August 24, 2018
By Simon Worrall
...You call beavers, (click here) “ecological and hydrological Swiss army knives” and “one of our most triumphant wildlife success stories.” Elaborate on those two statements, and showcase some of the economic and even medical benefits of beaver restoration....
...Beavers provide all kinds of great services for us humans, too. Beaver ponds filter out pollution, store water for use by farms and ranches, slow down floods, and act as firebreaks or reduce erosion. One study in Utah found that restoring beavers to a single river basin produced tens of millions of dollars in economic benefits each year.
In North America, when the first white traders and trappers arrived, there were as many as 400 million beavers. By 1900, there were perhaps 100,000. For three centuries they were trapped for their pelts; their furs made great hats. Then, in the early 1900s, we woke up and realized that incessantly trapping these animals was not sustainable and that these were important creatures, which we needed back in our landscapes. The recovery of beavers proves that conservation works!
One of the most ambitious beaver restoration projects is taking place in the Methow Valley, Washington State. Describe what they are attempting.
The Methow Valley is in central Washington on the east side of the Cascade Range. It’s a pretty dry place, with lots of wildfires. Snowpack and glacial melt from the Cascades is also declining, so water is critical. It’s one of the country’s largest apple- and hop-growing regions, a critical agricultural bread basket in the middle of Washington State. Inevitably, there are lots of beaver conflicts. Usually, the knee jerk reaction is to trap them out. But the Methow Project traps the beavers and relocates them to headwater streams on public lands high up in the mountains, thus getting them off private land. By building dams and creating ponds, they keep rivers and streams in Central Washington wet throughout the entire year. So beavers function as a climate adaptation strategy, compensating for the loss of snowpack and glacial melt....
