Beaver Library

Rivers and streams, when fully connected to their floodplains, are naturally resilient systems that are increasingly part of the conversation on nature-based climate solutions. Reconnecting waterways to their floodplains improves water quality and quantity, supports biodiversity and sensitive species conservation, increases flood, drought and fire resiliency, and bolsters carbon sequestration. But, while the importance of river restoration is clear, beaver-based restoration—for example, strategic coexistence, relocation, and mimicry—remains an underutilized strategy despite ample data demonstrating its efficacy. Climate-driven disturbances are actively pushing streams into increasingly degraded states, and the window of opportunity for restoration will not stay open forever. Therefore, now is the perfect time to apply the science of beaver-based low-tech process-based stream restoration to support building climate resilience across the landscape. Not every stream will be a good candidate for beaver-based restoration, but we have the tools to know which ones are. Let us use them.

Reducing nutrient runoff in streams is an important task to reduce algae blooms and associated environmental damage in large waterbodies. Beaver Dam Analogs (WTBDA) are an means to address this problem. These Water Tight Beaver Dam Analogs (WTBDA) present a novel approach to this technique that also aim to restore eroded seasonal creeks to perennial wetlands.

Mark Beardsley with EcoMetrics in Colorado presents on the benefits of partnering with beaver to restore wetlands. Learn more about Process Based Restoration, Beaver Relocation, and more in this webinar, presented to Society of Wetland Scientists on April 20, 2021

Published in Chesapeake Bay Magazine in March 2021, the article highlights various industry professionals who attended BeaverCON 2020. Professionals in stream restoration, water control devices, and environmental journalism were interviewed for this article, discussing successes related to coexisting with beavers. Several important beaver-related studies are mentioned.

Although the beaver-related restoration has broad appeal, especially in water-limited systems, its effectiveness is not yet well documented. This article presents a process-expectation framework that links beaver-related restoration tactics to commonly expected outcomes by identifying the set of process pathways that must occur to achieve those expected outcomes. Due to changes in expectations, a more useful paradigm for evaluating process-based restoration would be to identify relevant processes and to rigorously document how projects do or do not proceed along expected process pathways using both quantitative and qualitative data.

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.

Jeff Burrell with the Wildlife Conservation Society with demonstrates how installing inexpensive woody debris in streams to mimic beaver dams can encourage beaver damming to mitigate the negative effects of  less snow melt summer runoff due to climate change in Montana streams.

Dam building by beaver in degraded environments can improve physical and biological diversity
when viewed at a scale encompassing both modified and unmodified habitats.

The goal of this study was to evaluate factors such as cattle grazing that may limit the occurrence of dam-building beavers in northern New Mexico.

An Introduction to the Role of Beavers in a Warming World. Dr. Emily Fairfax’s ASWM presentation on the ability of beavers to combat climate change, such as reducing wildfire damage.

Learn about nature’s most ingenious engineers with Ben Goldfarb, author of “Eager: The Surprising, Secret Life of Beavers and Why They Matter.”

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 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.

This webinar by Dr. Nick Bouwes, Utah State University focuses on the use of Beaver Dam Analogs (BDA’s) to promote incised steam and beaver restoration. 2017

This webinar was presented by the Clark Fork Coalition in Montana with beaver experts Mike Callahan, Beaver Institute, Elissa Chott, Clark Fork Coalition in MT, and Torrey Ritter, MT DFW. Topics covered include beaver benefits, challenges and solutions. 2020

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

Opinion piece explaining why President Biden should create an Ecosystem Restoration Corps in 2021 to create jobs and improve this country’s environment.