T\u00c1SMAM KOY\u00d3M, U.S. \u2014 \u201cIt\u2019s a little wet!\u201d Ben Cunningham shouted over his shoulder as he slipped knee-deep into one of the unseen rivulets spidering through the hip-high grasses and willow galleries around us. Up until that point in our walk, Cunningham had been agreeably taciturn, contemplative about the return of this meadow to the Mountain Maidu people in recent years, and their efforts to bring beavers back as part of the tribe\u2019s work to restore its health.<\/p>\n
\u201cNext time, you\u2019ll have to bring your boots,\u201d he said, chuckling over the din of rushing water that seems to be both everywhere and nowhere under a thicket of green peppered with yellow-eyed, purple-petaled asters.<\/p>\n
Above, a young osprey circled in low loops above our heads. The bird dropped periodically, flying past dragonfly armadas, their abdomens glowing orange in the August sun.<\/p>\n
Our feet thoroughly soaked, we came upon a mound of sticks and mud nearly to eye level: a lodge. It had taken this beaver family a little less than a year to build, said Cunningham, a Mountain Maidu elder and chair of the nonprofit Maidu Summit Consortium. They\u2019d been released here in 2023, California\u2019s first beaver translocation in decades.<\/p>\n
The meadow was once mostly dry. Each year, mountain snowmelt in the spring and summer carved deeply gashed \u201cincised\u201d creeks through this landscape, allowing the water to run swiftly through the meadow and on downslope toward the Feather River.<\/p>\n
Today, meltwater from the ridges at the northern end of the valley flows into the beaver pond, slowing its gravity-hastened hurry and spreading it out on T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, as the Maidu call the meadow. Even in late summer, clear, burbling streams meander out from the pond.<\/p>\n
By curbing the rush of water from the heights with their dams, beavers can help lower fire intensity, create habitat for plants and animals, and blunt the effects of droughts.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are really powerful ecosystem engineers,\u201d Emily Fairfax, an assistant professor of geography at the University of Minnesota, told Mongabay. \u201cThe number of services they provide to us and ways that they build resilient landscapes is honestly too much to just rattle off all at once.\u201d<\/p>\n
Until recently, though, California didn\u2019t even acknowledge that the North American beaver (Castor canadensis) had long ranged widely throughout the state, much less the positives that the animal\u2019s \u201cecosystem engineering\u201d can provide, particularly in a warming world. Beavers had nearly been killed off for the fur trade by the mid-1800s, and afterward, scientists insisted that the animal was only native to a narrow strip of low-lying habitat.\u00a0What\u2019s more, the few that remained were often harassed for the problems they caused, real and imagined, for human agriculture, engineering and settlements.<\/p>\n It took an amalgam<\/a> of advocacy, education and corrections to the scientific record to set the stage for their return to parts of their historical homeland, like eastern California\u2019s mountains. In the mid-2010s, the Mountain Maidu joined that movement.<\/p>\n Beaver advocates had begun to rack up successes, including a state beaver restoration program<\/a>. California\u2019s policies on dealing with \u201cproblem\u201d beavers shifted dramatically, favoring coexistence over lethal control. In the meantime, the Mountain Maidu had prepared T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, installing dozens of structures that mimicked beaver engineering.<\/p>\n \u201cThey had done a lot of pre-restoration work,\u201d said Valerie Cook, the program manager for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW). \u201cWe knew that the habitat was, for the most part, just ready to receive and support beavers.\u201d<\/p>\n In an April 2025 report<\/a> on the beaver restoration program, CDFW notes the success at the T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m site, crediting the beavers for increasing the surface area of water at the release site by more than 22%. The release seemed to be a turning point for the state\u2019s once-contentious relationship with beavers.<\/p>\n California is a poster child for the impacts of climate change \u2014 a state beset by shifting weather patterns that bring inconsistent snowfalls and years-long droughts. Many of its forests teeter on the edge of destruction, wherein a single spark could ignite yet another record-breaking fire. And the state must simultaneously muster \u2014 and store \u2014 enough water from often-scant annual precipitation for both the U.S.\u2019s largest population and a yawning expanse of hydrologically intensive agriculture.<\/p>\n Beavers can play a big role in softening the repercussions of climate-related problems. But the pilot project at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m demonstrates that they\u2019re only a part of the solution.