5 ms·

London's history-making beavers are adapting to life in the capital

40 points by MarcusE1W 2y ago

cm2187 2y ago
Can't resist plugging the greatest Leslie Nielsen line ever to the twisted minds who thought the headline was a reference to the warmer days coming to London. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvWfbIe4X_4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvWfbIe4X_4
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
snowpid 2y ago
This happens in other big cities. In Berlin boars and foxes are part of city life now.
- hulitu 2y ago
  And lions too. /s
- jeltz 2y ago
  We have beavers in Stockholm too. I occasionslly see them at night when running i central Stockholm. We also have foxes, hares and deer, but those you can see all the time the beavers are a more rare sight since they live in the water and are nocturnal.
- portaouflop 2y ago
  I see foxes all the time in Berlin, often right when I exit the subway. And I live in the middle of the city. Tons of other animals in the big parks too, for example water turtles in Tiergarten
- mikepurvis 2y ago
  That’s really neat; I’ve seen foxes in the wild a few times when camping (in Ontario) and they seem extremely skittish and uninterested in being around humans.
- nkrisc 2y ago
  In Chicago we have coyotes and deer in the city. They live in and use parks, cemeteries, the river, and quiet residential streets at night to get around. I once had a big, well-fed coyote trot right past me on the sidewalk of a major road in broad daylight, before darting across four lanes of traffic to a cemetery.
djtango 2y ago
So they put 5 beavers there? Do they not suffer from incest or will they add more later?
RetroTechie 2y ago
Reading about animals adapting to human environments, always reminds me of this image: https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/ Which is truly depressing. Wild animals have no choice: it's either adapt to whatever little space remains for them, or go extinct. Remember @ one time much of western Europe was covered in forests & other rough terrain. And in coastal areas: river deltas, wetlands & tidal zones. Animals like beavers must have been everywhere. Then ~1600, humans cut most of those forests to make farmland, build houses, ships, bridges etc & heat their homes in winter. And hunted many animals to extinction (probably earlier, too). Sadly there's no easy way to restore balance.
- loufe 2y ago
  I've never seen that one. Made me think about the claim that all ants weigh more than all humans. Looks like it may or may not be the case exactly, but ants are at least a significant missing part of the picture. edit: forgot link : https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2201550119 https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2201550119
  - portaouflop 2y ago
    Ants aren’t mammals though
    - mikepurvis 2y ago
      Yeah, which definitely helps a lot, that we’re excluding all the wild fish, birds, insects, etc. The wild mammals are going to be human adapted ones like squirrels, mice, rats, etc, plus forest dwellers like beavers, badgers and the like. The real tragedy is probably the large mammals like buffalo, zebra, elephants, giraffes, giant cats, etc, and the hunting of those to near-extinction is deeply unfortunate but also predates industrialization if I understand correctly.
      - KineticLensman 2y ago
        > predates industrialization if I understand correctly. Yes, 'megafauna overkill' [0] [0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167268105000946 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S01672...
librasteve 2y ago
the Big Issue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Issue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Issue was created to give genuinely homeless people self respect … a magazine they can sell rather than just beg for cash sadly this great idea has been infiltrated in the UK by trafficked individuals under the command of modern slavers … there seems to be no action from the authorities or the press to stop this and bring the gang bosses to justice
- tweetle_beetle 2y ago
  Do you have a source for this story? First I've heard of it and interested to know more
  - krona 2y ago
    It's a form of respectable begging, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that it would eventually be exploited by entire families of professional beggars who come thousands of miles to use the magazine as a prop alongside their wheelchairs and dogs. If you want to see this in action, walk around the financial districts of London at lunchtime.
    - tweetle_beetle 2y ago
      A professional beggar, as you describe it, has little to do with modern slavery, as mentioned by the grandparent comment.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- MrSkelter 2y ago
  This is the rote response to anything designed to help homeless people. That it’s being exploited and is therefore unworthy of support. However we seem fine with businesses and individuals exploiting the tax code and banking system without making claims we should simply abandon commerce. Any system with value will attract a degree of exploitation. It’s proof of its worth, not evidence of it’s irrelevance.
lol768 2y ago
The site where they've put the beavers is a small parcel of land (less than 0.04 sq mi) next to an out-of-town retail park and industrial estate. I'm reasonably familiar with the site, and have walked the canal more a handful of times and driven the A4127 so many times I've lost count. The air quality here is poor, about 7.5 times the WHO annual air quality guideline values for PM2.5. It's a nice idea, but I can't help but feel like the beavers probably had a better life in Scotland where they were taken from. Online sources suggest that a more normal habitat size would be an order of magnitude larger [1] The problem with Greater London is how dense it all is; if we had better public transport connections and fewer London-centric employers (or indeed, more of an appreciation for remote working) it'd be possible for there to be more and larger green spaces which would help with the whole city being a massive urban heat island. There are some glimmers of hope, the A4127 has become a nightmare to drive on recently due to HS2 works - a necessary evil - which will hopefully encourage more offices to be established between London and Birmingham. It's a shame the wider HS2 scheme was castrated in yet another example of short-sighted thinking. [1] https://www.gloucestershirewildlifetrust.co.uk/beaver-faqs https://www.gloucestershirewildlifetrust.co.uk/beaver-faqs
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
sandworm101 2y ago
So they really are in a pen? I cannot imagine londoners putting up with beaver activity outide of fenced/walled areas. This sounds more like a zoo, very much the opposite of rewilding. What are they going to do when a new generation of beavers seeks a new stream to dam?
wolverine876 2y ago
Why not introduce furry mammals that don't need a large expanse of nature, but can adapt to and live directly in the urban environment. Something that could live in all sorts of corners of the city, even underground, and consume unwanted food from humans ... I'm joking a bit, but I'm serious. Why are beavers better than rats?
- stubish 2y ago
  They are larger and build damns and many other differences, so they fill different niches. The idea is to restore the pre-industrial ecosystem as best we can. Maybe their natural land management will improve the quality of the wetlands, or maybe it will cause flooding of nearby human occupied land and cause them to be quietly removed. Maybe they will become prey to wolves and lynx, or maybe they will need to be culled because those predators probably won't be released in London.

