Napa Wine Train – Worth A Dam

It’s sunday and we have only good news to share with you today here at beaver central. Our beaver-buddy from New Hampshire took a video this week of on of his beavers tail-slapping again and again in the middle of the afternoon. He was wondering why it happened at all and I suggested there might have been a threat we never saw, like an otter sniffing in the lodge opening or something.

I remembered one morning a million years ago when I saw an otter on our old beaver lodge an then saw a beaver react by tail slapping NINETEEN times. (I happened to count because I kept thinking, wow, I should try and film that, but I guess I missed it and am too late. But he generously kept slapping ONE more time, which I finally managed to film.)

Art was interested in my thoughts, and did a lovely job slowing the video down so you could see what is actually involved in a tail slap. This was just filmed with his phone but is great quality, check it out.

There are all kinds of donations to the silent auction today and for the first time I am nearly all caught up writing the bid sheets for display. There are fun things to share and surprising ones that we never saw in the past, like two tickets for Napa Valley Wine Trains gourmet dinner seating. Who knows, if you play your cards right I might be able to get Rusty to show you around the Napatopia beaver habitat on the way!

Jon and I did this years ago and were so impressed. The ride through the vineywards up and back is glorious and the meal was delicious. It’s a great way to identify places you might like to go tasting later. But my favorite winery to pass is always the hillside retreat at Far Niente, which isn’t open to the public for tasting. I have always asked for a donation before but never been granted tickets in the past. We were lucky this time. I can’t help thinking that this time has something to do with my reading up on some local history and reminding them how Martinez was once the home of the Christian Brother’s (1879-1930) which moved to Napa and whose huge castle-like grounds eventually became the Culinary Institute. Martinez and Napa are practically cousins! Anyway, the pitch worked. Go watch the welcome promo which for some reason I can’t embed here and try and tell me that you aren’t dying to see for yourself.

Another treasure comes from Sparkhead Kids in Ontario Canada. One look and you will immediately understand why I had to ask owner Annellie Samuel to donate. This velveteen pillow cover presents “Felix the friendly beaver” and is gloriously soft to the touch but tough enough to stand up to many, many nap times. In fact you might just want to snuggle with him yourself.

We are a small artist run husband and wife team that designs and produces all our product in Canada
We are inspired by the Great North American Wilderness, its beauty and all the magnificent animals that live in it. Our goal is to bring the outdoors to inside of your home and create a positive message of our environment.
Our animal characters are there to amuse and have you fall in love with and to stay your friend for many years to come.

Her charming website has both cushions and prints and whimsically writes about him:

“You will soon fall in love with our Felix the Friendly Beaver, Velveteen, Cushion Cover. Designed in Canada, this original art is perfect for your woodland nursery or bedroom decor.

“Hi! I’m Felix the Friendly Beaver! Have you ever seen a real beaver? I have a special, flat tail, which I use to steer when I’m swimming. When there is danger, I warn other beavers by slapping my tail on the water to make a loud noise. I also have strong, sharp teeth for cutting down trees to make my home from mud and branches in the middle of a lake. My house even has underwater tunnels! Come and be a busy beaver with me!”

Beavers reported on the Yukon tundra for the first time

Canada’s national animal has been turning up in some unexpected places lately, and while there are different theories about how exactly the beaver has managed to gain a foothold in the Arctic tundra, a recent report says climate change is likely a factor.

In 2008 and 2009, Inuvialuit hunters reported seeing beavers on two northern Yukon rivers, near the Beaufort Sea. Then, in 2015, Thomas Jung, a biologist with Environment Yukon, spotted a large dam, beaver lodge and winter food cache on the Babbage River in Ivvavik National Park. All of this suggests beavers are attempting to colonize the Beaufort coastal plain, according to an article by Jung, published in the journal Canadian Field-Naturalist.

“I was quite surprised. I had to look a couple times,” Jung says of his 2015 sighting. He asked the man he was flying with, “‘Have you ever seen a beaver dam up here? Because there’s a beaver dam.’”

Beavers have a broad range in North America, but up until now haven’t lived north of the treeline because they need wood for food and shelter.

As the Arctic warms, the tundra is undergoing ‘shrubification,’ meaning woody plants are growing in places that were once inhospitable and may be drawing herbivores like beavers further north.

Jung says how the beavers got to the Arctic coastal plain remains a mystery. A large mountain range lies between the beavers’ expected territory and their new home on the tundra and as he puts it, “I don’t think beavers are known as mountaineers.”

They may have come from the forested Mackenzie Delta, leapfrogging from river to river until they ended up far north. They also could have swum in the sea.

“The overland route is certainly challenging and the through-the-sea route is improbable,” Jung says, “but animals do improbable things quite often.”

That’s the truth alright. Beavers do lots of things we don’t expect, and the climate is certainly changing. Maybe they just came for the view?