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re always going back to the whole systems piece, honoring beaver for the work beaver can do, but not turning them into this silver bullet,\u201d said Brock Dolman, an ecologist and co-founder of the nonprofit Occidental Arts and Ecology Center in Sonoma County.<\/p>\n For more than two decades, the center has advocated for harmonious coexistence with beavers in California as a piece of restoring the state\u2019s watersheds. In that time, a \u201cbeaver fever\u201d has bubbled up, remaking the beaver\u2019s image from a hydrological pariah into a climate savior without equal, one whose return can heal the land and the past displacement of humans and beavers alike.<\/p>\n The reversal in perceptions has spawned debate in the advocacy community: Yes, moving beavers can spare them from being destroyed if they\u2019re causing flooding or cutting down trees in places that wreak havoc. But are we asking too much of them?<\/p>\n \u201cI think we\u2019re in kind of an idyllic [stage of] beaver literacy,\u201d advocate Heidi Perryman said. \u201cPeople have begun to hear a lot of good things about beavers, and they\u2019re very hopeful that beavers can fix everything that we\u2019ve messed up.\u201d<\/p>\n But the view of this animal as wholly positive is \u201cno more accurate\u201d than earlier beliefs that they\u2019re always a nuisance, Perryman added.<\/p>\n Perryman, a child psychologist in the San Francisco Bay Area town of Martinez, calls herself an \u201caccidental beaver advocate.\u201d When a pair of beavers turned up in Martinez\u2019s Alhambra Creek in 2006, town leaders wanted to get rid of them for fear that their dams would cause flooding.<\/p>\n But Perryman was taken with Martinez\u2019s new rodent residents, and she wasn\u2019t alone. A groundswell against killing them surged, and the beavers stayed.<\/p>\n Perryman reckons that, for years, she spent five hours a week watching the beavers after their arrival in Martinez, learning about their behaviors, discovering their personalities, and eventually documenting more than two dozen individuals<\/a>. She posted blogs, photos and video on a website linked to the nonprofit she still leads, Worth a Dam<\/a>.<\/p>\n As the beavers changed the watershed with their engineering, other wildlife flourished, Perryman said. \u201cWe had mergansers and heron and otter and mink, things that we had never seen in our creek before because of the dams that beavers maintained.\u201d<\/p>\n The town is seen as a model for coexistence, and it still hosts an annual beaver festival even though the beavers have moved on, no longer living in Martinez.<\/p>\n Now, with two pilot relocations \u2013\u2013 the one to T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m and another on the Tule River Reservation in Sierra Nevada foothills that began in 2024 \u2013\u2013 there\u2019s another tool that sidesteps the lethal removal of beavers that come in conflict with humans.<\/p>\n Though exact numbers are hard to come by, Perryman estimates that the state allows killing of 1,000 to 3,000 beavers each year through the \u201cdepredation permits\u201d CDFW issues to landowners when beavers cause damage, according to her public records requests.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s still remarkable how many times California turns down the opportunity to coexist with beavers,\u201d Perryman said.<\/p>\n No one knows the exact number of beavers living in California, but scientists figure that North America is home to 10 million to 15 million beavers, an extraordinary recovery for a species hunted and trapped to near-extinction. They numbered at least 60 million and perhaps as many as 400 million before they were targeted for their fur.<\/p>\n Perryman said she understands why moving beavers is so enticing.<\/p>\n \u201cIt really appeals to people because it\u2019s so much nicer to relocate things than to kill them,\u201d Perryman told Mongabay. But, she added, \u201cIt\u2019s really important for people to do relocations thoughtfully and carefully \u2026 It\u2019s not without risks.\u201d<\/p>\n Relocation: An ecological solution or a last resort?<\/p>\n Rather than concentrate on those risks, Perryman said, the focus today is more often on how beavers can help, which can be rife with unrealistic expectations. That view has made her skeptical of California\u2019s translocation efforts.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t get to relocate beavers and have them stay just where you want them or have them only build dams where you want them or have them only take the trees you choose for them,\u201d Perryman said. \u201cThey do their own thing, and our fortune is that we can be smart enough to learn how to coexist with them and [benefit from them].\u201d<\/p>\n Most experts agree that finding ways to live with beavers should be the primary aim, before trying to move them.<\/p>\n \u201cTranslocation is kind of the final piece,\u201d the OAEC\u2019s Dolman said, \u201cif and when you\u2019ve exhausted everything [else].