There’s only one animal besides humans that can build a dam, the beaver. The beaver is a very exceptional mammal because it can create, modify, and control its habitat. Beavers typically inhabit the northern hemisphere, but have also been introduced in South America’s Tierra del Fuego (Cavendish). Beavers are the second largest rodents in the world and have many similar relatives such as the nutria (Cavendish). The main characteristic of a beaver’s habitat is its dam. A dam allows the beaver to control the direction of water flow in a river or stream. In the spring, beavers build their dams out of logs, branches, and mud, across various waterways (Cavendish). To construct the dam, they first make a ridge across the river and then add rocks
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The dams hold back running water and in a few weeks, there is a deep new pond. Once the pond is about three feet deep, beavers build a lodge (Cavendish). The lodge is a room with underwater passageways that deny access to predators (Cavendish). They are nocturnal animals, doing most of their work during the night like cutting down trees. Once the tree is down, the beaver will eat the trees, leaves, and bark and then drag the branches into the water to build the dam (Cavendish). In the fall, beavers do maintenance on their dam by building it higher to make the water deeper (Cavendish). This is very important because if the pond is too shallow, it could freeze to the bottom during the winter and trap the beavers inside their lodge (Cavendish). A beaver’s dam does more then just provides shelter; it creates new habitats for many plants and animals. It also completely changes the landscape, making it unrecognizable. Dragonflies, turtles, raccoons, ducks, frogs, and otters are just some of the animals that benefit from the new pods and wetlands that the beavers create (Cavendish). Sometimes, beavers are the only way these new waterways are …show more content…
But even a keystone species like the beaver can cause many problems when introduced into new areas. For example, in 1946, Patagonia imported 50 Canadian beavers to expand South America’s fur trading business. However, the industry did not take off and the beavers were released into the forest. Over the years these 50 original beavers increased the population to over 100,000 and have completely changed the regions ecosystem. Patagonia is a natural scrubland with very dense beach forests. When the trees in this region are cut down, it is much harder for them to redevelop since they are not used to being eaten. This creates vast empty wastelands consisting of dead trees, stumps, and mud. Another problem with this overpopulation of beavers is that they do not have any predators in South America. The only program to manage the beavers is to hunt and kill them. Government workers along with other local hunters are trying to manage the population but setting up traps and shooting as many as they can. This beaver situation in Patagonia is a great example of how invasive species may be very beneficial to their native environment, but when you place them somewhere else, it can be detrimental to their new ecosystem. The beaver as an invasive species in Patagonia has upset the natural balance of the ecosystem that has been in place for thousands of decades in just seven decades. This
The dams hold back running water and in a few weeks, there is a deep new pond. Once the pond is about three feet deep, beavers build a lodge (Cavendish). The lodge is a room with underwater passageways that deny access to predators (Cavendish). They are nocturnal animals, doing most of their work during the night like cutting down trees. Once the tree is down, the beaver will eat the trees, leaves, and bark and then drag the branches into the water to build the dam (Cavendish). In the fall, beavers do maintenance on their dam by building it higher to make the water deeper (Cavendish). This is very important because if the pond is too shallow, it could freeze to the bottom during the winter and trap the beavers inside their lodge (Cavendish). A beaver’s dam does more then just provides shelter; it creates new habitats for many plants and animals. It also completely changes the landscape, making it unrecognizable. Dragonflies, turtles, raccoons, ducks, frogs, and otters are just some of the animals that benefit from the new pods and wetlands that the beavers create (Cavendish). Sometimes, beavers are the only way these new waterways are …show more content…
But even a keystone species like the beaver can cause many problems when introduced into new areas. For example, in 1946, Patagonia imported 50 Canadian beavers to expand South America’s fur trading business. However, the industry did not take off and the beavers were released into the forest. Over the years these 50 original beavers increased the population to over 100,000 and have completely changed the regions ecosystem. Patagonia is a natural scrubland with very dense beach forests. When the trees in this region are cut down, it is much harder for them to redevelop since they are not used to being eaten. This creates vast empty wastelands consisting of dead trees, stumps, and mud. Another problem with this overpopulation of beavers is that they do not have any predators in South America. The only program to manage the beavers is to hunt and kill them. Government workers along with other local hunters are trying to manage the population but setting up traps and shooting as many as they can. This beaver situation in Patagonia is a great example of how invasive species may be very beneficial to their native environment, but when you place them somewhere else, it can be detrimental to their new ecosystem. The beaver as an invasive species in Patagonia has upset the natural balance of the ecosystem that has been in place for thousands of decades in just seven decades. This