Beaver lodge visits make waders required attire

Put on your long johns and waders. We’re going over to the biggest beaver pond around to see what we can see.

The pond consists of a tangled mass of small willows and alders, flooded to a level of 3 or 4 feet. Near its center, where the beaver lodge is located, the water becomes deeper and relatively uncluttered.

As we approach the pond through this stand of trembling aspen, don’t be surprised if a woodcock flies up in front of us. The poplar-lined stream banks beavers choose for pond sites also provide prime habitat for woodcock.

Look at the size of this aspen the beavers have just cut down. It must measure 12 inches in diameter. Beavers won’t inhabit an area that doesn’t offer abundant soft wood trees such as aspen and willow. A tree this size is an easy night’s work for the beaver’s four chisel-shaped incisors.

We’ll follow this well-worn path down to the pond. Beavers use this route for dragging freshly cut branches to the water. These paths usually lead to fairly open channels that emanate from the lodge and provide beavers with a waterway system that penetrates the most tangled sections of the pond. Hopefully, this channel won’t run too deep, and we’ll be able to follow it to the lodge.

As we move through dark water, walk slowly and quietly. Test your footing before each step. The pond is loaded with submerged tree branches and muddy drop-offs.

Beavers have added fresh mud and sticks to it in recent days. They’re insulating for winter. Note all the branches they’ve buried underwater to provide an adequate winter food supply. When the pond is frozen, beavers will dive out of an underwater lodge exit to access the branches. Once dragged back to the lodge, each branch will be twirled about by front paws, while its soft outer bark gets eaten like corn on the cob.

Now that’s a fun read. The title gripped me with terror that they were working there way IN the lodge, but the actual column is just delightful appreciation. It talks about wildlife at the pond, and the varied pond floor which we know means bug variation. And he doesn’t bother the beavers, which is perfect etiquette in my book.

We should take our leave before darkness falls. A northwest wind and chilly water have got me shivering. I wanted you to see this place before ice entombed it, so you’ll be able to come back on your own next spring.

Fun ad this morning for a new notebook. See if you can spot the most impressive photo-shopped image:

And the Yakima outrage from yesterday gets better [worse]. Leonard Houston sent a note this morning pointing out that the beaver left behind had an ear tag. That means they know all about this abandoned soldier. They know his number and they know he didn’t make it into the mothership for rescue.

They just couldn’t be bothered.

Or I suppose the kindest possible interpretation is that the beavers they relocated weren’t tagged. And this is one relocating himself into vacated lodge the very next day. Which, come to think of it, is as good as an explanation of why getting rid of beavers doesn’t solve problems as I can think of.

Why I’m Officially mad at Yakima…

heidi08 Beavers, Beavers elsewhere, Who's Killing Beavers Now?, Who's saving beavers now? October 10, 2014

A young beaver explores an old beaver lodge near Ellensburg, Washington, US. Its family was moved as part of a program to trap nuisance beavers and relocate them to the headwaters of the Yakima River where biologists hope their dams will help restore water systems used by salmon and people.

Photograph: Manuel Valdes/AP

Apparently someone was so busy getting credit for saving beavers that no one bothered to get the WHOLE FAMILY. I know it’s hard knowing how many there are and not all beavers cooperate by climbing in the metal suitcases. But I assume that watching helps you get an idea of how many to catch. We certainly know how many beavers there are in Martinez, This youngster was left behind by mistake after the Rapture took away his family. No one came back for him and only the AP photographer cared enough to take the photo.Which was published on “This week in Wildlife in the Guardian“.

It’s Island of the Blue Dolphins for beavers. Do you think that will be in the Washington Post? I guess we should look on the bright side. When that yearling gets over the shock of abandonment he’ll probably start doing beaver things and then the property owner will kill him like he originally wanted to do. So he won’t be lonely any more at least.

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We need cheering up after that story. Here’s a fun headline from Canada picked up by the CBC. I’m glad the councillor is against beaver trapping. But my favorite part is the photo. Because thinking of a beaver swimming on its back makes me giggle.

Projet [sic] Montreal borough councillor Sterling Downey says he recently learnt the city of Verdun reintroduced trapping to kill or relocate beavers on Nuns’ Island.