\u201d<\/p>\n R. Kyle Pagel, a scientist with the state\u2019s beaver restoration program, echoes that sentiment. CDFW starts with encouraging coexistence strategies when there\u2019s conflict, such as coating tree trunks with sand-containing paint to discourage beavers from cutting down trees.<\/p>\n Only after those efforts fail should relocating the beavers \u2014 or killing them \u2014 be considered. The answer is, in part, pragmatic: The thinking is that once they\u2019re gone, the \u201cproblem\u201d is solved, but a spot that\u2019s suitable for one family of beavers is apt to attract another, Pagel said.<\/p>\n \u201cMost likely, it\u2019s just a matter of time before a new group of beavers moves in and causes conflict again,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n As part of the beaver restoration program, landowners, NGOs and even federal agencies can follow in the footsteps of the Mountain Maidu and the Tule River Tribe and request<\/a> to have beavers moved to their land. But before that happens, it\u2019s critical to evaluate any unintended consequences to infrastructure or neighbors, Pagel said, as well as whether the animals are likely to stick around long enough to bring some of the intended benefits.<\/p>\n \u201cThe last thing we want to do is then proceed to translocate them to a brand-new site, and then have conflict again,\u201d he added. Still, Pagel acknowledged, \u201cWe\u2019re not going to be able to conduct enough translocations to take care of every beaver conflict.\u201d<\/p>\n Perryman highlighted her concerns about the Tule River Reservation release in a letter to CDFW that she shared with Mongabay. The wildlife agency concluded that the beavers released there in June 2024 were likely killed by predators \u2014 probably black bears, or wolves from the Yowlumni Pack that first turned up near the reservation in 2023<\/a>.<\/p>\n Perryman said more should have been done, such as making sure the entrances to the temporary lodges provided were underwater, to give them a chance to escape from predators and allow them time to adapt to their environment.<\/p>\n \u201cWe put beavers in places without safe places to hang out,\u201d she said, \u201cand basically, we created a bear-feeding program.\u201d<\/p>\n The two reintroduction pilot sites \u2014 on the Tule River Reservation in Southern California and Mountain Maidu land at the northern end of the Sierra \u2014 differed in food availability, water levels and the presence of predators. That likely contributed to the divergent outcomes, said CDFW\u2019s Valerie Cook.<\/p>\n Now, the goal is to improve relocations at these sites and beyond. Experts say they\u2019ll use \u201cthe best available science\u201d to pick out places that would benefit from beavers, as well as when, how \u2014 and if \u2014 to relocate them.<\/p>\n The \u201cchallenge\u201d of the initial releases hasn\u2019t stopped the tribe from learning what to do better next time, said Kenneth McDarment, a Tule River tribal citizen and former member of the tribal council.<\/p>\n He said they\u2019ve visited the Tulalip Tribe in Washington state, known for their successful beaver reintroductions, and worked to identify new release sites with enough food and adequate water depth to allow the beavers to dodge predators.<\/p>\n \u201cSuccess will be a healthy population that\u2019s thriving and reproducing through our watershed,\u201d McDarment said.<\/p>\n A stream flowing through the T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m mountain meadow. Image by John Cannon\/Mongabay.<\/p>\n More than 100 mortars embedded in exposed bedrock, used by the Mountain Maidu\u2019s ancestors to pound acorns \u2013\u2013 an important food source \u2013\u2013 attest to their long presence at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m. Image by John Cannon\/Mongabay.<\/p>\n A beaver exploring its new territory on the Tule River Reservation. Image courtesy of CDFW.<\/p>\n A beaver on Mountain Maidu land, its characteristic tail helping it to steer as it swims. Image courtesy of CDFW.<\/p>\n An osprey circles T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, the mountain meadow that was the site of the first beaver release in California in more than seven decades. Image by John Cannon\/Mongabay.<\/p>\n \u2018Partnering with nature\u2019<\/p>\n Researchers like Emily Fairfax say they want to return more beavers to their historical range. The animals once lived across much of the state, but rampant trapping for fur markets up through the beginning of the 20th century \u201cruined beaver populations,\u201d Fairfax said.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we owe it to the beavers to do whatever we can to help them reestablish in the watersheds.\u201d<\/p>\n In the past several years, a bevy of research has documented the impacts that beavers\u2019 presence can have: dampening the effects of drought<\/a>, sequestering carbon<\/a>, generating habitat<\/a> for other species, and buffering the landscape against high-intensity fires, as detailed in a paper<\/a> Fairfax co-authored with the title \u201cSmokey the Beaver,\u201d published in the journal Ecological Applications.