Bringing Beavers Back to the Right Neighbourhoods

After a summer hiatus, I’m back and looking into the research, starting with beavers.

Beavers have long been fascinating to me. Their ability to change the landscape is incredible. Earlier this year, there were news stories about beavers in the Czech Republic who stepped in while the authorities argued. There had been a plan to build a dam to protect the Klabava River, but between expenses and permitting issues, they made little progress. Enter the beavers. Eight beavers constructed a dam that stabilized the river, maximized water quality, and created a diverse wetland. You can read more about this story on the site Wildlife for All.

Beaver populations have suffered from hunting, habitat loss, and disease, but they are making a comeback. While sometimes they will build in areas that result in undesirable flooding, they generally have excellent watershed management skills. Not only can they build the dams to create ponds and wetlands, but they can also manage those dams over time to adapt to changing conditions. Some of the benefits include increasing biodiversity, limiting the spread of wildfires, improving water quality, storing freshwater, and recharging groundwater.

In some cases, humans are supporting the beavers through relocations, but how do you know where is the best place to relocate a beaver to? That’s where the work of Wan, Fairfax, & Maher (2025) comes in. They worked to use high-resolution imagery to analyze beaver pond areas and help watershed managers prioritize areas to bring beavers back to. Their work aims to support maximizing the benefits while limiting the negative impacts and paying attention to potential trade-offs.

Unfortunately, this is where the need for data comes in. For areas with the high-resolution images, the same location is often recorded only every two to three years. This has implications for the accuracy and can increase the steps needed before relocations can be planned. However, given the need for climate resilience and the benefits of nature-based solutions, this research has a lot of potential for improving ecosystem health over the long-term.