The National Park Service and Redwood Creek Nursery continue to help Redwood Creek reestablish its natural meandering course with occasional deep pools by strategically placing logs and woody debris in the creek; restoring historic flood plains by removing levees; and actively encouraging the amount and diversity of streamside vegetation.
Salmons Struggle for Survival: Muir Woods National Monument. NPS US Dept of the Interior.
Your federal tax dollars at work proudly doing what beavers could do for free. Our Wikipedia friend has been finding a lot of these kinds of projects, where rangers are rebuilding dams to help salmon, usually after they rip them out to harm beavers. I suppose it keeps our goverment employees busy, but to be honest, when I talk to the rangers out at the John Muir Site they think they’re plenty busy already.
Why couldn’t we have beavers at Redwood Creek in Muir Woods? They aren’t going to eat the sequoias. They would add interest to the millions of tourists there every year, and they would help those special coho by making little dams along the creek that eeked out flow in the summer months, and slowed the current in the winter months.
The National Park System just released a massive report on whats wrong with that creek in particular, and why they didn’t see any salmon returning last season. Guess what it doesn’t mention? I guess NPS didn’t get the memo from NOAA? I guess they’re too busy to have a conversation with Michael Pollock of Northwest Fisheries. I guess they aren’t ready to overcome years of prejudice with just a few reams of hard scientific data?
Come into the light, NPS. It’s a beaver renaissance out there, and they have many, many uses.
