Beaver Library

An excerpt from a presentation at the Society of Wetland Scientists webinar, given by Mark Beardsley of EcoMetrics, LLC. Mark covers the history and perception of the beaver, as well as how beaver behavior contributes to wetland restoration.

Traditional restoration efforts are barely scratching the surface of what could be restored. Moreover, a disproportionate amount of funds are spent on too few miles of streams and rivers leaving millions of miles of degraded streams neglected. To fill this gap, restoration practitioners are increasingly trying restoration techniques that are more cost?effective, less intensive, and can more practically scale up to the enormous scope of degradation.

A synthesis of scientific literature and our current level of: 1) understanding of the relationship between habitat quantity and quality and salmon production, 2) quantify the improvements in salmon production and survival that can be expected with different restoration actions, and 3) use models to help identify habitat factors limiting production and quantify population-level responses to restoration.

We have developed and implemented a simple approach that emulates the ecosystem engineering effects of beaver. This approach is less expensive and disruptive than typical large-scale engineering efforts and has the potential to restore both fish habitat and floodplain vegetation more rapidly than simply revegetating and waiting for the riparian zone to mature.  (Pg 246 – 255)

Artificial beaver dams are a hot restoration strategy, but the projects aren’t always welcome.

Study to gather and produce human dimensions-inclusive, basin-centralized beaver knowledge through an explorative, benefits-maximizing approach to landscape-scale BAR opportunities assessment in the Salinas River.

This paper examines the relationship of ecological restoration to community development. The author presents several opinions on the role of beaver in ecological restoration, the historical relationship of human and beaver, and the beaver’s role within a “multispecies commons”.

Low-tech stream restoration gains using beaver dam mimicry gains popularity as an effective fix for ailing waterways in the American West.

The Low-Tech Process Based Restoration of Riverscapes Pocket Guide is an illustrated and condensed version of the Design Manual. The pocket guide is designed to fit in your pocket (4 x 6”) to use as a reference in the field. 2019.

The goal of this project is to test whether a restoration method developed and tested in Bridge Creek, Oregon will be suitable for restoring streams like Pataha Creek in southeast Washington.

Idaho rancher, Jay Wilde, and Joe Wheaton from Utah State University use BRAT, beaver restoration assessment tool, and identified good beaver habitat to help restore Birch Creek to year-round stream flow.

Idaho rancher, Jay Wilde, partnered with Anabranch Solutions to build BDAs, and the USFS and Idaho Fish & Game to relocate beavers into Birch Creek to help restore year-round stream flow.

Study on how beavers alter freshwater ecosystems and increase aquatic production to determine how these changes influence the magnitude and lateral dispersal of aquatic nutrients into terrestrial ecosystems

Survey that identifies a need to assess beaver-related restoration projects in western rangelands to increase
awareness, accountability, and to identify gaps in scientific knowledge.

This first webinar in the Association of State Wetland Managers (ASWM) and Bureau of Land Management (BLM) co-hosted six-part webinar series on beaver restoration details how beaver affect the land and the hydrologic impacts from loss of beaver through various hunting, trapping and removal activities. The webinar shared the role that beavers and beaver dam analogs (BDAs) can play in stream restoration.

This second webinar in the ASWM-BLM Beaver Restoration Webinar Series focuses on making decisions about where beaver restoration and/or the use of beaver dam analogs (BDA) can have the greatest positive and least negative impacts. It includes a demonstration of Utah State University’s Beaver Restoration Assessment Tool (BRAT), a model that helps planners assess key parameters essential to beaver work.

This third webinar in the ASWM-BLM Beaver Restoration Webinar Series focused on the long-term changes in riverscapes that result from beaver restoration.  Where intense stream restoration is needed, people are identifying low-tech process-based methods that combine the management of grazing, beaver and other approaches that engage processes to create self-sustaining solutions.

This fourth webinar in the ASWM-BLM Beaver Restoration Webinar Series focused on common barriers to beaver restoration and beaver dam analog (BDA) work and when/how these barriers can be overcome.

This guidebook provides a practical synthesis of the best available science for using beaver to improve ecosystem functions. The overall goal is to provide an accessible, useful resource for those involved in using beaver to restore streams, floodplains, wetlands, and riparian ecosystems.