Beavers changed the climate first

 

            Mankind changed the climate of North America three times, twice for the worse.  But beaver changed the climate of the Northern hemisphere before man existed, for the better.

            Beaver evolved from a digging rodent in the flat plains of Nebraska, where spring flooding was common.  They built corkscrew-shaped burrows with a rise at the bottom, which trapped air even when all was water above them.  At some point, they started building dams to keep their habitat safely flooded; to grow trees and water plants for food; and to build lodges in the middle of their ponds.  They spread across the Northern Hemisphere.

When Europeans found North America, they found beaver everywhere.  Their dams, ponds and swamps blocked every stream and most river valleys East of the Mississippi.   West of the Mississippi, they provided water for Plains Indians, their horses, and the buffalo they hunted.  They held running water on and in the land by slowing it down and soaking it in, keeping water tables high.  The trees and plants they grew pumped massive amounts of water vapor into the air, making rain.  The land was full of water and a wealth of trees and wildlife.

The wealth that most excited Europeans was the beaver themselves.  They had about run out of beaver in Europe after they figured out how to make felt from beaver fur, for hats. 

European fur traders bought beaver furs and land from the Eastern and Canadian Indians with blankets, beads, and metal tools and cookware.  As beaver became scarce from the East, it opened the land for European travel and settlement, draining ponds and swamps as beaver dams failed for lack of maintenance, leaving open rivers and flat, rich meadows for farming, travel, and industry. 

West of the Mississippi, Plains Indians would not kill beaver, as they revered them for holding water in their dry land.  So American and British Mountain Men had to do the hard work of trapping and killing beaver and selling it to the traders.

This was an ecological disaster in the West, as dams collapsed and water ran to the sea unimpeded, digging streams into gullies and dropping water tables below the reach of the trees that had grown there.  Rich grasslands turned to desert. The climate became quite dry and hot and the land poor, the first time Man changed the climate in North America.

 

Source: Ben Goldfarb, Eager: the surprising, secret life of beavers and why they matter, 2018.

 

Speech to the Josephine County Commissioners and the Grants Pass City Council, 9-1-2021

 published at GardenGrantsPass.blogspot.com

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 Rycke Brown, Natural Gardener             541-955-9040             rycke@gardener.com