Beavers are such incredible engineers! We had an ongoing problem with them damming up our creek. DH would tear it down every weekend. I finally got the notion of putting a long piece of that black plastic drainage tile from above their dam, through their dam, to below their dam, so the water behind it would constantly be able to drain. We checked it the next day, and they had pulled that long piece of drainage tube out! I absolutely hate the philosophical dilemma having them around poses for me. They are incredible animals, and make great parents to their babies. They are so smart. I guess the problem arises when they eat trees that we love. If the country was as it used to be......miles and miles of forest, then it wouldn't matter. We've always tried to scare them away with just noise, firecrackers, smoke bombs, etc. .....things that would just irritate them and not kill them. Its a challenge. Fortunately, our creek has been low in the past few years, and they moved on (for now.)

msrpaul- it should work if there's something in there they're after. different species are after different things. the fruit draws the red spotted purples in droves off my deck midsummer. i use blackberry seeds/mash that i have after i strain them for syrup. but any sweet fragrant fruit should work. they don't go for it for a few days, so let it get plenty stinky! i've seen other species on the plates, too. including bees and wasps- so set it somewhere you won't get stung. oh & the b&b you were asking about? hummer & butterflly magnet! basil, interesting that they were on the concrete instead of the mud. must have been leaching some mineral they were after. yeah, my swallowtails love my mimosa, too. if you have tulip poplar trees, that's what the caterpillars feed on, so be sure to leave a few around. if you have woods, i'm sure you have some. they have funky leaves shaped like a tulip, i guess, and get a pretty flower way high that looks like tulips and is green and orange. you may see some on the ground after they've fallen in spring. also, that sweet gum tree (with the spiney balls) is a host plant for luna moths- the huge, lovely ephemeral celery green moths you see at night around your lights. moths & butterflies are awesome! tammy

You won't lose 30 acres permanently, you'll just have a short term (could be anywhere from 2 to 6 or 7 years) period of waterworks, until the nearby food resource (trees) is exhausted. Then the beavers will move on and the land will undergo another transformation which I found was quite interesting in it's own way. Diversion devices are very cheap to install (less than $200 worth of supplies) but sometimes time consuming to maintain as the beavs are determined critters and you're basically thwarting their intentions to keep the water level rising. But in order for them to work you have to install them in the correct place and I don't know if you will own the land where the correct place exists. One good thing about beavers is that they make wetland areas more obvious so that may stall some nearby development for a few years. You can also save a bit on your property taxes if you work with your assessor to have that portion of your land noted as wetland (even if it doesn't have DEC regulated status, it will likely have Army Corps jurisdiction). Just make that change before March 1 (in NY) in order to have it affect the next prop. and school tax cycle. I hope you will enjoy the book. It's likely your library has a copy. I checked my local interlibrary system (Upper Hudson) and they have several. It's a somewhat dated take on wildlife appreciation, but it is also a very interesting read, especially if you've got 'em in your backyard already. This weird warm winter has probably delayed the beavers' retreat to their den for the winter, but when it gets cold enough (and frozen) they will "disappear" for a few months only to reappear with their adorable kits in mid-spring. There is a big tree gnawing push before "hibernation" because they need to amass a huge depot of food near the den to tide them over until warm weather begins again. They are very vulnerable to predators on ice, and of course being air-breathig mammals have to surface which is impossible when there is thick ice. You should get a bumper crop of wood ducks next spring if you put out nest boxes over the winter, along with all kinds of birds that need more water than just a stream. If you don't already have them you may begin to hear barred owls calling at night ("Who cooks for you; who, who, cooks for you-all?") My beavers flooded a mostly open meadow so I had different birds than you will get, but yours will be very interesting none the less. My normal pond is only about an acre, but when the beavers temporarily enlarged it to nearly thirty I had migrating ospreys visit, and the odd pass by bald eagles who normally stay closer to the rivers. (I live in the Hoosic/Hudson watershed.) I was relatively new here then and I was flabergasted with the bird life I saw. When the beavers left, the extraordinary number of species dimished somewhat because I lost a unique habitat. Enjoy your temporary boost while you have it. You may find (to your relief, it sounds) that canoeing is out as the water probably isn't very deep and will be occluded by many hidden tangles of branches and stumps under the surface. It takes many years to decay away all that stuff to create clear water, prbably longer than the beavers will be there keeping the water levels up. If it freezes completely, you can venture out on the ice and look down to see what's there. The beavers will have cleared quite large channels to move their tree harvest and to get material for dam-making. Watching them at work is very amusing. Some of their structures will be transitory, but some of the main ones will last long after they leave. I haven't had beavers for more than 15 years and their lower dam is still visible and slowing water that flows down my creek. That's the significant benefit of beavers to an ecosystem: they transform it and make it much more productive, and water-cleansing for a long time afterward. One of the things to keep in mind when reading the book is that it was written about the 30s and 40s. At that time beavers were almost completely extirpated from NY and seeing one was a rare treat. COnsidering the role of the beaver in our state's history, it was a very lucky thing that we have retained enough of them, and temporarily protected them, in order to maintain the big benefit they are to managing our wild areas. They, like white tail deer, have recovered enough that now they are often a nuisance to our increasing suburbanization, but I believe they still have a vital role to play and it's important that we support and make accomodations where possible to keep them "beavering away" (LOL) on our behalf. Enjoy your thumpers! Molly~

Thanks for all your hard work Karen! Can't wait to read it in its entirety. Jodi-