Thanks to Mae West for presciently foretelling this morning’s beaver news cycle. Obviously all the beaver dramas in the world know that Beavers: Wetlands and Wildlife visit Martinez today and they’re trying to show off their best problem solving and thoughtfulness. Let’s start with Montana where Audubon outside Yellowstone was thinking about trapping some beaver because they were eating their trees.
(Yes, Audubon.)
Apparently lots of folks objected, wrote letters and probably sent them this article over and over again 
because Audubon is apparently having a change of heart. Just check out this morning’s headline from the Billings Gazette:
Beaver gets trapping reprieve
The trapping of a tree-eating beaver from a pond at the Audubon Conservation Education Center has been delayed for now.
“We’re exploring other options,” said Roger Williams, president of the Yellowstone River Parks Association, which owns the property where the center is located.
“This gives us the time to work out a solution without killing the beaver,” said Steve Hoffman, executive director of Montana Audubon.
A story in The Billings Gazette on Saturday about the planned trapping led to a public outcry that prompted the YRPA to postpone its plans. YRPA officials wanted the beaver removed because it is toppling trees valued at thousands of dollars. The trees were planted by volunteers to reclaim the area, which is an old gravel pit.
Well if any of you wrote letters telling them about fencing and sand painting, thanks! The bird folk will try a little harder to see the FOREST for the TREES, and realize that beavers are birds best friends. Brock Dolman of the water institute and I will be speaking at Madrone Audubon on monday night, and I’ll make sure to mention tree protection!
Nalcor watched the ‘V’ in the water as the nose of a beaver sliced through the mirrored stillness of the pond’s surface. The little muskrat admired the beaver.
In truth he wished he could be more like him. Beavers worked tirelessly and they accomplished a lot. Not just a lot, but they accomplished things that were good for others and not just for beavers.
This swampy pond where Nalcor had been brought up would not exist, if the beavers had not worked so hard to build a dam across the little stream that was a tributary of the Big Cigar River, the one the people wanted to dam.
The beaver dam created a large pond in the little stream that was both home and food source to creatures other than beavers. Birds lived here and the pond served as a stopping point for many different species, as they migrated north in the spring and returned south again in the autumn.
In fact, Nalcor had just spotted a pair of Greater Yellow Legs strutting along the margin of the pond just where the wake of tiny ripples that marked the beaver’s passing lapped against the marsh grass. The long beaks of the tall birds were probing the shallows for the tasty morsels they craved. They needed to bulk up for the long flight south.
Without the beaver dam the stream would be moving too fast for grass to grow; without grass and its decaying roots to eat there would be no reason for the yellow legs to stop here on their journey of migration.
The calm of the beaver pond allowed all manner of other shoots, leaves and flowers to grow and Nalcor loved the delicious salads they provided him.
The beavers were good neighbours. Their work benefitted everyone, though Nalcor sometimes found himself feeling ashamed for how little work he did compared to his industrious rodent cousins, always happy to share the benefits of their labour. The beavers destroyed nothing and their work created a windfall for so many.
Beautiful Prose right? Marystown, where the gazette is from is on the eastern side of Canada over by Newfoundland. Nice attention to detail describing the classic V in the column but it’s sneaky genius too. See NALCOR is an energy company that wants to build a hydroplant flooding out acres and acres through the town that will look like this
So the parable of the beaver building a dam that benefits everyone is offered in stark contrast to the story of the massive dam that destroys much in its path. The slick energy company has completed its EIRs and started a community blog and named its project after the wildlife it will displace and the author of the column in return has named the wildlife after the enegycompany. Awesome. I love this man.
It reminds me of the tale I heard of the proposed dam years ago that would have flooded the gold country near where my parents live. The town took massive steps to prevent themselves from being underwater, including organizing a campaign that must have embedded itself in my subconscious when i chose our name
because obviously some projects aren’t WORTH A DAM and some projects ARE.
