International Beaver Day!

Today celebrates one of our world's greatest engineers- the beaver. These rodents have amazing capacity to accumulate water in an area and alter hydrology. As climate change affects our planet, areas are subject to desertification, with water sources becoming more scarce and dry areas become even more arid. Beavers help to mitigate some of these effects- beaver ponds store water during wet times of years, and as water recedes in the dry months, water is released slowly into surrounding soil to continue supporting riparian vegetation.

Beavers show an amazing ability to retain wetlands even in times of drought. Beyond providing habitat for a multitude of species, wetlands store carbon and provide temperature mitigation. They help filter water and mitigate flooding, and help to prevent erosion. Wetlands are one of our planets most productive ecosystems, and sadly one of most threatened.

The ability of beavers to create wetland habitats is so impressive, that humans are imitating their work in an attempt to restore riparian areas. Beaver dam analogues are human created structures that mimic beaver dams, and have been used to slow the movement of water in stream systems, raise water levels, create connectivity to floodplains and allow for the formation of new banks that support vegetation. We wish we were beavers!