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fires are getting worse. The droughts are getting worse. We need to figure out how to make our rivers healthier,\u201d Fairfax said. \u201cThere\u2019s a huge amount of data showing that beavers do work, so let\u2019s just do it.\u201d<\/p>\n California\u2019s beaver restoration program \u201chas taken a really positive step\u201d in finding ways to reintroduce beavers, Fairfax said. Still, she added, \u201cI think we should be ramping up much faster than we are right now, because the scale of environmental challenge we have is really, really high, and it\u2019s such a low-hanging fruit to just let beavers exist.\u201d<\/p>\n That points to the importance of reintroduction, even with the types of challenges that arose on the Tule River Reservation, she said.<\/p>\n Fairfax was present for both pilot releases at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m and at the Tule River Reservation, and she acknowledged the sadness of knowing translocated beavers have died. \u201cI understand that, but also the predators need food too,\u201d Fairfax said.<\/p>\n Pagel noted that many of the translocated beavers come from the valleys carved by the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers. They probably didn\u2019t live alongside predators like bears, wolves and mountain lions, and inhabited more temperate climates than what they experience in the mountains. T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, where the first family was released, sits at nearly 1,500 meters (5,000 feet) above sea level.<\/p>\n \u201cI would be shocked if they\u2019ve ever seen snow,\u201d Pagel said. Nor had they likely ever had to store up food for harsher winters, he added. But, somehow, the family survived that first year.<\/p>\n Fairfax also noted that expecting that all relocated beavers will survive is unrealistic. For one, it doesn\u2019t take into account what would have happened to beavers that are in conflict with people. \u201cAll of them would die if we did nothing,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n Given a chance, Fairfax said, beavers can adapt, if not always in predictable ways. She was a physicist before diving into the watery world of beaver ecology, and she said pinning their behaviors down is next to impossible, from the materials they use for their lodge to their choices of food. \u201cThey break every single rule,\u201d she said. \u201cYou can\u2019t write a law to describe them.\u201d<\/p>\n A big part of the problem is shifting our approach from controlling nature to partnering with it, she added. \u201cWe dammed the Mississippi. We\u2019ve built levees. We\u2019ve dammed the Colorado. We know how to control nature,\u201d Fairfax said. But teaming up with nature is \u201ca lot harder.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWorking with beavers requires letting go of some control,\u201d Fairfax added. \u201cIt will be messy and frustrating.\u201d<\/p>\n A dose of sovereignty<\/p>\n The beavers released on the Tule River Reservation in 2024 unearthed some of that frustration when they didn\u2019t survive. But hundreds of miles to the north, where the granite of the Sierra Nevada gives way to the volcanic Cascades, the beavers brought to Mountain Maidu land are thriving, apart from two deaths attributed to lung infections.<\/p>\n While the focus is now on restoration, the quest to reclaim T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m has a long history. The Mountain Maidu were pushed out of this valley nearly two centuries ago. But the land still bears the signs of the Mountain Maidu\u2019s forebears, as well as the beavers. Centuries-old beaver dams have been excavated in the meadow. And exposed bedrock there holds 112 cup-shaped mortars where Maidu ancestors once pounded the acorns that provided them with countless meals.<\/p>\n In 2019, four years before the beavers were brought back, T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m was returned to the Mountain Maidu.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was a good feeling, [to] get something we can work with and be proud of \u2026 make it back like it used to be,\u201d Cunningham said, as he took in the verdant meadow.<\/p>\n The paired returns of the beaver and the Maidu bring not only a renewed partnership with nature, but also a measure of \u201ctribal sovereignty\u201d to the people who have long cared for these spaces, Fairfax said.<\/p>\n \u201cThese are independent nations that have had beaver \u2026 and for a long time, they couldn\u2019t get them because of California\u2019s policies,\u201d she said. \u201cIf nothing else, this is helping restore an animal to a people that have lived alongside it a lot more sustainably than most Californians have.