{"id":651707,"date":"2026-06-22T06:10:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-22T06:10:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/651707\/"},"modified":"2026-06-22T06:10:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-22T06:10:14","slug":"beavers-in-north-york-moors-have-helped-reduce-flood-risk-experts-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/651707\/","title":{"rendered":"Beavers in North York Moors have helped reduce flood risk, experts say"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Beavers released into the North York Moors have contributed to reducing the risk of flooding and helped to boost wildlife diversity, according to researchers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Two Eurasian beavers were released in 2019 into an enclosure in Cropton Forest, where natural flood management had already taken place, and monitored over a five-year period.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">During that time, they built six dams, one of which was the biggest in England, researchers at the University of Leeds said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The academics said the beavers&#8217; efforts had increased the impact of existing natural flood management infrastructure and helped to reduce downstream flooding.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Cath Bashford, species recovery officer for Forestry England in Yorkshire, said: &#8220;They have created a complex wetland habitat connecting the river with the floodplain, holding back water in the upper catchment, bringing benefits in times of drought and slowing the flood in times of flood.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Researchers also found increased diversity in plants, as well as among mammals, amphibians and dragonflies, and in bat populations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Beavers were absent from the British landscape for centuries but wild beaver populations have returned in recent years as part of reintroduction schemes, including releases into monitored enclosures.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The beavers that were released were already a pair and 11 kits were born during the trial period.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Beavers released into the North York Moors have contributed to reducing the risk of flooding and helped to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":651708,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[90,56,54,55,4407],"class_list":["post-651707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-science","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/651707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=651707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/651707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/651708"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=651707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=651707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=651707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}