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I can't imagine beavers can raise water levels by more than a foot or so - would such a water level rise not also be possible in heavy rains? So would that simp

I can't imagine beavers can raise water levels by more than a foot or so - would such a water level rise not also be possible in heavy rains? So would that simply just not be a great place to build anyway?

eesmith 3y ago
Watch some post 10 videos on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/@post.10/videos https://www.youtube.com/@post.10/videos He goes around clearing out culverts and other drainage ways, including ones blocked by beavers. The water level difference can easily be over a foot, with water overflowing an embankment and causing erosion damage. Without the beaver dams, the drains would be able to handle a heavy rain.
sandworm101 3y ago
Beaver dams and ponds are generally about a meter deep. That is deep enough that your field isnt a field, your road is impassible, and your house is now an island. They actively want to create ponds. You can fight the process, you can drain the ponds even and destroy the dams, but it is an uphill struggle.
cultofmetatron 3y ago
Disney world is a great example of how people will build something regardless of how bad the land is for it. Life finds a way
- TylerE 3y ago
  "When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England."
cmrdporcupine 3y ago
They can definitely raise things more than a foot and they can cover huge areas of land, and they breed pretty quick and then spread into neighbouring properties. My parents let the beavers restore a low lying area on their property back to marsh. But he still had to put in a kind of escape valve pipe (with some tricks to stop the beavers from plugging it) or it would flood out a very large area near their home. And he has to do some population control on them, too, or they just continue flooding all the surrounding areas.
- ggm 3y ago
  I applaud this approach. its partial re-wilding. It incurs costs (both sides) and its not entirely free. But, you get wildlife, and you get something closer to nature, and the upsides can include significant improvements to biodiversity and water retention in the ground, as well as downstream flood mitigation effects. It's good people are overt "yea I like it overall but it has issues" because pretending there are no issues is silly. People who don't want to do it will magnify the cost side issues to the expense of benefit. People who want to do it will minify.
  - cmrdporcupine 3y ago
    It's tricky though. My father is now almost 80, and it's getting too much for him to monitor and control them. What happens to the land when he can't? There is, unfortunately a perception of nature being a naturally-balancing system. But it's really not. It's dynamic, constantly changing, and beavers can be a real chaos wildcard, creating outcomes that can modify hundreds, even thousands, of acres of land.
    - ggm 3y ago
      Not to minimise your dilemma it's no different to other risky and tricky questions about succession planning in Farming. It's no coincidence that alongside commercial fishing, farming has a horrendous accident rate. If e.g. you have any livestock much over the size of a chicken your near 80yo parent could be at significant risk from unexpected animal behaviour. Cattle yards cause horrific crush injury.
zdragnar 3y ago
I don't mind their dens, but they actively attack plants in strange ways. I've had some arborvitae shrubs for years that were left completely alone... Up until this last winter, when one day they were all destroyed, practically right down to the ground. There wasn't a shortage of food, and these weren't good for den building- there's acres of forest between my house and the closest den anyway. All of our trees along the river bank have to be wrapped in chicken wire to keep the critters away. There's thousands of others along the river banks to choose from; I can only guess they like that the trees are in open lawn rather than surrounded by taller grasses or ferns.
- yawgmoth 3y ago
  Everything eats Arborvitae, especially deer. It is often planted for its speed of growth. I would not describe this as 'strange ways'. It's herbivores eating tasty plants.
  - zdragnar 3y ago
    Deer have also left them alone for years. Not 20 feet away is the edge of the forest where there's plenty of other food. We have many hostas and other plants deer typically go for that are left completely alone. The loss of the arborvitaes just seemed really random. Other than that, the only problem we have had with wildlife in the past 5 years it so is remembering to not leave bird feed out over night- either the black bears or raccoons will steal it rather promptly.
- lofaszvanitt 3y ago
  They deemed them unnecessary, so culled their numbers.

eesmith 3y ago

Watch some post 10 videos on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/@post.10/videos https://www.youtube.com/@post.10/videos He goes around clearing out culverts and other drainage ways, including ones blocked by beavers. The water level difference can easily be over a foot, with water overflowing an embankment and causing erosion damage. Without the beaver dams, the drains would be able to handle a heavy rain.

sandworm101 3y ago

Beaver dams and ponds are generally about a meter deep. That is deep enough that your field isnt a field, your road is impassible, and your house is now an island. They actively want to create ponds. You can fight the process, you can drain the ponds even and destroy the dams, but it is an uphill struggle.

cultofmetatron 3y ago

Disney world is a great example of how people will build something regardless of how bad the land is for it. Life finds a way

TylerE 3y ago
"When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castle on a swamp, but I built in all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. And that's what you're going to get, Lad, the strongest castle in all of England."

cmrdporcupine 3y ago

They can definitely raise things more than a foot and they can cover huge areas of land, and they breed pretty quick and then spread into neighbouring properties. My parents let the beavers restore a low lying area on their property back to marsh. But he still had to put in a kind of escape valve pipe (with some tricks to stop the beavers from plugging it) or it would flood out a very large area near their home. And he has to do some population control on them, too, or they just continue flooding all the surrounding areas.

ggm 3y ago
I applaud this approach. its partial re-wilding. It incurs costs (both sides) and its not entirely free. But, you get wildlife, and you get something closer to nature, and the upsides can include significant improvements to biodiversity and water retention in the ground, as well as downstream flood mitigation effects. It's good people are overt "yea I like it overall but it has issues" because pretending there are no issues is silly. People who don't want to do it will magnify the cost side issues to the expense of benefit. People who want to do it will minify.
- cmrdporcupine 3y ago
  It's tricky though. My father is now almost 80, and it's getting too much for him to monitor and control them. What happens to the land when he can't? There is, unfortunately a perception of nature being a naturally-balancing system. But it's really not. It's dynamic, constantly changing, and beavers can be a real chaos wildcard, creating outcomes that can modify hundreds, even thousands, of acres of land.
  - ggm 3y ago
    Not to minimise your dilemma it's no different to other risky and tricky questions about succession planning in Farming. It's no coincidence that alongside commercial fishing, farming has a horrendous accident rate. If e.g. you have any livestock much over the size of a chicken your near 80yo parent could be at significant risk from unexpected animal behaviour. Cattle yards cause horrific crush injury.

zdragnar 3y ago

I don't mind their dens, but they actively attack plants in strange ways. I've had some arborvitae shrubs for years that were left completely alone... Up until this last winter, when one day they were all destroyed, practically right down to the ground. There wasn't a shortage of food, and these weren't good for den building- there's acres of forest between my house and the closest den anyway. All of our trees along the river bank have to be wrapped in chicken wire to keep the critters away. There's thousands of others along the river banks to choose from; I can only guess they like that the trees are in open lawn rather than surrounded by taller grasses or ferns.

yawgmoth 3y ago
Everything eats Arborvitae, especially deer. It is often planted for its speed of growth. I would not describe this as 'strange ways'. It's herbivores eating tasty plants.
- zdragnar 3y ago
  Deer have also left them alone for years. Not 20 feet away is the edge of the forest where there's plenty of other food. We have many hostas and other plants deer typically go for that are left completely alone. The loss of the arborvitaes just seemed really random. Other than that, the only problem we have had with wildlife in the past 5 years it so is remembering to not leave bird feed out over night- either the black bears or raccoons will steal it rather promptly.
lofaszvanitt 3y ago
They deemed them unnecessary, so culled their numbers.