Want to go deeper? NOAA Fisheries has the full Bridge Creek story.
For Further InformationIn Oregon's Bridge Creek, beavers given simple dam starters raised juvenile steelhead survival 52% and production 175% (NOAA Fisheries).
Image: NASA (PIA26448, Klamath River, Oregon and California).
Beavers, helped by NOAA Fisheries scientists and partners who installed beaver dam analogs.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Beaver dam analogs: simple structures beavers build on, raising water and reconnecting streams to floodplains.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Results came within a few years; scientists tracked 35,867 tagged fish over seven years.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Bridge Creek in Central Oregon.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Eroded, trenched streams had stranded plants and harmed steelhead; beaver dams bring water back.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Natural solution
Beaver dams anchored to the analogs raised water levels and created pools, and water spread onto the floodplain, regrowing streamside plants and side channels. Juvenile steelhead survival jumped 52% compared with a control watershed, and four years in, juvenile steelhead production was up 175%.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
For Further Information: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
In Bridge Creek, Oregon, beaver dams helped young steelhead survival jump 52% and production rise 175%.
Steelhead were once abundant across the Northwest before beavers were trapped out; restored streams that produce nearly twice as many young fish support the fisheries people rely on.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Beaver ponds created more wetland, cooled the water slightly and grew back streamside vegetation, rebuilding a whole river ecosystem.
Source: NOAA Fisheries, Oregon beavers engineer better fish habitat
Want to go deeper? NOAA Fisheries has the full Bridge Creek story.
For Further Information