Beavers Rule!

Last fall walking around Lily Lake I saw something a little odd in the water: willow branches that appeared to have been deliberately placed, not just branches that had accidentally blown over and gotten stuck.

Over the next few months sticks and aspen branches were added to the willows, with mud holding the whole thing together. It was becoming obvious that beavers had decided to take up residence in this lake, part of Rocky Mountain National Park. During the September 2013 floods, a large beaver colony was wiped out on Fish Creek, about three miles down the mountainside from the pond. Had some of the beavers survived and made their way up the creek to this lake?

However, the spot they had chosen was right next to the path that goes around the lake (left), and slowly over the spring the house of mud and sticks started encroaching on the trail. I wondered how the National Park Service would handle this: a beaver lodge on one of the more popular and accessible trails in the park, hindering a complete circle of the lake, especially for those in wheelchairs. Beyond the beaver house, the path is crumbling, as the marsh pond on the other side is undermining the path; beavers may be adding to the instability as they tunnel back and forth, carrying willow bushes and aspen branches from the other side of the marsh to their home sweet home.

Word about this very visible and accessible beaver lodge has gotten around, and on most evenings people gather, many with big cameras, for this rare wildlife opportunity to see the animals up close.

Lily Lake is not even a real lake but started as a marshy area that was dammed at some point to keep water from spilling onto Hwy. 7. Weeds constantly threaten to clog the lake and turn it back into a marsh. But in this rocky landscape of mountains and trees, ponds are scarce. In summer, muskrats criss-cross the pond, carrying grasses in their teeth (right),  fish bubbles dot the surface of the water, dragonflies flit over the surface, and ducks circle the ponds, some with their chicks. They don’t care that it’s an artificial, humanly made piece of water. For them, it’s life. They’ve claimed it as their own.

When I finally asked a park ranger what the park service was planning to do about the beavers, she told me that it was a conflict between meeting the needs of human visitors and beavers but that ultimately the beavers have priority.

Another park ranger at the lake told me about plans to reconstruct the trail on that side of the lake. They would probably move some of the sticks and logs off the trail but leave the mud house in the water undisturbed. But, he shrugged, the beavers will probably just put the sticks back on the path.

The park service may have met its match in an indomitable and determined animal, indifferent to the wants or needs of the federal government or the humans who may be inconvenienced by its intrusive home.

 Go beavers!

Comments

[julene Bair]

I was relieved to learn that the Park Service has their priorities straight. At least there are a few places on this earth where non-human animals take precedence. Interesting story. Great wildlife shots.

[Jennifer]

"Ultimately the beavers have priority"—yeah! Reconstructing the trail rather than destroying the dam is the intelligent, sensible, humane thing to do. I'm impressed with the Park Service's approach here.

And what great photos! Thanks, Kathy, as always, for your eagle eye and your sensitivity to the web of life to which we humans are so often oblivious …

[shoney]

Very Cool!

[Brent Zeinert]

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