Out For A Swim

Hearts & Minds

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, City Reports, Creative Solutions October 27, 2010

So Jon was down at the beaver dam last night checking on our heroes who made a little berm in front of the gap to stop the flow over the dam. Three tough young men were gathered there, a little bit appreciative and a little bit menacing. While he watched the three kits chewed on leaves and swam about. Then GQ came over the gap and the smallest kit swam quickly to him and onto his back and they swam together into the lodge. And everyone there said pretty much the same thing,

“AWWWWWW”

These are the essential traits that protect our beavers: understandable family attachments, understandable work ethic, understandable tragedies. Populist beavers. To the extent that people care about our beavers it is mostly do to the ways in which their behavior doesn’t take a park ranger to explain. The beavers, quite without our help, showed their value to the public and allowed their activities to be observable. Since most colonies keep their private lives private I’m not sure why ours decided to lift the curtain – maybe they had no choice because of their locale, or maybe they knew something we didn’t – but they did – and more so than any organization or media or advocate it’s what kept them safe.

I’m thinking especially about this because we are getting closer to the Santa Clara Creeks conference date where I’m going to talk about their role, and I’m supposed to have a chat with the Washington DC HSUS urban wildlife today to see if our beavers would fit with a ‘success guide’ for helping people help animals nationwide. I’m thinking over what worked and what didn’t. There are lots of things we did that helped save the beavers, chase media, write articles, put out video, work every farmers market for a year, talk to children, talk to Rotary and Kiwanis and Elks, talk to experts, and get children’s artwork and display in every single place we could imagine. But all these things wouldn’t have been nearly as effective if our beavers weren’t relatively easy to see and understand.

There are, of course, people who care about the beavers and have never seen them. Still one of the reasons beavers are a ‘charismatic species’ is that its easy to see sign of them. These people have mostly seen the dams, or the old lodge, or a beaver chew or even just footage on the news. It’s important to remember that Worth A Dam didn’t come to be until March of 2008 and didn’t generate a press release until June of that year. Most of the early coverage was pretty organic and based on luck. It was public support that got our beavers in the news, including this inexplicable report which gave us our furthest (national) reach.

I took the liberty at the time of editing the version I put on youtube to reflect the city’s obvious campaign not to call it a CREEK. But its interestesting to me now that this was reported in April of 2008 and there is no mention of the flow device or footage of it.We had already solved the problem but no one knew it. The city never really believed it was going to work three years ago, and didn’t even bring the issue up.

TRAILER: The Concrete Jungle from Don Bernier on Vimeo.

What’s this turtle doing?

heidi08 Beavers, Environmental, Video October 21, 2010

The above was filmed last night at the beaver dam. A turtle was cautiously watching ‘the gap’ and seemed to want to go over so I started filming. Half way through the turtle appears to change its mind and come back, then started this weird back-and-forth rubbing on the surface. The way the legs are moving i wondered if (she) was digging a hole and laying eggs? Now i wonder if (he) is more likely marking his territory and telling no other turtles to cross here. It is a pretty smart investment of turtle resources, since nobody gets to the pond without using the gap. Our beaver friend who knows all about creeks asker her friend whose a turtle expert and he says turtles don’t scent mark which means we really have no idea what he or she was doing.

The Hokey Pokey? Meanwhile, all three kits were seen last night: you can even see their telltale ripples in the water.

The turtle unfortunately isn’t one of our many pond turtles, but looks to be a red-eared slider, a released ‘pet’ that has bred in the wild and has become a pretty invasive species. It’s the same breed that laid eggs near the bridge two years ago, hatching 13 babies, one of which is now lovingly cared for in the office of the county recorder. Looking at this turtle choosing the most traversed part of the entire creek to mark you can understand why aggressive sliders have been more successful than the gentler western pond turtles. Cheryl tells me that there is even a program to reintroduce and foster pond turtle sponsored by the Oakland Zoo.

Just in case any reader needs a ‘gap refresher course’ I suggest you take a look at this video. (Footage shot by Cheryl Reynolds). You can see that every species, be they beaver or bird, crosses the dam in the little depression we call ‘the gap’. In fact, in 2008 when Mom and Dad beaver first let their kits into the pond, Jon saw them lay ‘sticks’ over the gap – in effect closing the door and making a water-safe playpen for their children!

I will end with apologies for the weirdness of the website of late. The server was down yesterday and depending on the browser you use some viewers have been getting incomplete or dropped posts. I assure you we are working on figuring out the solution, and feel free to drop me a note if any thing inexplicable appears on this site.

“Making Friends and Influencing People”

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Beavers or Social Ambasadors October 5, 2010

It’s been an interesting weekend in beaver-dom. I got a nice letter from Ontario where my letter to the editor was published last week. Turns out a single voice in the wilderness has been trying to force the issue into the media lime-light for a long time, and would love some beaver friends stateside.