40 points by MarcusE1W 2y ago

Can't resist plugging the greatest Leslie Nielsen line ever to the twisted minds who thought the headline was a reference to the warmer days coming to London. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvWfbIe4X_4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvWfbIe4X_4

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

snowpid 2y ago

This happens in other big cities. In Berlin boars and foxes are part of city life now.

hulitu 2y ago
And lions too. /s
jeltz 2y ago
We have beavers in Stockholm too. I occasionslly see them at night when running i central Stockholm. We also have foxes, hares and deer, but those you can see all the time the beavers are a more rare sight since they live in the water and are nocturnal.
portaouflop 2y ago
I see foxes all the time in Berlin, often right when I exit the subway. And I live in the middle of the city. Tons of other animals in the big parks too, for example water turtles in Tiergarten
mikepurvis 2y ago
That’s really neat; I’ve seen foxes in the wild a few times when camping (in Ontario) and they seem extremely skittish and uninterested in being around humans.
nkrisc 2y ago
In Chicago we have coyotes and deer in the city. They live in and use parks, cemeteries, the river, and quiet residential streets at night to get around. I once had a big, well-fed coyote trot right past me on the sidewalk of a major road in broad daylight, before darting across four lanes of traffic to a cemetery.

djtango 2y ago

So they put 5 beavers there? Do they not suffer from incest or will they add more later?

RetroTechie 2y ago

Reading about animals adapting to human environments, always reminds me of this image: https://xkcd.com/1338/ https://xkcd.com/1338/ Which is truly depressing. Wild animals have no choice: it's either adapt to whatever little space remains for them, or go extinct. Remember @ one time much of western Europe was covered in forests & other rough terrain. And in coastal areas: river deltas, wetlands & tidal zones. Animals like beavers must have been everywhere. Then ~1600, humans cut most of those forests to make farmland, build houses, ships, bridges etc & heat their homes in winter. And hunted many animals to extinction (probably earlier, too). Sadly there's no easy way to restore balance.

