Tag: Rusty Cohn

Friendly photos

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and Birds, Environmental, Who's saving beavers now? September 7, 2015

Up in the air and over the wall,

Till I can see so wide,

Rivers and trees and cattle and all

Over the countryside—

Robert Louis Stevenson (The Swing)

You won’t wonder at all why I started this post with that particular poem of my childhood when you see this recent photo of the Napatopia beaver habitat. Guess who went out and purchased a drone? This photo was taken at 105 feet.

Just to get you oriented the green part is Tulocay creek, and to the left of that is the Westin Suites and parking lot. The water flows towards the bridge. About a third up on the left is that beautiful lodge of theirs smartly anchored to the dead tree. About a third from the end near the bridge you can see a stand of tulles where the dam is. And then the mostly dry creek continues on with plant and brush growth after that.

Beaver dam from 105 feet — Tulocay beaver pond at 105 feet: Rusty Cohn

This really shows the many benefits that an urban beaver pond can give to a constrained city creek. Flora, Fauna and biodiversity boosts galore. Thanks Rusty, for sharing the results of your new toy with us. We only wish Martinez still had a dam we could talk you into photographing next!

Speaking of amazing photos not taken by us, this photo series was posted on Facebook this morning by Glenn Hori, an old friend of the Martinez Beavers. He wisely chose them in honor of Labor Day. He says they were taken on July 16. Such a hard working beaver! It breaks my heart to think these photos are Jr. bravely doing her job right up until the end. But it’s good to remember what a fantastic craftsman she was. (Click twice on the photos to enlarge.)

I’ve got one more picture to share, and that is the result of many hours labor on my part. I made this as a graphic to use with Audubon, starting with the silhouettes of our beavers and adding everything else in layers. I can’t begin to describe to you the amount of work something like this takes with my hokey little graphics program, but I’m proud of the result. How many bird species do you recognize?

Beaver Stewards

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers and water, Beavers elsewhere, Who's saving beavers now? July 29, 2015

That lovely article is in the Santa Cruz sentinel this morning, and debuted on the front page of the Contra Costa Times yesterday, which was fun. Especially when I think about the still-unhappy beaver grumblers who do things in Martinez like tell public works to rip out willow shoots before they grow or paint over beavers in a popular mura l. Ahh memories!

I thought you’d want to see this fun morning of kit wrestling from Rusty Cohn in Napa.

We’ve only seen yearlings do this, so this is fun to find. And you deserved to read this poem from Deidre’s friend Marcy Beck who works with Stewards of the Coast and Redwoods. (I’m thinking they need to exhibit at the beaver festival next year, by the way). Try reading it aloud because it has great sounds.

Marcy Beck

Napatopia and Ohiotopia?

heidi08 Beavers elsewhere, Beavers or Social Ambasadors, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Who's saving beavers now? June 15, 2015

blue heron on lodge — Blue Heron on beaver lodge in Tulocay Creek: Rusty Cohn

Beavers set up home in downtown Napa

Downtown has some new residents, and they’re not the two-legged tourist variety. Beavers have moved into Napa Creek and built at least two dams visible from the Pearl Street pedestrian bridge and from the parking lot behind the former Napa Firefighters Museum.

“I think it’s great. It speaks to the health of the watershed,” said Shaun Horne, watershed and flood control resource specialist for the Napa County Flood Control and Water Conservation District.

“It’s a good sign for the creek,” Horne said. “The whole beaver population seems to be spreading. These creatures are recolonizing some of these areas that maybe didn’t have the best habitat prior to this.”

Beavers change creek hydrology for the better, Horne said. Dams pool water, which is good for fish, birds and other wildlife. Beaver dams can also help reverse channel deepening, provide nurseries for fish, increase habitat for small mammals, contribute to the establishment of new vegetation and improve downstream water quality by trapping sediment.

Napan Rusty Cohn is a regular beaver watcher. He’s seen the animals and their work at Tulocay Creek near Soscol Avenue and other river areas in the city. He gave the new dam on Napa Creek a thumbs-up.

“They did a nice job of building it,” Cohn said. He has yet to spot the downtown beavers, but he has a theory about where they came from.

More remarkable beaver wisdom from Napatopia, with Flood control saying how valuable beavers are and Rusty getting some smart quotes in. I can’t figure out thought why they didn’t run some of his great photos, or the news that there are three new kits in Tulocay creek. Reporters remain a mystery to me, but you are encouraged to solve the puzzle for yourself.

More good news from places that aren’t here. Brace yourself. This is surprising. The state of Ohio (OHIO?) Department of Transportation has apparently contracted with Mike Callahan to teach them to install flow devices to control beaver damming rather than killing them Here is proof they’re listening.

A Possible Beaver First!

Last week in Cincinnati the Ohio Dept. of Transportation hired me to train their personnel how to manage beaver problems with flow devices. Is anyone aware of another state Highway Dept. that has committed to building and installing flow devices themselves? I think Ohio may be the first! Here in Massachusetts the MassDOT is very supportive of flow devices but they contract with me to install them. Ohio wants to start doing flow devices themselves which I think is pretty cool!

All this came about due to local beaver advocate Karen Arnett being persistent and lobbying the ODOT to consider flow devices as an alternative to trapping. Her dogged efforts bore fruit and the beavers, humans and ecosystems of Ohio are bound to benefit.

