We’ve talked about Torrey Ritter before. He’s been on our radar a while. Back in April I said about him, “Torrey is a true Beaver Believer who finished his degree at Montana State University studying beaver dispersal patterns and went back for a masters in Organismal biolology (which I didn’t even know was a thing). His wiki page encourages everyone to support your local beavers, so you can tell we’d be fast friends.”

Now Torrey is doing all that good work for the Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks department. Collecting a regular pay check hasn’t changed his fondness for beavers one single whit.

Leave it to beavers

Beaver benefits

Torrey Ritter, an FWP beaver specialist, says the streams and rivers in the West look very different than they did before Europeans settled the west and brought grazing animals with them. Once the beaver fur trade took off and trapping and shooting beavers became an integral economic puzzle piece, what were once winding, interconnected waterways with wide floodplains gradually turned into straighter, narrower and faster streams.

“Beavers created this really diverse riparian habitat that all these different species could live in,” says Ritter. “What beavers do is spread water out over a much larger part of a floodplain. It seeps through the system much slower and not only benefits wildlife but also agricultural producers and fishermen. Just having those dams in place slows that water down a lot.”

How’s that for an introduction? Not only is Torrey a great beaver teacher, he also manages to capture the attention of an impatient reporter who made space for ALL of this good news in their glowing article.

Beaver dams create wetlands in redirecting the flow of streams, providing healthy habitats for wetland-dwelling species like birds,

amphibians and insects. While they’ve been known to use a variety of different tree types to build their dams, they usually focus on quick-growing trees like poplars and cottonwoods. Those types of trees often sprout multiple seedlings from the spot the beaver chops off, meaning that beaver activity can facilitate the growth of new sprouts.

That means healthier soil, more environment-cleaning photosynthesis and better habitat for other animals, including greater green cover for large game like elk, deer and wetland-loving moose.

See what he did there? He basically just said that more beavers mean better hunting in big sky country. He is tying beaver benefits directly to what he knows matters most. Torrey is smart.

In addition to helping out native plant species and facilitating regrowth, beaver dams also help preserve water quality and quantity. 

The dams, which are porous, act as natural water filters, slowing down streams and helping to remove sediments from fast-moving water. Since the whole point of the dam is to provide a beaver family with a still pool in which to live and hunt for food, slower water means the flow from the other side is cleaner as a result.

Cleaner water, More moose, Better soil. Got anything else?

Slower-moving water also provides greater recharge for nearby groundwater sources. Since the dammed stream takes less sediment with it and meanders more, it allows for greater absorption into the water table and reduces erosion along nearby banks.

What’s more, Ritter says, is that the sediment-catching properties of beaver dams can help streambeds and waterways return to their historical character.

“All that sediment, rather than being flushed down into reservoirs, is caught behind dams and can help rebuild,” he says. “You end up with these complex, multi-channeled floodplains that provide resources for a really large number of species.”

And, since so much of western Montana’s streamflow comes through mountain snowmelt, beaver dams built in mountain streams help to moderate the rate of flow, meaning more water later into the warmer months.

“Dams in the mountains that slow that down ensure that there are longer flows later into the year,” says Ritter. “There’s more of a buffer between the snow melting off the mountains and droughts later in the year.”

Tadaa! You are watching a master at work. Better hunting and fishing. Cleaner water and less drought. What else do you need to convince you? Do you think he’s painting an overly rosy picture? Wait for the next punch.

But no matter the benefits, in some situations simply leaving beavers to their own devices isn’t the best technique. Trapping is an option for beaver management, but the state of Montana requires a permit to trap, and there are non-lethal ways to protect nearby trees and waterways from the effects of beaver inhabitation.

“The problem with trapping or shooting beavers is it’s always a temporary solution,” says Ritter. “Beavers will travel to find suitable places, and they’re always going to show up again in good habitats.”

The best management practices depend on what problems beavers are causing, Ritter says. The two he sees most frequently are flooding and tree damage.

To protect trees, FWP recommends loosely wrapping trunks in wire fencing or hardware cloth. For smaller trunks, slicing a length of PVC pipe and wrapping it around the base of the trunk can help prevent damage.

There are also ways to allow the critters to go about their beaver business, while still preventing property damage or flooding. Flow devices can be installed in streams, especially near culverts or road crossings, to help mitigate the backing up of water due to damming. Ritter uses the brand name: Beaver Deceivers.

These involve threading a flexible tube through notches cut in a dam, then placing a cage around the end of the tube that prevents beavers from plugging the hole. Water flows through the dam and, in most cases, the beavers can still use their home as long as the level of the pond created is still deep enough.

WOW. Not only did he hold this reporters attention, deliver the right message in the right way. He made it sensible and memorable. He came with a good understanding of solutions. Trapping only works for a while. Solving the problem lets you have all these benefits longer. Torrey is OUR kinda guy.

In the future, Ritter says, there’s also a possibility of using beavers to aid in restoration of Montana’s river drainages. By building small imitation dams, planting willows and releasing beavers into an affected area, allowing them to simply do their job creates a double benefit: helping the beaver population to rebound and providing some relief and healing to damaged waterways.

When we reach that perfect beaver future, Torrey, with our clean water and many fish, plentiful flow devices and happy beavers, no one will deserve more credit than you Torrey, who has been such a bright knowledgeable voice in the wilderness.

Hmm, do you have any summer plans yet? Something tells me you’d be a hit at a certain beaver festival!