loufe 2y ago
I've never seen that one. Made me think about the claim that all ants weigh more than all humans. Looks like it may or may not be the case exactly, but ants are at least a significant missing part of the picture. edit: forgot link : https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2201550119 https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2201550119
- portaouflop 2y ago
  Ants aren’t mammals though
  - mikepurvis 2y ago
    Yeah, which definitely helps a lot, that we’re excluding all the wild fish, birds, insects, etc. The wild mammals are going to be human adapted ones like squirrels, mice, rats, etc, plus forest dwellers like beavers, badgers and the like. The real tragedy is probably the large mammals like buffalo, zebra, elephants, giraffes, giant cats, etc, and the hunting of those to near-extinction is deeply unfortunate but also predates industrialization if I understand correctly.
    - KineticLensman 2y ago
      > predates industrialization if I understand correctly. Yes, 'megafauna overkill' [0] [0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0167268105000946 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S01672...

librasteve 2y ago

the Big Issue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Issue https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Issue was created to give genuinely homeless people self respect … a magazine they can sell rather than just beg for cash sadly this great idea has been infiltrated in the UK by trafficked individuals under the command of modern slavers … there seems to be no action from the authorities or the press to stop this and bring the gang bosses to justice

tweetle_beetle 2y ago
Do you have a source for this story? First I've heard of it and interested to know more
- krona 2y ago
  It's a form of respectable begging, so it shouldn't come as a surprise that it would eventually be exploited by entire families of professional beggars who come thousands of miles to use the magazine as a prop alongside their wheelchairs and dogs. If you want to see this in action, walk around the financial districts of London at lunchtime.
  - tweetle_beetle 2y ago
    A professional beggar, as you describe it, has little to do with modern slavery, as mentioned by the grandparent comment.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
MrSkelter 2y ago
This is the rote response to anything designed to help homeless people. That it’s being exploited and is therefore unworthy of support. However we seem fine with businesses and individuals exploiting the tax code and banking system without making claims we should simply abandon commerce. Any system with value will attract a degree of exploitation. It’s proof of its worth, not evidence of it’s irrelevance.

lol768 2y ago

The site where they've put the beavers is a small parcel of land (less than 0.04 sq mi) next to an out-of-town retail park and industrial estate. I'm reasonably familiar with the site, and have walked the canal more a handful of times and driven the A4127 so many times I've lost count. The air quality here is poor, about 7.5 times the WHO annual air quality guideline values for PM2.5. It's a nice idea, but I can't help but feel like the beavers probably had a better life in Scotland where they were taken from. Online sources suggest that a more normal habitat size would be an order of magnitude larger [1] The problem with Greater London is how dense it all is; if we had better public transport connections and fewer London-centric employers (or indeed, more of an appreciation for remote working) it'd be possible for there to be more and larger green spaces which would help with the whole city being a massive urban heat island. There are some glimmers of hope, the A4127 has become a nightmare to drive on recently due to HS2 works - a necessary evil - which will hopefully encourage more offices to be established between London and Birmingham. It's a shame the wider HS2 scheme was castrated in yet another example of short-sighted thinking. [1] https://www.gloucestershirewildlifetrust.co.uk/beaver-faqs https://www.gloucestershirewildlifetrust.co.uk/beaver-faqs

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

sandworm101 2y ago

So they really are in a pen? I cannot imagine londoners putting up with beaver activity outide of fenced/walled areas. This sounds more like a zoo, very much the opposite of rewilding. What are they going to do when a new generation of beavers seeks a new stream to dam?

wolverine876 2y ago

Why not introduce furry mammals that don't need a large expanse of nature, but can adapt to and live directly in the urban environment. Something that could live in all sorts of corners of the city, even underground, and consume unwanted food from humans ... I'm joking a bit, but I'm serious. Why are beavers better than rats?

stubish 2y ago
They are larger and build damns and many other differences, so they fill different niches. The idea is to restore the pre-industrial ecosystem as best we can. Maybe their natural land management will improve the quality of the wetlands, or maybe it will cause flooding of nearby human occupied land and cause them to be quietly removed. Maybe they will become prey to wolves and lynx, or maybe they will need to be culled because those predators probably won't be released in London.