Tasmam Koyom, 2019-2023
(This build is one of over 70, so populating this page is going to take a while)
Site of the first legal beaver re-introduction in 75 years, this valley is Maidu land and a real joy to work in.
5 years, 7 rounds of implementation and one family of beavers later…
In 2019 MSC got their land back from PG&E, and we started work right away with a one-day pilot. We built 4 structures to address a noisy little headcut everyone was worried about, and then we built a couple of small BDAs upstream. Just above and just below here, it’s pretty deeply incised again, and was getting worse all the time. So why not start there, and fight the biggest guy in the bar first? Because you never make your big gains down in the trench, and we’re smart enough to keep our heads up out of the channel.
In 2020 we reworked the original structures, and built a few more in the same area, which added a little more wetted area, some complexity and a little channel length. It was a decent start for an additional day’s work, and very very cheap. We also seeded the trench above with some rapid wood loading, because there was no driving posts in there.
In 2021 we had the Dixie fire, and built around 30 structures up in this area, plus connected a channel on the next tributary over. At $40k into this part of the meadow we started to get the kind of results I like to see, with around a mile of stream built that lit up 2 more miles. This aspect of PBR is a curse, because the more we build the more stream miles light up, but it’s a blessing because each channel has much lower stream power and is easier to build. Late in 2021 we got an atmospheric river that did a ton of good work for us and opened up a bunch of process space.
In early 2022 we spent 5 days and slammed in another 70 something structures, and it was just incredible how well the system responded once it was really fattened up. That fall we had the first Build Like a Beaver workshop, and started on the side channel to Yellow Creek.
Spring 2023 we repacked a bunch of structures, added a few more, drowned some groundwater wells, and had the second Build Like A Beaver training on the side channel. Then CDFW dropped off 7 beavers, and we handed off the baton.
2024 all we’ve got planned is a quick rework of the training structures, and then we’ll pivot to monitoring for a year—see what the furry experts get up to.
The Results (2023 coming soon)
