Wauconda woman pulled from shoulder-deep mud

Stuck for hours after trying to clear beaver dam

A Wauconda woman was rescued late Monday after she sank shoulder-deep in mud while trying to clear a beaver dam, according to fire officials.

The woman called out for help for hours before someone heard her around 10:30 p.m. Neighbors heard a faint cry from a swampy area near the house, said Ted Hennessy, deputy chief of the Wauconda Police Department.  Rescuers used ladders and boards to reach the woman, then shovels to dig around her, Hoover said. Workers attached a harness around her body and pulled her out.

From the ‘just desserts’ file comes the story this morning of a nameless woman from Wauconda (near Chicago) who decided to rip out the beaver dam on her property, sank into mud up to her shoulders and had to be excavated by the fire department with pulleys like a sarcophagus in the Valley of the Kings. Prompting this single question, why didn’t this ever happen to a member of our city council or a certain property owner on the banks of Alhambra Creek?

She was taken to Condell Medical Center in Gurnee as a precautionary measure, Hennessy said.  People who live in the area said they are familiar with clearing beaver dams.  The problem area is a pond near VD Kimball Second Subdivision that drains into nearby Bangs Lake, said Caroline Thacker, the subdivision’s treasurer.  Thacker said the beaver dams cause water to back up into people’s homes and yards. 

“I’m sure she was trying to do good,” Thacker said.

Unless you’re the beavers of course.

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Beaver deceiver keeps culvert clear

More outstanding examples of beaver-stupid from Ottawa, the city that ripped out the lodge in Paul Lindsay Park and exposed two young kits to starvation and death. Their public relations department decided to do a little polishing on their tarnished wildlife image and prompted this article about flow devices being installed in places that merited an experimental approach on account of (a) not actually having beavers or (b) not really mattering all that much.

A “beaver deceiver” was erected in the Kizell Pond wetlands on Wednesday, Aug. 8.  The installation of tubing and cages are to keep the beavers from building dams near or blocking the culvert on Goulbourn Forced Road.

The Kizell Pond beaver deceiver is one of five currently in the city, with another two set for construction, said Nick Stow, senior planner of land use and natural systems with the city.

“They have two main benefits,” said Stow. “They allow us to protect infrastructure from beavers without having to trap and remove the beavers and…they also dramatically reduce maintenance costs in the long term.”

Ah Nick! How have you been? It’s been a while since the endless stream of emails we exchanged where you lied first about the beavers being in the lodge the city ripped out, then lied about there being no homeless kits, then lied about the fact that storm water ponds were SPECIAL problems and couldn’t tolerate a flow device, and then lied about Mike Callahan when I sent you photos of installations he had done in storm water ponds, and then lied TOO him directly when you explained that they weren’t possible solutions in Stittsville. No wonder you wanted to show off your beaver-saving prowess, after explaining to Anita that you might be willing to bring in an ‘expert’ (rhymes with ‘rapper’) to move the beavers but she couldn’t watch or know where they were being taken to or tell anyone else about it.

This was my very favorite part of the article

“It will take about a year for the site to fully develop and of course the water levels are very low right now because of the drought,” he said. “So when the water levels come back up and the beavers again become active at the site, we expect the only visible part of the beaver deceiver will be the tops of the cages protecting the inlets to the drains.”

You see, the reason this was a good site for the ‘trial installation of a flow device’ was because there are NO BEAVERS THERE. (Or water for that matter).   Makes sense right? The same way you test the success of cancer medication on people who don’t have cancer, herpes treatment on people who never contracted the disease, or birth control on lesbians? You don’t think Ottawa would take a tom-fool risk like installing a beaver deceiver where there were actual BEAVERS do you?

I’m so full of respect for your courageous and humane decision, I just have to ask. Have you ever walked out near the dam to check the installation up close? It’s incredible. Walk right into the water to get the best view. Step closer…Just a little closer….