Come tonight for First Night Celebrations and a grand re-introduction to our furry favorites. Family-friendly Beaver presentations will be offered at 7,8,9,and 10 and run about 20 minutes. We will be in the Telfer building upstairs in the community hall near the corner of Ferry and Escobar streets. Look for new video and never before seen photos, as well as a narration to explain all about them. An ongoing art project will feature glow in the dark beads and the first 50 participants will receive a beaver charm. Take our quiz and enter the raffle for one of the prizes offered. Meet fellow beaver fans and get your  questions answered! Remember this is the first official, city-sponsored beaver event, so come show your support, make new friends and help tip the scales.

By all accounts expect a Dam good time!

I’ve been working hard on the video virtual tour and beaver compilation for First Night. Videographer and beaver friend Moses sent us a lovely package of clips, many filmed at night showing things I’ve never seen before. You should come to first night just to watch them: Images of dad repairing the dam with master builder status or mom fixing up the lodge. They alone are worth the price of button admission. To whet your appetite I thought I’d give you a little David Attenborough. He’s got his usual team of amazing camera crew and his consistent respect for wildlife.  Still, regular beaver watchers will spot something fishy about the footage inside the lodge. Write me if you can guess what it is.

It appears the BBC will not allow me to embed this clip. Go here for a treat.

We went to the Sierras this weekend to remember what snow (and my parents) looked like. On the way there we pass through the town of Sutter Creek and a low bridge over rushing waters, that this summer were looking awfully still. You could tell there was a dam downstream, but it was private land and we’ve had more than a few run ins with one-eyed crabby old men carrying shotguns on that creek so we were hesitant to go look.

I looked all over for news of these beavers. Nothing in the local papers or gossiped at church. This fall the water was passing freely again and we thought the beavers had been quietly killed, like most beavers are.

But yesterday’s trip over the creek spied not one but TWO visible dams, and a pair of heavy still beaver pond. The Sutter Creek Beavers are alive and well, and digging up that goldust to pack their homes and lodges.

Just thought you’d want to know.

Check out this article from Juneau about the volunteer group intervening to keep beavers from causing problems on the hiking trails at Dredge lake. The original plan was apparently every institution’s original plan but residents didn’t want the beavers killed. An alternative solution was suggested involving wrapping some trees and unplugging culverts. The success has helped form cooperation between Rangers and volunteers, and at this point there is a somewhat stable situation.

The spokesperson for the group, Bob Armstrong, is even publishing a book on the Mendenhall glaciar beavers soon. Like our own Cheryl Reynolds he is an avid birder and wildlife photographer, who found out more about beavers as he worked on this project. Did he happen to read the article on beaver dams increasing songbirds? Or the newer research on beaver dams increasing safe habitat for salmonids? If you get in touch with us Bob, we will load you up with research and problem solving tools.

The biggest one it sounds like you need is the beaver deceiver, and we can put you in touch with its inventor, Skip Lisle. Blocking culverts is a big beaver hazzard, although its been a non-event in Martinez so far. Beavers block where the water goes through because its the easiest. However, they like to build their dams at right angles and are off put by the trapezoidal wire fence Skip installs outside them. You don’t have to dig every night, there is an easier way.

You may also need a flow device or two to control the height of the dams. There are a couple different kinds that accommodate fish easily. You can find plans here or check in with Mike Callahan at Beaver Solutions whose working on making this a more broadly teachable skill.

We entirely applaud your effort and would be thrilled to offer help in any way possible. A few points in the article gave us pause though,

Beaver lodges at Moose, Crystal and Dredge Lakes appear to have the right level of water-not too high to flood beaver sleeping quarters, not too low to prevent them from reaching their winter food supply.

Obviously beavers don’t want to flood their sleeping quarters either. So either they stop building when the water gets too high, or they move to someplace higher or build upwards. The water height outside the lodge is the same as the height inside the lodge, and sometimes people forget that beavers have this built in reminder of level-setting.

Finally, I twitched a little at this sentence:

All dams are open enough to allow fish passage and avoid flooding.

Sigh. Do what you must to control flooding, but don’t say you are lowering dams to help the fish. Mr. Armstrong you have your work cut out for you educating an entire fish and wildlife department about the role that beaver dams play in making still pools for juvenile salmonids, especially in winter! I would direct you to our friends at the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife,  but there’s tons more where that came from. Remember that beaver and salmon co-evolved, long before rangers were there to help lower those dams. Trust me, those fish will work it out.

