The earliest trade in North American with the indigenous people and European traders and colonists was for beaver furs. It became so lucrative the Iroquois turned against neighboring First Nations to eliminate them from the beaver trade in what became known as the Beaver Wars.1 When the vast agricultural building of America began with Pres. Jefferson, beavers were interfering with the water flow. Following that, the Industrial Revolution needed water for industry and power for electricity so dynamite was used to blow up beaver dams— an unfortunate way that manifest destiny claimed the waterways without sharing with the Beaver.
Despite this attempt to exterminate it, they have survived and with some help from conservationists, it is still here, and making some unexpected appearances.
At the beginning of colonization in America, the North American beaver (Castor canadensis) a semi-aquatic rodent, had a population of 100-200 million. Now after humans driving them almost to extinction due to the fur trade and development, they have come back to 10-15 million.2
Why we should love them
Honestly, I was shocked to learn that there are so many people who still want to exterminate them. Once I posted a beautiful video of a pair of beavers in our community lake on our social media platform, it was met with a barrage of beaver warriors who declared we should find them and kill them! They complained that they could destroy all of our trees and clog up our waterway. Some helpful resident suggested wrapping wire mesh like chicken wire around your trees to make them unattractive to beavers. Hopefully that was a learning experience. I learned not to post news or videos of beavers.
Beavers can make the environment cleaner, make better habitat for fish and control flooding. They create better habitat for elk and deer, as well as salmon. Since it is estimated that 37% of mitigation of climate effects can be done by allowing natural ecological processes to repair the environment, beavers can be a major part of that approach.
Beaver sightings
Beavers are recovering and they are making appearances in their former habitats from tens or hundreds or even thousands of years, past. There is some indication that development is driving them back to former habitats and development is forcing them to move, but that is hard to explain this sighting in New York City:
“. . . in 2007 a beaver was spotted in the Bronx River, marking the first beaver sighting in New York City in over 200 years. Beavers are now present on Staten Island as well, and have been spotted in Manhattan and Brooklyn.”3
Beavers returned to the Plains after 5000 years, read the headlines for Texas Monthly in 2022. I happened to be one of those who sighted a pair of beavers swimming in a lake and took a video of them, since I had been told there were no beavers here.
In 2023, the Los Angeles Times reported sightings in Los Angeles, California.4
Believers in Beavers
It is the official mammal for New York and Oregon.5 It became the official symbol of Canada in 1975 given the beaver fur trade’s close history with Canada’s history.6
The Beaver helps mitigate the effects of climate change.7 It makes the water cleaner, it creates biodiversity hot spots, it helps with flood control and
The Anishinaabe indigenous people in southeastern Canada crafted this beautiful necklace with beaver teeth, with deerskin and traditional glass bead work. For them, the beaver is a relative and embued with wisdom. As Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, a member of the Alderville First Nation, and of the Anishinaabe people described the world of the beaver, Amikwag in the Anishinaabe language:
Amikwag build dams, dams that create deep pools and channels that don't freeze, creating winter worlds for their fish relatives, deep pools and channels that drought proof the landscape, dams that make wetlands full of moose, deer and elk, food cooling stations, places to hide, and muck to keep the flies away. Dams that open spaces in the canopy so sunlight increases, making warm and shallow aquatic habitat around the edges of ponds for amphibians and insects. Dams that create plunge pools on the downstream side for juvenile fish, gravel for spawning, and homes and food for birds.8
The Tulalip Tribes in the northwestern U.S. has a program to remove “nuisance” beavers and take them to hydrologically at risk streams and rivers where they can help to improve the water in the Snohomish Watershed.9
The Blackfeet Tribe in Montana has created a handbook, the “Ksik Stakii Beaver Mimicry Guidebook,” for modeling habitat to restore streams, after the beaver’s design.10
Beavers, our relatives
The hubris of humans to think they should exterminate the beaver, once for its fur and then because it is a “nuisance” raises serious questions about human wisdom. For now, it looks like we may have a second chance with the beaver coming back, and we should take this moment to celebrate its existence and its co-existence with us.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beaver_Wars
https://wildlife.ca.gov/Conservation/Mammals/Beaver
https://www.nyc.gov/site/wildlifenyc/animals/beavers.page
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-09-11/baby-beaver-sighting-inspires-hope-for-california-comeback
https://www.50states.com/state-animals/
https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/official-symbols-canada.html
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-09-07/california-launches-beaver-restoration-program-to-fight-climate-change
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/ideas/the-brilliance-of-the-beaver-learning-from-an-anishnaabe-world-1.5534706
https://nr.tulaliptribes.com/Programs/Wildlife/Beaver
https://bcapwebsite.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/beaver-mimicry-guidebook.pdf