\u201d<\/p>\n Not far from where Cunningham and I stood next to the dam, a tribal work crew was busy clearing away the young conifers that bristled in \u201clodgepole alley\u201d on the meadow\u2019s periphery, an arduous effort to temper the risks that more frequent and intense fires pose to this landscape. The blisters, sweat and \u2014 on the day I arrived, bee stings \u2014 the crew endures are a testament to their commitment to complementing the work of the beavers. And in this case, it seems, they\u2019re restoring resilience, not only to T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, but to a people.<\/p>\n For Cunningham, the work is a celebration, the reuniting of two ancient family members: the Mountain Maidu and the beaver. And it\u2019s part of what brings Cunningham back to T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, day after day.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s just great to be out here, to have something to work for, be proud of,\u201d Cunningham said. \u201cIt\u2019s your own.\u201d<\/p>\n Banner image: A beaver explores its new home at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m in 2023. Image courtesy of CDFW.<\/p>\n John Cannon is a staff features writer with Mongabay. Find him on Bluesky<\/a> and LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Citations: <\/p>\n Aubry, S. C. V., & Sistla, S. (2025). Beaver dams mitigate the impacts of whiplash weather in a fragmented habitat: A Salinas River case study. The Journal of Wildlife Management. doi:10.1002\/jwmg.70081<\/a><\/p>\n Jordan, C. E., & Fairfax, E. (2022). Beaver: The North American freshwater climate action plan. WIREs Water, 9(4), 34. doi:10.1002\/wat2.1592<\/a><\/p>\n Willby, N. J., Law, A., Levanoni, O., Foster, G., & Ecke, F. (2018). Rewilding wetlands: beaver as agents of within-habitat heterogeneity and the responses of contrasting biota. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 373(1761), 20170444. doi:10.1098\/rstb.2017.0444<\/a><\/p>\n Fairfax, E., & Whittle, A. (2020). Smokey the Beaver: Beaver\u2010dammed riparian corridors stay green during wildfire throughout the western United States. Ecological Applications, 30(8), e02225. doi:10.1002\/eap.2225<\/a><\/p>\n![\"Two](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1-Two-beavers-await-release.jpg\")
<\/a>Two beavers await release at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, a Mountain Maidu meadow in Northern California. Image courtesy of CDFW.
\nCorrecting history<\/p>\n![\"Researchers](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/22.riverscape-figure-jordan-and-fairfax.jpg\")
<\/a>Researchers emphasize the role of beavers in buffering watersheds against the effects of climate change. Image courtesy of Jordan and Fairfax, 2022<\/a> (CC BY 4.0<\/a>).<\/p>\n![\"CDFW](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/2-CDFW-staff-move-a-family-of-seven-beavers.jpg\")
<\/a>CDFW staff move a family of seven beavers close to the release site at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m in 2023. Image courtesy of CDFW.
\n![\"Beavers](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/5-Beavers-like-this-one.jpg\")
<\/a>Beavers like this one, on Mountain Maidu land, are bringing back an animal that was killed as a pest species and trapped to near-extinction for the fur trade. Image courtesy of CDFW.
\nHow do you solve a beaver problem?<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/6-beaver-noses-out-of-its-crate.jpg\")
<\/a>A beaver noses out of its crate at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m, a return to its historical habitat. Image courtesy of CDFW.<\/p>\n![\"Three](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/8-Three-beavers-from-a-family.jpg\")
<\/a>Three beavers from a family of seven take their first swim at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m in 2023. Image courtesy of CDFW.
\n![\"Beavers](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/14-Beavers-build-lodges.jpg\")
<\/a>Beavers build lodges like this one at T\u00e1smam Koy\u00f3m that have underwater entrances, offering shelter from the elements, a safe home for kits, and food storage. Image by John Cannon\/Mongabay.<\/p>\n![\"12-stream-flowing-through-the-T\u00e1smam-Koy\u00f3m\"\/](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/12-stream-flowing-through-the-Tasmam-Koyom-1200x800.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"17-Mountain-Maidu\u2019s-ancestors-to-pound-acorns\"\/](\"https:\/\/news.mongabay.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/soliloquy\/assets\/css\/images\/holder.gif\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/20-beaver-kit-hitching-a-ride.jpg\")
<\/a>A beaver kit hitching a ride on the tail of its older sibling to rejoin the rest of their family in exploring their new habitat. Image courtesy of Brock Dolman\/OAEC.<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/21-A-kit-peers-up-at-the-camera.jpg\")
<\/a>A kit peers up at the camera in Martinez, California. Image by Heidi Perryman\/Worth a Dam<\/a>.<\/p>\n