WEST SEATTLE WILDLIFE: Two video views

| Delridge | West Seattle news | Wildlife

Two reader-provided videos of West Seattle wildlife to share this afternoon. First, Manuel and daughter were out along Longfellow Creek when they got this view of three of its beavers:

Two years ago we wrote about a city plan to keep beaver dams from blocking creek flow; checking back on the city website, it looks like a related project remains in the planning phase.

On to the shores of Puget Sound – Stewart L. shared this video of a river otter, dining:

If you’re new around here – yes, river otters are the ones you’ll commonly see in the saltwater around here, not sea otters.

Beaverman July 23, 2023 (5:24 pm)

A couple of years ago a hog-wire mesh channel was installed through the beaver dam that was supposed to keep the creek flowing and allow migratory salmon.
It soon became clogged with debris and remains so today.
At on point I talked with volunteers from https://beaversnw.org/ who were at the dam and involved with the project.
Over this this year storms, the area that was replanted with trees was again flooded as the mesh channel had become clogged.
The beavers have chewed through multiple tree trunks (like in the cartoons) to fell the trees.

Ferns July 24, 2023 (10:16 am)

So cool to see the beavers. I hope local officials who are responsible for preventing flooding from their dams are looking to other communities that have already been dealing with this. Around grand Teton national Park for example – they had to make adjustments when they welcomed back the beaver population that had decimated in the past. Not sure what the beaver history is in this region.

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