Beavers create wetland habitat for wildlife

Your poignant memories enjoying the swamp and mournful commentary of the loss of wetlands is what my grandmother would call a ‘great start’. You say you don’t like beavers, but you understand their value in the habitat. Fair enough. People are often moved to advocate for these animals through mysterious paths… because of a particular duck… because of a wish to recharge the watertable… because of a wish to save the dwindling pacific salmon population. I come from the point of really enjoying the opportunity to observe these animals and their interactions. When beavers moved into downtown Martinez, our city responded by deciding to kill them, as many cities do, but the beavers were so well loved they were forced to try some of those new-fangled “humane solutions”. We hired Skip Lisle to come out from Vermont and install a flow device at the dam. This has safely maintained the dam height for three years.

Because we allowed the beavers to stay, we have reaped the benefits of their stewardship. We now regularly see otter, muskrat, steelhead wood duck, scaup, heron and kingfisher at the dam. We even had mink last year. Beavers do chew trees, but their chewing acts as a natural coppice cutting that stimulates dense bushy regrowth, ideal for migratory and songbirds whose numbers have been shown to go up as the number of beaver dams in an area increase.

Trapping beaver is a short-term solution that must be repeated again and again. Flow devices that protect dams and culverts are cheap, effective solutions that have the added advantage of preserving our shrinking wetlands. Any city smarter than a beaver can keep a beaver.

Thanks for your editorial.

Heidi Perryman, Ph.D.

President & Founder

Worth A Dam

Because the gods of the beaver universe never want to give you too much good news at once, I also got a reply to my post about the hilarious beaver-trapping lecture at the Nature Center. It was from some one calling themselves “josh’s aunt” who assured me that Ohio did have members of PETA and that they “made excellent coats”. Get it? Crazy vegetarian hippies tell us not to wear animals so we wear them instead! Gosh that’s funny! What a family affair. Maybe this was Josh’s grandma?

(Is this just a regional thing or is all of Ohio insane?)

On a final note, there are rumblings from Los Altos about a Heifer International Project encroaching Adobe Creek. Our wikipedia friend is involved and hopefully will guest blog about it soon. Its one of those attractive “VELVET BRICK” projects: Choose a hero that everyone loves, like ARF of SENIOR CITIZENS and force the in-building project down everyone’s throats in violation of every possible code, so that it will be easier to do it next time.

Sound Familiar? I told them I’d help however I’m able.

A lively Alhambra Creek

heidi08 Environmental, pictures October 3, 2010

Beavers Create Habitat for Wildlife. Here’s the Proof.

Photo: Cheryl Reynolds

Beavers and otters don’t love eachother, but they’re condemned to be around eachother until the end of days. Remember that the two don’t compete for food, as the otter is a carnivore and not interested in willow. Beavers sometimes ignore otters in their territory, and sometimes show them none-to-politely to the door. Otters are a sort of ‘obligate’ nester, and don’t make their own dens. They would be thrilled to use a cozy beaver lodge to raise their pups and have spent a lot of time checking out the abandoned lodge at Bertola’s. The beavers think that’s frankly not a very good idea, and on Friday both Dad and the two year old gave tail slaps to that effect. The claim that otters will sometimes eat young kits is controversial, and I don’t know that any study ever found beaver parts in an otter tummy. Either way our kits are far to plump to be in danger any more.

I don’t know how anyone could look at this picture and not conclude that lower section of Alhambra Creek, five years ago rated the least healthy part of the waterway, is now teaming with life. That otter wouldn’t be there unless several meals were calling their names. And the ‘fish of the day’ is there because of the beaver ponds.

Thanks Cheryl.

Our Beavers in Bay Nature

heidi08 Beaver News, Friends of Martinez Beavers September 28, 2010

So the October-December Issue of Bay Nature was in my mailbox yesterday. And guess what adorned the last page?

Remember the night last month where John Muir Laws came to sketch our beavers? This is what it was for! He was cajoled into coming to see our remarkable family by some very kind docents from Audubon Canyon that attended my Close to Home talk. They all came together, oohed and ahhed appreciatively at the right things, and finished the evening with burritos and salad in the park. It was a pretty magical night – Jack Laws has a way of making nature feel vibrant and accessible. The evening stands out in my memory as almost churchlike — but way more fun than church. The feeling of being the only person to enter an expansive stunning Cathedral in the morning when light is pouring in through the stained glass windows. Or maybe a gnarled bay grove along a valley basin that just looks like a Cathedral.

If you would like to pick up your very own commemorative issue for the grandchildren go here, but if you don’t already take this magazine you really should subscribe! It will tell you everything you need to understand the natural parts of the Bay Area and Beyond. They’ve been interested friends of the Martinez Beavers since way back. I’m still waiting for the four page exposé on the relationship between beavers and salmon, but someday it will come, I’m sure.