED, NEW MEXICO

The Bren School is the environmental division of UC Santa Barbara, so within walking distance of the salmonid restoration conference, where they could have heard all about beavers restoring watershed if they were interested. The project was a discussion of theoretical beavers in the Jemez, which is a tributary of the Rio Grande in New Mexico where there aren’t too many beavers to spare. They did not talk about actual beavers. They built the 40 dams themselves based on a model of where beaver dams should be expected to go. Using a tool from the Army Corp of Engineers they measured how much water they preserved with the dams. Then calculated the effect on two species of special concern, a rare native trout and a aquatic mouse. The idea being that you have to prove that beavers are a good idea before any will actually sponsor them. There aren’t too many beavers in New Mexico but there are some. I had to wonder what would happen if any slipped into the Jemez study area by mistake?

I honestly tried very hard to not think like a crazy beaver lover and follow the science behind their presentation without getting annoyed that there were no ACTUAL BEAVERS in their BEAVER thesis. But then they showed this slide and I really couldn’t help myself.

How could they know what a beaver looks like if there’s not any in their beaver research? They’d have no way of knowing that photo actually wasn’t one. And it’s not like Dr. Tim Robinson of the Cachuma Conservation Release Board counted 300+ actual beaver dams on the lower Santa Ynez River a half hour drive from their school. There are certainly no resources on the internet that would help them learn the esoteric difference.

Let’s not suggest that WildEarth Guardians whose writing them grants to fund this project should know any better. I mean just because they have an audited statement from 2012 with a end of year balance of six digits doesn’t mean they should know what an animal they’re funding looks like, right? Stop being so picky, Heidi.

There were questions and answers after the presentation and some nice discussion about native fish versus non natives getting around beaver dams. Byran from Earth Guardians talked about the recent legislation in New Mexico about climate change and beaver management, which was largely the work of Wild Earth Guardians and their legal struggle to make the state take beavers seriously.

Since I know what its like to be a graduate student presenting your work, I politely didn’t ask anyone about the nutria or the decision to study hypothetical beavers (rather than the actual ones USDA says they killed in New Mexico), but I did write them privately that they might want to change that photo before putting the presentation on line.

For whatever reason that didn’t happen. So let this be a cautionary tale (tail).

Too good to be true

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Environmental September 12, 2013

No wonder no one believes us. The annals of research trying to show that beavers benefit ecosystems is just too good to be true. It’s like a new issue of Goofus and Gallant, or one of those religious stories about a good child who suffers brightly with a terrible disease because of her very strong faith. A mistrustful world is never going to believe that any single animal can do that many good things for a crippled planet. They just won’t. Here’s an example:

Do Beaver Dams Impede the Movement of Trout?

Ryan L. Lokteffab, Brett B. Roperab & Joseph M. Wheaton

Dams created by North American beavers Castor canadensis (hereafter, “beavers”) have numerous effects on stream habitat use by trout. Many of these changes to the stream are seen as positive, and many stream restoration projects seek either to reintroduce beavers or to mimic the habitat that they create. The extent to which beaver dams act as movement barriers to salmonids and whether successful dam passage differs among species are topics of frequent speculation and warrant further research. We investigated beaver dam passage by three trout species in two northern Utah streams.

So far, so good. An investigation is warranted. Let’s get to the bottom of this. Tell us the gory details. How do those rotten beaver dams ruin our streams?

Our results suggest that beaver dams are not acting as movement barriers for Bonneville Cutthroat Trout or Brook Trout but may be impeding the movements of invasive Brown Trout.

Did you get that? Not only are beaver dams NOT blocking passage of the good fish. They are also keeping out the bad ones. Who’s going to believe that, I ask you? Here’s another example.

These are the Ruby Mountains of Nevada, just outside Elko where beaver friend Brock Dolman just got back from a mountain trip and exploration. He found some fantastic beaver habitat, and a species of frog that is only doing well near beaver dams. This is the Columbia Spotted Frog that is listed as endangered everywhere else.

IMG_3370[2] — Columbia Spotted Frog – Photo Brock Dolman

Here’s a little something from Fish and Wildlife on the topic.

U.S. FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE SPECIES ASSESSMENT AND LISTING PRIORITY ASSIGNMENT FORM

Beaver Management

The reduction of beaver populations has been noted as an important feature in the reduction of suitable habitat for Columbia spotted frogs (Reaser 1997a, p. 39; NDOW 2006, p. 163; ODFW 2006, p. 288). Beaver are important in the creation of small pools with slow-moving water that function as habitat for frog reproduction and create wet meadows that provide foraging habitat and protective vegetation cover.

Honestly, it’s like beavers are the “Dudley Do-right” of the animal kingdom, another famous Canadian who was a hero of unbelievable proportions that gets everything right and makes everything better without important flaws to endear them to us. Beavers are superman without kryptonite – Rooster Cogburn without the eye patch – or in the language of modern fiction, an annoying Mary Sue character without an absent parent. They do EVERYTHING right. Of course no one can believe in them.

Except us.

There were lots of fans and believers on the bridge last night, to catch the end of summer beaver show. Three kits and JR. VERY high tide. In fact, don’t ask how high it was. Ask how LOW the dam was in comparison.

The dam was so low that both a kit and the yearling SWAM through it! Guess mom has some repairs to do this morning. Love the yearling’s little shake at the beginning.