He says it’s cruel and is calling on his borough to stop its contract with trappers.

He says a more ethical method needs to be used.

In past reports, Verdun officials said they were using trapping because beavers were destroying trees at an alarming rate and giving some residents headaches.

But some residents have also complained about them, particularly in 2008 after a dog was killed when it got stuck in a trap.

The SPCA says it wasn’t consulted before the trapping was introduced and has now offered Verdun officials other options, such as services from Fur Bearer Defenders, a non-profit with expertise in the subject.

It says trapping also has serious impacts on our ecosystem and it hopes Verdun will reconsider.

Verdun is just outside of Montreal in Canada and clearly our friends at Fur-bearer Defenders have made inroads there. I’m just going to sit and imagine coucillors opposed to trapping because its bad for the environment. And I think you should too.

I’ve been on vacation this week in Mendocino and the coastal lovely fogginess finally comes to an end today. So I spent yesterday making the annual movie of this year’s kit. Jon will never be able to listen to this song again, but I think you should enjoy! Do you realize this is the 20th kit we’ve had born in Martinez since we decided not to kill them?

And finally a big thank you to our musician friend GS from San Francisco who celebrated his mother’s well-lived life by making a generous donation to Worth A Dam with his inheritance. Thanks so much! And we’ll make sure we use it in the service of beavers!

Beaver NIMBY

heidi08 Beaver Behavior, Beavers elsewhere, Educational, Environmental December 10, 2013

Yakima is having some more good press for their beaver relocation program. I met a few folk from their program and think their hearts are in the right places. But I can’t help being frustrated that moving beavers out of town is accomplished with such fanfare, while the long hard slog of teaching a city to LIVE with the beavers they have hardly gets a blurb. Think about it, the beaver battle in Martinez was covered in the media excitedly, the money spent on sheetpile is still heralded to this day, the plan to rip out the dam with an anchor was on national news, but Skip’s flow device and its success was never ever mentioned once.

(Once in an interview with a KTVU anchor she reminisced fondly, “Oh I remember being here during all that uproar! I was pregnant and my daughter is three now! Someone put in that pipe right? I guess it didn’t work because I never heard anything else about it”. To which I replied “It worked so well that no one ever talks about. If it hadn’t worked you would have been back to report on the story!)

Well the KQED program dedicated to “sustainability” has an interesting take on this short-term solution.

Putting Nuisance Beavers to Work

With their strong buck teeth and flat tails, beavers are the engineers of the natural world. Their craftsmanship, however, sometimes impacts man-made environments such as houses, roads, and farms. As a result, beavers are often considered to be nuisance animals and killed for the trouble they cause.

Now, beavers throughout central and eastern Washington State are being saved. In March 2011, the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) established a three-year pilot project to relocate troublemaking beavers from homes and farms and move them to upper river tributaries. WDFW biologist William Meyer has been working on the Yakima Basin Beaver Project since its inception.

“I originally got the idea for this project from the Methow Valley Beaver Project,” said Meyer. “I thought, ‘I need to apply for a grant and do this project in the Yakima Basin.’” Meyer received funding for the project from the Salmon Recovery Funding Board.

Clearly KQED’s quest is smitten with this ‘problem relocating project’. (Never mind that they never reported on our beavers OR responded to the press releases about the six Beaver Festivals. Do I sound bitter?) It is indeed better to move a problem than to kill it, but remember the original plan in Martinez was to move OUR beavers, (well two of them anyway – they’d still have killed the rest).We found an successful alternative. And the success rates for the Methow Project on which this is based is about 50%. Which means that half the beavers are dead or eaten the following year.

“I think this is a win/win,” said Meyer, “These little ecosystem engineers can restore habitat, and [by moving them] we can solve someone’s problem.”

Those are some “Hunger -Game-Odds” but I guess its better than being killed outright. Still, let’s be honest, sometimes its a win/lose right? And since the property owner will face the same problem next year and will have fewer fish and birds, more erosion and a lower water table, I guess it can be a lose/lose too.

Tell me how a plan to move beavers is sustainable, QUEST? Is there could be a conveyor belt of some kind involved?