They dropped beavers onto dead land stripped of trees, a barren patch where officials expected nothing. The rodents were relocated as a last-ditch experiment, and humans assumed the dry terrain would reject them.
Beavers reintroduced to degraded watersheds in Washington state have restored wetland ecosystems, reduced wildfire damage, and improved salmon habitat, according to years of monitoring by state agencies and university researchers.In the early 2000s, the Methow and Yakima watersheds had been severely damaged by drought and wildfires that consumed 70 percent of the region’s forests. The ground could…
In Arizona, crews tore down a 96-year-old dam—and then the desert river came back to life. For nearly a century, the concrete structure had blocked the waterway, strangling the ecosystem downstream and leaving a dry, barren channel where wildlife once thrived.
A camera mounted on a rusted metal pole above a dry riverbed in Arizona recorded only cracked mud, heat, and drifting sand for years. Then, on a spring morning, it captured 14 seconds of footage showing water moving through the frame. A hydrologist reviewing the footage stopped and remained silent for nearly a minute. What had appeared in the recording was something she had never seen in that loca…