Beavers give a dam about Salmon

Beaver and salmon have coevolved together over thousands of years on the North American landscape and salmon have historically thrived in streams and rivers modified by beaver activity. By building dams and complexes in our streams, beaver change the way rivers function. The added stream complexity slows the water down, holding it in ponds and releasing it slowly through the drier seasons. Bringing beaver back to our watersheds helps create the complex and diverse habitat conditions that are essential to support salmon, and so many other stream dependent species, while building climate resilience into our watersheds.

Coexisting with Salmon, Beavers and People

Living with beaver creates challenges too. Beavers topple trees, dam streams, plug culverts, and flood low lying areas. These particular activities have earned beavers a bad reputation with many landowners. Until recently, lethal removal was one of the few options available to address issues with nuisance beavers. Methow Beaver Project (MBP) has grown out of more than a decade of collaboration between the US Forest Service, WA Fish and Wildlife, Habitat Biologists and a dedicated group of volunteers and supporters who believed that they could create a better way to manage beavers through coexistence. The partnership between Methow Salmon and the MBP is working to expand that vision to better understand how actions that encourage coexistence beaver and humans can also be used to make better stream restoration designs to support endangered and threatened salmon.