Another day of unbreatheable air for us while rescue workers in Paradise sift through the unimaginable looking for victims of the camp fire. There are 1000 people still missing and we know what that means. In the mean time there are beaver stories that merit our attention. It’s winter in many parts of the US that aren’t currently on fire. And that’s never good news for beavers.

Traps poised for sharp-toothed wanderers

Beavers are being trapped along the Alaska Highway across from the Meadow Lakes Golf Club as a precaution, says conservation officer David Bakica.

The Department of Highways and Public Works (DPW) is afraid the buildup of water behind the dam the beavers have created could push against the gravel road bed and compromise its strength, Bakica explained recently.

The water is already inside the right-of-way, he pointed out.

The devices installed a couple of years ago at the mouth of the highway culvert to prevent the beavers from damming the culvert is working well, Bakica told the Star. The beavers have, however, decided to block the creek upstream from the culvert, within the highway right-of-way, he said.

So the culvert protection you used a couple years ago is working, but the beavers have dammed upstream and rather that build on the success of a couple years ago and install a flow device, you are choosing to kill them in winter.

As it was explained to him by Highway staff, when water sits against a roadbed, every time a vehicle passes over it, the roadbed acts as sponge, pulling in water and heightening the risk of failure, he said.

To date, five have been trapped, though they’re still not certain if all the beavers have been removed, Bakica said Thursday.

Waiting for ice cover not only increases the safety aspect, but it’s also easier to target the entrances and exits of the beaver lodge, he explained.

DPW wants to pull down the dam, but to do so while the beavers are still in there would be inhumane, as the animals would eventually freeze to death without water or become easy prey, he said.

In other words DPW thinks beaver live IN the dam because DPW is almost always stupid.

Bakica said relocating beavers really isn’t feasible in most cases. It’s costly, and can simply mean moving a problem from one area to another, he pointed out.

DPW’s Doris Wurfbaum said the intent is to break down the dam this winter so that the water is free-flowing come spring.

I’m going to assume that the fact that you installed culvert protection 2 years ago at all means that public pressure cared about these beavers and forced your hand. Hey killing after the freeze has another benefit of keeping the beaver-lovers away so they won’t complain too much!

You know there’s another way to do this, right?

We need to remember that beaver stupid still exists everywhere and its not all hearts and Ben’s book out there. I was stunned to see this complaint whine its way across my news feed the other day.

Salmon Runs in the Columbia River system are being systematically ruined by the pseudo science ecologist/ environmentalists who are incharge.

If it was not for the pseudo science of ecology we could have infinitely more fish in northwest rivers and beyond.  The environmentalists actually are the real cause of fish declines. 

Wow. Ecology is a pseudo-science and environmentalists cause fish decline. The mind boggles. The jaw drops.

The Indian tribes controlled the salmon at these points of difficult uphill cascades passage in the gorge for several thousand years.  The river was much more polluted than it is today when salmon runs were much larger.  The Indian populations along the Columbia river were higher per square mile concentrated along the river than anywhere else in north America at the time in pre Columbian times.   Beavers had everything dammed and were so numerous the river was fouled by Beaver feces and from the Indian populations along the rivers and streams.  Those nutrients fed the salmon runs. 

Got that? The rivers used to be more polluted because of all the beaver poop. And all that poop fed the salmon. So now that there is less pollution there are less salmon. Because of the stupid ecologists.

In some ways today the rivers are too clean for fish to thrive as much as they can and fish hatcheries can also be placed further down stream to more tidal areas of the river system like in the Willamette river itself right downtown.  There is horrible missed opportunity in developing the ‘resource’ and worst of all the fisheries selected the best salmon for  the hatchery fish and the eco environmental flakes designate those as unnatural fish which is helping to destroy river and ocean survival traits of various species.   The truth is absolutely not allowed .  Ensured are stupid jobs for idiot people and the salmon and the economic value of these salmon is suffering as a result

If we were to substitute the word pollution for the words ‘nutrient-rich’ I could almost agree. Of course you can’t conflate what beaver do to rivers with what industrial or chemical companies do to rivers. There is zero comparison. The author is onto something though about lots of beavers resulting in lots of salmon, but he misunderstands the role that ecologists want to play in restoring rivers. Correlation isn’t causation. Just because they showed up when the salmon population started to fall apart doesn’t mean they caused it. Just like going to the hospital isn’t the cause of death.

I posted a comment in response and surprisingly he approved it and its still there. I’m not sure what that means, but I’m going to assume its a good sign. At least anyone else that visits the sight can see it.