Beavers are a keystone species in riverine and wetland habitats. Their presence sustain the function of streams and wetlands. The ecosystem services of a functioning stream include; good water quality and stable hydrology, resistance and resilience to wildfires, and a wide corridor of diverse habitats, high value forage, cover and access to water for wildlife. Funds from this project will increase the number of watersheds and support the wildlife and people within and below them benefitting from the presence of beaver is Northern Utah. There are several projects underway in the Northern Region that utilize beaver as a restoration agent (these include Johnson Creek and Wildcat Creek in Box Elder County, and the Chalk Creek drainage in Summit County). Many other projects in the Northern Region will benefit from the accessibility of beavers for restoration provided by this project. Under the previous version of the UDWR Beaver Management Plan, freedom to translocate beavers was greatly restricted. With the new version of the plan, many of the previous impediments have been removed. We now, however find ourselves in a 'backlog' situation with many more projects needing animals than can be provided with internal (agency) personnel. This proposal would provide a pool of money to pay trappers providing nuisance beaver removal for removing them alive versus the previously mandated lethal removal. Those beavers could then be quarantined and relocated to project areas. With USU now having a secure quarantine facility capable of holding numerous beavers we would not be limited to only taking opportunistic single animals, but capturing significant numbers and holding until whole colonies can be moved. In addition, we would like to expand our 'living with beavers' program and have materials and expertise available to assist landowners with infrastructure to mitigate the need for removal of beaver colonies.

It appears that we were able to meet the regional needs for animals at the current size of expenditure for our USU partnership, and are asking for more funds to expand the program. We will use funds to purchase additional traps, beaver dam analog construction/maintenance, fund a seasonal technician/s at the Beaver Ecology and Relocation Center, and buy materials used for beaver damage mitigation (beaver deceivers, pond levelers). We will continue the practice of removing beavers from nuisance areas and relocate them to projects in the Northern Region. We have Beaver Dam Analogues in many locations, but without maintenance, they will quickly deteriorate and become non-functional; they will be evaluated for suitability for beaver reintroduction. We are currently utilizing BDAs in project areas and the need for beavers in some of those areas is increasing concurrently.

The immediate threat is the loss of the project labor and planning involved in the projects already underway and/or completed. They were generally all designed to have beavers introduced at some point and now with the more favorable Beaver Management Plan, that is possible. Also,by not doing this project we will continue to see devastating erosion and down-cutting of streams that will cost more money to repair in the future and possibly cross ecological thresholds. Beavers can fix damaged streams through their dam construction. These watersheds are extremely valuable to hundreds of thousands of water users. We will potentially have larger catastrophic fires in the future that could otherwise be stopped or slowed down by larger riparian zones that beavers create. These fires can have devastating impacts on human communities and ecosystems since they are unnaturally large. The impacts can be almost impossible to repair back to pre-fire conditions and will take decades. These fires can destroy key fish populations and cross ecological thresholds that will be difficult to return from. From these fires we often lose the opportunity to have quality angling opportunities in these streams for many years. Beavers can capture more sediment and slow runoff which will reduce the damage to these water bodies post fire. We will not have as healthy fish and amphibian populations that could be attained by the diversity of habitat that beaver complexes provide. Every year that we do not do this project we move further away from desired conditions. We are seeing many frog and toad populations decrease and disappear from habitat loss and other threats. By doing this project we will help increase available habitat and places where amphibian species can be safe. By allowing these species to decline we risk having to spend millions of more dollars to bring them back and potentially could lose these populations completely. Beaver dams will help store more water in watersheds where humans and animals can utilize it. By not doing this project we will continue to see degradation of many watersheds and by doing it we will be able to repair many damaged watersheds in a very cost effective way. Also, this may be a very inexpensive way to increase our water storage capabilities for human consumption instead of building large reservoirs and dams that have many negative impacts that cross ecological thresholds never to return. A series of several thousand small natural beaver dams could have equivalent water storage as a multi-million dollar reservoir construction project. This will be essential in protecting Utah's water resources moving forward.

