We often overlook the importance of some animals in our beautiful world. A lot of these animals do so much for Earth without ever receiving as much as ‘thanks’ from us. One of these species would be beavers!
Beavers are well-known for being iconic little buck-toothed architects and industrious builders. These clever rodents might just hold the key to solving our planet’s most important issues, though! How?
Well, read this article and find out how beavers make our world a better place. And once you’re done reading, you better say “Thank you!”
1. Natural Water Filtration
Let’s start with an important fact: beaver dams create wetlands. The wetlands serve many different purposes, but one of them is that they’re able to filter water! That’s right – the dams stop pollutants and sediment from going downstream!
Clean water benefits everyone! Wildlife? Check! Humans? Check! But beavers have no idea about it! They just diligently work to make water safer for everyone involved. I guess not all heroes wear capes!
2. Combating Droughts
Another thing that beaver dams do: they retain water, and thus create water reservoirs when seasons get dry! Thanks to these reservoirs, vegetation is always hydrated, filled with nutrients, and ready to be eaten by a hungry animal!
Beavers might as well wear shirts that say “Stay hydrated” because they certainly help the cause! In a world where water is becoming increasingly scarce, beavers really might just be the solution we never knew we needed.
3. Flood Mitigation
The virtues of beaver dams continue! Do you know what else they do? They help control floods by dispersing water more evenly across the land! So, instead of fast-moving and destructive floods, beavers help water take it easy.
Thanks to them, many communities have been saved from horrific damage. And if we take a look around the world, we see how dangerous playing with fast waters can be! That’s why beavers need to be appreciated, by humans especially!
4. Boosting Biodiversity
We have already established that beavers create wetlands with their dams. Now, these wetlands in themselves are amazing! They become havens for other species – think amphibians, insects, birds, fish, and yes, all kinds of plants!
This of course makes populations thrive! Even those that may be endangered. That just means that beavers save more endangered lives than human conservation efforts do. Fellow humans, we gotta step it up!
5. Fighting Climate Change
Now this fact surprised even me: wetlands are extremely important for fighting climate change! The reason why? Wetlands store carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
In simple terms: beavers help trap gases that aren’t very bueno, reducing them in our atmosphere! You really could say that in the quest for a perfect dam, beavers manage to fight climate change one pond at a time.