Topic Results: Stream Restoration

Back to Currated List of Topics

Beaver (Castor Canadensis) of the Salinas River: A Human Dimensions-Inclusive Overview for Assessing Landscape-Scale Beaver-Assisted Restoration Opportunities

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.

Tags: |

Beavers as commoners? Invitations to river restoration work in a beavery mode

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”.

Simple hand-built structures can help streams survive wildfires and drought

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

Low-Tech Process Based Restoration of Riverscapes Design Manual

The purpose of this design manual is to provide restoration practitioners with guidelines for implementing a subset of low-tech tools—namely beaver dam analogues (BDAs) and post-assisted log structures (PALS)—for initiating process-based restoration in structurally-starved riverscapes. ‘Low-tech process-based restoration’ is a practice of using simple, low unit-cost, structural additions (e.g. wood and beaver dams) to riverscapes to mimic functions and initiate specific processes. Utah State Univ., 2019.

BDA Pocket Guide – Utah Sate University

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.

Working with Beaver in Pataha Creek to Restore Salmon and Steelhead Habitat: Assessment, Design, and Construction Report

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.

Preston rancher restoring beaver to creek

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.

Beaver power provides year-long water to Idaho ranch

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.

Beaver Activity Increases Aquatic Subsidies to Terrestrial Consumers

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 of Beaver-Related Restoration Practices in Rangeland Streams of the Western USA

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.

The History of Beaver and the Ecosystem Services They Provide

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.

Identifying Where to Place Beavers and When to Use Beaver Mimicry for Low Tech Restoration in the Arid West

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.

Case Studies of Long-term Changes from Beaver Restoration Activities

By

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.

Addressing Common Barriers and Objections to Beaver Restoration Work Webinar, 2020

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.

The Beaver Restoration Guidebook, Version 2.01, 2018

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.

A Critical Review of the Effects of Beavers Upon Fish and Fish Stocks

A review by the University of Southampton of how the reintroduction of beaver will affect fish in Scotalnd

Ecology, management, and conservation implications of North American beaver (Castor canadensis) in dryland streams 2014

A review that suggests that beaver activity can create substantial benefits and costs for conservation

Euro-American Beaver Trapping and Its Long Term Impact on Drainage Network Form and Function, Water Abundance, Delivery, and System Stability

Examines the long-term impact of historic beaver trapping in the United States on stream systems, the role of beaver trapping in arroyo formation in the American Southwest, why the significance of beavers was missed by the U.S. General Land Office surveys in the late 1700s to mid 1800s, and how that oversight impacted later researchers in the 1950s and 1960s as the study of fluvial geomorphology and hydraulic geometry emerged.

Tags:  erosion, arroyo formation, hydraulic geometry, channel incision, beaver trapping, General Land Office surveys

The Economic Value of Beaver Ecosystem Services Escalante River Basin, Utah 2001

In-depth report on how beaver could provide benefits to local residents and visitors well into the millions of dollars per year in Utah.

Can the Mighty Beaver Save the Bay?

A 44 minute Baltimore Sun podcast by Dan Rodricks on beavers and their impact. He interviews beaver experts Frances Backhouse, Mike Callahan, and Scott McGill on the history, present management and future of beavers in North America. Recorded in Feb. 2, 2018