For 10 years I’ve been building hotspring pools at one spring. The material you add gets coated in limestone deposits pretty quickly. So it really feels like building a legacy for my young ones to play in when they’re older.
Not just illegal, the potential impact on a waterbed is huge. I spoke at length with a BLM hydrologist about this, artificial deepening of discrete hot spring pools can and has caused entire areas to wash out into a uniform warm muck.
I'm sure you know much more about natural rates of mineral deposition and erosion and the potential effects of altering them than a literal industry professional with decades of experience.
Christ, enough of the anti-beaver comments. Beavers co-evolved with species and their environment for a long time and (were) part of the eco system before we nearly eradicated them like we did many other species. From the article you linked:
> Even though the beaver destroys life, its actions give way to new life and help conserve the overall environment. The positive effects of the beaver on its environment far outweigh the negative effects.
That depends how much alternative space there is in the ecosystem. Just because the species could evolve together in an entire wilderness doesn’t mean they can co-exist in every square kilometer.
Just to play devil's advocate: the first algae were extremely damaging to the environment by releasing toxic oxygen. Of course, that took millions of years to take effect.
So beavers could in principle also be damaging, but taking a long time to kill. (And, of course, nowadays a lot of organisms have come to depend on the once-toxic emissions of algae. Beavers might have a similar effect on the ecosystem.)
Killing off nearly all the wolves, mountain lions, lynx, bears, coyotes, foxes, etc, is probably a good chunk of the problem when talking about small mammal populations.
Less than 50%, actually, though I doubt that it's true that it only applies to the US. Children usually get a free pass because their meddling is ineffective or impermanent.
Right, we didn't get a ticket. But a handful of 13 year old boys can move some pretty big logs and trees.
It was made very clear that we were not to fuck with the creek or any other waterways, and it was serious business. We had to rip the dam apart and he told us to never do it again.
