Fighting fire with beavers: How dam-building rodents are deployed to prevent megafires, restore scorched wildlands
Stretches of river that had beaver dams fared better in three fearsome Colorado fires in 2020. People charged with repairing wildfire damage are taking heed.
Emily Fairfax/courtesy photo
While Western forestry experts accept some wildfire as redemption for the landscape, they’ve also learned that out-of-control megafires can do more harm than good. Now a new study puts a spotlight on the small, cartoon-cute creatures ready to serve as a stalwart defense against raging, 100,000-acre firestorms: the humble, hardworking beaver.
River segments hosting beaver-created dams fared far better during and after megafires than riverscapes without beaver activity, leaving pockets of intact habitat crucial for wildlife, and protecting waterways from runaway erosion, a study published in The Geological Society of America in January found.
“Every presentation I’ve seen the last handful of years that has to do with these big fires, there’s an 鈥� aerial photo of a sea of black with this green island in the middle,” said Clay Ramey, fisheries biologist for the Aspen-Sopris Ranger District, who was not an author of the study. “That’s the beaver pond.”
The study, led by University of Minnesota Twin Cities ecohydrologist Emily Fairfax, investigates three megafires that took place partially or wholly within Colorado borders in 2020 鈥斅�聽鈥� which together burned 579,603 acres.
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