The ODOT training included a PowerPoint presentation tailored to ODOT needs, and a hands-on flow device installation where many ODOT staff participated. The flow device install site is a highway retention pond where unfortunately beavers were trapped last year. Since new beavers are bound to relocate here ODOT wanted a flow device to protect the drainage structure and prevent the need to trap in the future. I was very impressed with the level of interest by ODOT staff and their willingness not only to do the work but also get in the water. See pictures. Kudos to ODOT as well as to Karen for getting ODOT interested in flow devices!

Karen contacted this website ages ago, and Beavers: Wetlands and Wildlife as well. She really did a stellar job of getting new ideas through thick skulls. And Mike did a great job convincing them once she got their attention. Great work team beaver!

Beavers: The future and the past

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beaver Chewing, Beaver-themed merchandise, Beavers elsewhere, City Reports, Creative Solutions, Who's saving beavers now? June 10, 2015

Let’s start out with some momentous news. Last night in Napa they almost certainly saw three kits. HURRAY THREE KITS!!! One appears to charge off with the adults to feed, so missed his photo opportunity in his rush to maturity, but they are pretty sure it’s a brave little kit they’re seeing. Congratulations Napatopia, we’re excited for you!

Now its on to some inspiration from our great friend Camilla Fox who lent full ‘Project Coyote‘ voice recently to the Bobcat hearing in Santa Rosa. Great work team bobcat!

Finally an update and a short poll. I know you all recognize the fellow on the left, but the gentleman on the right might be less familiar to our new readers. This is Alex Hiller a beaver supporter from Germany who once came to america to visit a beaver family with Hope Ryden of the famed Lily Pond book. Alex was an early and dedicated supporter and attended the beaver symposium in Lithuania, shocking the heck out of Skip and Glynnis by wearing his Worth A Dam t-shirt shown here.

I hadn’t heard from Alex in a while and I thought I’d send him the Geo article in case he hadn’t seen it and wanted to help with a translate. This morning he wrote back sighting an old German saying, “Some people you assume to have perished only got married.” He announced that he met and married a wonderful woman from Sri Lanka who was passionate about elephants so they were focusing their energies there for the time being. How cool is that? Congratulations Alex! We wishing you every happiness but we will miss our reliable foreign correspondent!

Lastly. if we were offering recycled bags for sale at the festival would you prefer a green bag with a logo or a khaki bag with this in brown? I like them both so you’re vote is needed. Let me know here. Thanks!

Beavers Bitter and Sweet

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Educational, Environmental, Friends of Martinez Beavers, kits, What's killing beavers now?, Who's blaming beavers now?, Who's Killing Beavers Now? May 31, 2015

So what kind of person are you? The one who says give me the bad news first? Or the one who happily opens all his Christmas presents even though his nervous looking parents say they have something important to talk to you about? What kind of person should I assume you are? Like me, get the hard stuff out of the way so that the easy stuff is easier?

Here’s the hard stuff. It starts with a hard hitting article in this mornings SF Gate and features two familiar faces (but only one of the pretty): Wildlife Services and Camilla Fox.

Wildlife groups take aim at lethal control of predators

Brennan, a 55-year-old trapper for the U.S. Department of Agriculture Wildlife Services, has killed coyotes, mountain lions, bears, skunks, raccoons, bobcats and, by his own estimate, 400 dogs.

“He represents a kind of mind-set, a culture,” said Camilla Fox, the executive director of Project Coyote, a wildlife advocacy organization that is calling for government support and training in nonlethal methods and techniques for controlling natural predators, and for widespread adoption of programs like one that has succeeded in Marin County for 15 years.

Brennan and his fellow trappers are the target of a nationwide campaign by Project Coyote and other wildlife conservation organizations to stop what they characterize as indiscriminate killing of wildlife by a rogue agency that still lives by the outdated slogan “the only good predator is a dead predator.”

The latest sortie occurred in February when five conservation groups sued the Department of Agriculture for the “wanton killing” of wildlife in Idaho. They want the agency to promote nonlethal methods of control, including guardian dogs, fencing, hazing techniques, night corrals and lambing sheds.

So Camilla Fox and the Coyote Project teamed up with the Animal Legal Defense Fund, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Animal Welfare Institute to sue Mendocino County for renewing their contract with WS without the necessary environmental review. The team already managed to pressure Sonoma away from renewing its contract.

You better believe this kind of work is making an impression on both politicians and a certain population of hunters and trappers who are deeply devoted to making the scrutiny go away. Case in point? When the John Muir Association named Camilla as conservationist of the year, our board was peppered with complaints from a few very difficult men who objected vociferously over and over.

Should WS maintain contracts all over California? Or the country? You can guess my answer. I went through the numbers yesterday and saw where we fall in comparison. California USDA doesn’t kill the most beavers, by any means, but we’re definitely in the top 10.

Congratulations Camilla on a very sympathetic article. You are really good at your job, which is apparently three times harder than ours. (WS killed 60000 coyotes nationally, and 22000 beaver).

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Now for the good news. Rusty and Robin at Tulocay creek last night were delighted to find TWO kits instead of one. Although they never posed together in the camera frame they were clearly witnessed, and the smaller one generously hung out with mom for a while providing what is possibly among the top five cutest beaver videos I have ever seen. Watch it all the way through. If this doesn’t melt your heart you should see your cardiologist immediately because there’s probably something wrong with it.