Well not everyone is full of Christmas cheer for beavers. Some people have their hearts set on killing them. Never mind that they do useful things for people only if they’re alive. The killing is so darn much fun.
This from Oregon’s Statesman Journal.
Beavers doing just fine
As a lifelong outdoors person, I’m amazed at the misinformation and distortions contained in Quinn Read’s opinion column (“Beavers can’t get a break in Oregon” C9, Dec. 13).
Anyone who has spent time along Oregon’s waters has encountered the ubiquitous beaver or evidence of their presence. They inhabit almost every corner of the state with suitable habitat.
I have seen them swimming past boat launches in downtown Portland as well as in wilderness areas and coastal streams and marshes. If you have property adjacent to a stream you have likely had to protect streamside trees from their continual gnawing or unplug culverts to prevent washouts or flooding.
While they can be destructive pests, they are not classified as “predators,” as Quinn stated, but protected by extensive state trapping regulations as fur-bearing mammals and not “hunted” as game animals.
Gov. Kate Brown needs to consider all the legislative mandates contained in the wildlife policy when she appoints new commissioners and include a few hunter and anglers whose constituency contributes over 90% of the ODFW budget and knows the difference between “science-based discussion” and anthropomorphic “BS.”
Thank goodness at least three ODFW commissioners had the common sense to listen to their own staffs’ findings that beavers are doing just fine in Oregon needing no further regulation on any portion of Oregon lands, federally owned or otherwise.
James Dundon
Of course James is a longstanding member of OHA and featured in the 2018 summer issue of this magazine, and the Rocky Mt. Elk Foundation because why not cast true to type?
People who like to like to kill things like to kill beavers. None of that boring tracking and waiting. Beavers give you their full address. You just need to show up for the invitation.
Of course when a person traps beavers they are basically taking their ecosystem services away from US. Like robbing a community food pantry. No one else can have any because you got there first.
Quinn’s point wasn’t that we were ‘running out of beavers’ James. It was that we’re running out of salmon, and water, and time to protect ourselves from climate change. You like survivalist movies right? Don’t ask me how I know, I just know. Think of beavers as a furry swiss army knife that can do many of the things we need in the drying time we have left.
You are fighting for your right to steal resources from everyone else.
Here’s another example from Beaver Creek Park in Montana, where the board finally decided to allow trapping, despite some protest from local residents.
Striking a balance in Beaver Creek Park
It was encouraging to hear that the Hill County Park Board is initiating a process to document a policy for trapping in our Beaver Creek Park.
Hopefully this policy will address more than just lethal trapping of beavers and incorporate a whole park management perspective.
It will be important to document a policy that is consistent with our vision for Beaver Creek Park while being workable and built on valid science, prudent natural resource management, specific infrastructure issues and sound business practices. Striking a balance between recreational, economic, ecological/biological and hydrologic/water quality considerations for the long run will be challenging.
It is time to stop forcing personal beliefs and agendas on our park. It is time for us to get our heads together, listen to each other, respect differences and work in the interest of all the natural resource values, issues and opportunities we have, and could have, for all the owners and users of our Beaver Creek Park.
Lou Hagener
Lou Hagener of Havre is a certified professional in rangeland management by the Society for Range Management, a longtime resident of Havre, user of and advocate for Beaver Creek Park.. Ahh so Lou was part of the group investigating the pesky beaver dams in the park to see if there was any value in their presence after trapping was objected too by folks and flow devices were recommended by Trap-free Montana. See that’s where the line “Personal beliefs and agendas comes in”. Just because YOU in your liberal tree-hugging heart believe that trapping is wrong doesn’t mean that my basement should be flooded.
Oh and when he says “let the science decide”? He means HIS science, you know those papers written in the 1970’s that say flow devices never work and beavers are pests.
It’s a big park. I’m sure he recommended dedicating on stream section to be the test case where beavers were allowed to remain so that their effect on fish and wildlife could be assessed for the rest of the park. Right?
Wrong.
See BALANCE means what I believe is true, and what you believe is a personal agenda trying to take over our lives. That seems fair, doesn’t it?
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