(StatePoint) As the sun sets over a forest stream, a beaver family gets to work. For millions of years, these large rodents with bright orange teeth and a flat paddle-shaped tail have been reshaping landscapes by craftily constructing dams that slow flowing water, creating ponds where they build their lodge homes. Chomping through the night, they drag aspen and willow branches through the water, stack them with precision, and seal the gaps with mud and plants. All this hard work benefits people and the planet.
“Thanks to their impressive building skills, these industrious animals, which are found across most of North America, are a keystone species—an animal that supports its entire habitat,” says Clay Bolt, manager of Great Plains Communications at World Wildlife Fund.
Many wetlands started as beaver-dammed streams. As the beaver pond grows, it can support an increasing number of plants and animals. Frogs splash at the edges, fish dart beneath the surface, and many species of birds find refuge in these lush habitats. But there’s an invisible benefit too – these waterlogged areas are amazing at trapping air pollution. Studies show that beaver-made wetlands provide services contributing to clean air and water worth hundreds of millions of dollars—though to the beavers, it’s all in a day’s work.
During a heavy rainstorm, while some streams and rivers overflow their banks, a beaver-engineered stream system handles the floodwaters with ease. Their dams work like aquatic speed bumps, creating winding paths that slow rushing water. This prevents soil washing away and allows rich nutrients to settle to the bottom. Over time, this activity gradually raises the stream beds and reconnects them to surrounding land that used to flood naturally. And during dry spells, beaver dams release stored water slowly, keeping streams flowing when they might otherwise dry up. Perhaps most impressively, these structures function like a free water treatment plant, cleaning water by trapping dirt and filtering out pollutants like nitrogen and phosphorus.
Recent studies have also found that areas with beaver activity burn much less severely during wildfires – suffering only one-third the damage compared to similar areas without beavers. In the western United States, where landscapes are subject to drought and wildfires, fires often burn everything except areas surrounding beaver complexes. There, even during dry spells, water continues to soak into the ground, refilling underground water supplies and keeping plants moist. Putting this into practice, World Wildlife Fund is working with ranchers in the Northern Great Plains to recreate beaver habitat by constructing dams—Beaver Dam Analogs or BDAS—that mimic the crafty rodent’s water management systems to store water, a particularly precious resource in this arid habitat. Some landowners are even seeing beavers return thanks to the more favorable conditions provided by BDAs.
“By protecting beaver families and welcoming them back to waterways, communities can benefit from their building skills to create landscapes that better withstand severe weather, support wildlife, and suppress wildfire, one carefully laid stick at a time,” says Bolt.
World Wildlife Fund’s new “Stories of Hope and Wonder” is an ongoing series that connects people to the wonder of nature and offers hope for a future benefiting both people and wildlife. Each month, Stories of Hope and Wonder will feature a different species overcoming some of nature’s toughest obstacles to ensure their survival. To read past editions of Stories of Hope and Wonder visit www.worldwildlife.org/hopeandwonder.