Predawn christmas morning, once my favorite time of the year as a child, now a pleasantly familiar good feeling. We had some great conversations yesterday about a grant application for the next beaver project, got the support of some key players, and the probono services of some top notch environmentalists. It was truly a magical coming together of wisemen and wisewomen, and I expect great things. Because the year has given me me so much, I’ve been working on this to give all of you…

 

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the seventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Seven on committee

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the eighth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Eight eager muskrats

Seven on committee

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the ninth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Nine children laughing

Eight eager muskrats

Seven on committee

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the tenth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Ten news reporters

Nine children laughing

Eight eager muskrats

Seven on committee

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the eleventh day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Eleven cameras snapping

Ten news reporters

Nine children laughing

Eight eager muskrats

Seven on committee

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

A Dam in Alhambra Creek

On the twelfth day of Christmas my true love gave to me

Twelve hatching turtles

Eleven cameras snapping

Ten news reporters

Nine children laughing

Eight eager muskrats

Seven on committee

Six baby ducklings

Five City Council!

Four furry kits

Three watching women

Two adult beavers and

And some nondenomenational Very Good Cheer:

So last night a few bundled beaver loyalists trotted down to the dam to watch for our furry friends. It was warmer than it had been, and not raining yet. Our efforts were not disappointed. Kit by kit made its aquatic appearance, three in all. I don’t know if you have noticed there is a haybail in the water. It was on the sheetpile side, but made its way over near the dam recently. How exactly did a haybail get in there? Best guess is that it was tossed in during the “snow event” downtown, when they used them on the borders. Lets just hope it wasn’t tossed at something.

(As if our beavers didn’t have enough to worry about with metal and netting. They have less room to swim at the moment and don’t need a huge haybail taking up their legroom. Of course it is water logged and impossibly heavy now, although two good men with waders could probably get it onto the bank.) The beavers had a few ideas of their own. One kit started biting off flakes and carrying them away to the lodge. Packing material? Or natural flooring?

The highlight came when our bravest kit scrambled up the side of the bail and struck a pose atop it, sniffing around and enjoying the new view. I cursed myself for not having a camera, but it looked kind of like this:

Next the large yearling approached who came up onto the dam for a full viewing, and finally the small yearling slunk over the gap in the shadows. For a magic moment there were 5 beavers visible in the water at once, and the traffic jam made for two tail slaps and some lovely mewing noises.

Not to be outdone, a muskrat made an appearance, and a rat of the more mundane variety swam by like Ester Williams with a tail. (What’s up with our rats being such good swimmers and divers anyway? Someone needs to do a research project).

When you hang up your stockings tonight, remember what our beavers want for Christmas!

I’m thinking of a beaver visit tonight. Come by if you’re around and wish the family happy a happy holiday before the relatives get here. They seem to be getting started around 7:30. The kits first and then one sneaky yearling who slips over the dam and goes out to forage on his own. Maybe see you there?

Hey the sun came back! Good work team. It was touch and go there for a moment, but you came through in the end. Other cheery news came last night from a CSU professor who read about our work in the LA times and wrote for more information so he could add our strategies to his course.

I am a professor at Cal State University Channel Islands here in southern California.  I am planing on discussing your guys’ beaver saga in my ecological restoration class this coming semester when I talk about the value of historic photographs.  I’m hoping your guys can e-mail me a copy of the photo you found in the museum depicting the banks in 1999.  Thanks for any images/info you can send my way and for fighting the good fight.  Keep it up!

-Sean Anderson
ESRM Program
CSU Channel Islands

That would be tne Environmental Science and Resource Management Program, for which beavers are obviously an excellent tool. Do you realize this means that teaching hard working, earth-concerned, college students how to be more like Worth A Dam will be part of his curriculum?

Surely that news will give all our council a merry merry christmas. Especially the one with the presidential name. If you need more Christmas cheer, I found this yesterday and think we should hire her for the next council meeting. “Sage” advice indeed.

Today is winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, and the longest night. Traditionally mankind worried about making sure the sun came back to his regular position and lured it along with cheery flames and celebration. (Hence the “yule log”). I understand why. Have you been noticing where it sets? Its practically in Benecia these days, which means the unloved Martinez Oxalis on my side yard is exploding with wintry opportunity.  I mean what if it never came back? What if it just kept right on creeping northwards? Tonight we begin our winding path back to spring, where the beavers will become progressively more visible and easier to observe. Make sure you toast the new solar year with a loved one tonight and check to be sure there’s something green in the house. And beavers, enjoy your longest night of swimming and feeding.

Welcome Yule!

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Cheryl has information on how to help here.