Utah Beaver Management Plan This project will address the following objectives and strategies of the Utah Beaver Management Plan 1. Increase awareness of and appreciation for the role of beaver in Utah's ecosystem by stakeholders (landowners, educators, recreationalists, sportsmen, water rights holders). We are doing this by sharing this proposal with sportsmen and land managers. Establishing at least one showcase beaver management area in the central region. 2. Improve understanding of all UDWR and other government agency employees involved in beaver management and assure consistent transmission of information and application of management actions. Once again just by proposing this project and the collaboration involved in accomplishing our objectives we will be fulfilling this objective of the plan. 3. Maintain reproducing beaver populations within their current distribution in appropriate habitat. We will be doing this by augmenting populations that are dwindling. 4. Work to improve riparian habitats, associated streams and wetlands in as many suitable tributaries as feasible through translocating beaver into unoccupied suitable habitat on public and or private land. 5. Facilitate and promote beaver-assisted restoration activities and expansion of existing beaver populations in areas where beaver are already present, habitat exists to already support them and human beaver conflict is low and or easily mitigated. Utah Moose Management Plan 1. Population Management Goal: Achieve optimum populations of moose in all suitable habitat within the state. 2. Habitat Management Goal: Assure sufficient habitat is available to sustain healthy and productive moose populations. 3. Recreation Goal: Provide high-quality opportunities for hunting and viewing of moose. Wildlife Action Plan 1. Under the threats, data gaps, and action section of the plan, it identifies a list of Essential Conservation Actions. It states the need to restore and improve degraded wildlife habitats. species and others. 2. The habitat type that this project is located in as identified in the WAP is the aquatic scrub/shrub type, forested aquatics, and riverine. We will be improving the habitat in this key habitat and addressing the threats to this habitat type. 3. The plan identifies sediment transport imbalance as a medium threat to this habitat type and this project will help to reduce sediment transport by stabilizing the banks with vegetation and rocks. 4.It identifies channel down-cutting as a high threat and this project will help to remove the channels in the stream and make a more subtle gradient. This project will raise the water levels to restore the floodplain and reduce this channel down-cutting. 5. The plan mentions a management strategy that this project addresses to help improve this habitat type through 1.( restoring more natural water and sediment flow regimes) WAP Ch. 7-1; Mountain Riparian Habitat, criteria and score totals (ch. 7-8) 3rd highest priority statewide. Ch. 6-15; Western Toad; threat - Statewide Mule Deer Management Plan Habitat Objective1: Maintain mule deer habitat throughout the state by protecting and enhancing existing crucial habitats and mitigating for losses due to natural and human impacts Habitat Objective 2: Improve the quality and quantity of vegetation for mule deer on a minimum of 500,000 acres of crucial range by 2019. Statewide Elk Management Plan 1. Increase forage production by annually treating a minimum of 40,000 acres of elk habitat. 2. Maintain sufficient habitat to support elk herds at population objectives and reduce competition for forage between elk and livestock. Statewide Turkey Management Plan Objective Increase wild turkey habitat, quality and quantity, by 40,000 acres statewide by 2020. This project will help us to increase lots of quality habitat for turkeys since they are located where we plan to do the project and beaver dams will greatly benefit them. Objective 2;Strategy e- Improve habitat to draw wild turkey populations away from conflict areas. WAP - Promoting policies that maintain or restore natural water and sediment flow regimes" (like this project does) is the very first suggestion for improving the condition of both key habitats Aquatic-Forested and Aquatic-Scrub/Shrub. Pages 58 and 61.

Healthy riparian zones and associated healthy wet meadow complexes created by beaver activity are quite effective fire breaks.

It is hoped that with the re-introduction of beavers into the systems needing them, perennial flows will again be established much further downstream in the drainages and the flows of ephemeral streams will be temporally extended longer into the growing season. Capture of sediment in the dams themselves will reduce suspended solids transported downstream.

We will work with land owners and managers to comply with applicable regulations and respecting landowner desires and rights. This will largely be a noninvasive project that utilizes a native species to restore health to the watershed, with the exception of some BDA work to prepare release sites. We will reduce impacts as much as possible to reduce the amount of NEPA required. But all necessary NEPA or cultural clearances will be finished before project implementation. We will be completing stream alteration permits where necessary as well to comply with the Army Corps of Engineers requirements and water rights.

According to The Beaver Restoration Guidebook: Working with Beaver to Restore Streams, Wetlands, and Floodplains. (Pollock, M.M., G.M. Lewallen, K. Woodruff, C.E. Jordan and J.M. Castro (Editors) 2017. (www.fws.gov/oregonfwo/promo.cfm?id=177175812) it is important to prepare beaver release sites with good habitat prior to release. This will encourage the beavers to stay at the site and protect them from predators. One of the key things that they need is to have a series of at least 3 beaver dams with ponds about 1 meter deep. We will construct these dams in a way that will be as low of an impact as possible. Where we do need to use posts and traditional BDA construction techniques we will construct them based on design techniques using the ICRRR beaver restoration principles. The basic construction techniques include the use of sharpened lodgepole fence posts driven to a depth of approximately .5-1 m into the stream bed and banks. The posts will extend about 1 m above the channel bed depending on the stream. The posts will be spaced approximately 0.5 - 0.8 m apart. We will then weave willow branches or other tree branches that are available onsite between the posts to create a structure that will mimic a beaver dam. The concept is that the dams will last until sediment has built up behind the dam. Riparian and emergent vegetation begins to grow and the stream channel aggrades and floods. We will place dams about 30 - 100 m apart, depending on factors such as gradient and degree of incision. Where appropriate, postless BDAs will be utilized. Beavers will be trapped by UDWR staff or other affiliates, purchased from USU's Aquatic Research Center, or acquired opportunistically. Beavers will be quarantined at USU Aquatic Research Center Look to mitigate problem beavers 'in place' with the use of damage mitigation devices and practices. Purchase of additional live traps and associated equipment needed to assist capture if necessary and maintain a small cache of BDA construction/maintenance materials. PIT tag released beavers to aid in monitoring efforts.

Periodic survey to monitor status of yellowstone cutthroat trout (Raft River Site); observations by district biologist to document sage grouse use.After beaver releases, the number of dams will be documented through dam complex surveys at least once every 4 months for the first year. Surveys will consist of the stream being walked or mapped with a drone and dams will be counted and photographed. We will consider goals reached when the dam density estimate for each stream is reached or dam density stabilizes. Beaver movements, density, and survival will be monitored using wildlife motion sensor cameras, and other low cost methods such as using PIT tags and PIT tag readers. Reassessment of the stream's condition will be done to determine if more releases are necessary. UDWR biologists and USFS biologists will inspect streams for potential repatriation of absent fish and amphibian species. Big game species are continually monitored and some deer, elk, and moose may be collared in close proximity to the project and any changes in these movements in relation to this project will be documented. We will monitor the benefits that beavers and the BDAs have on improving the health of the watershed. Rapid Stream-Riparian Assessment (RSRA) surveys have been done prior to BDA construction and beaver reintroduction (see attached). The RSRA generates a score for water quality, hydrogeomorphology, fish and aquatic habitat, riparian vegetation, and terrestrial wildlife habitat. This method was selected because it is a time and cost efficient means to monitor restoration projects. In addition to this in depth monitoring we will also take multiple photo points and record video of the watershed before the project begins. This will help us to document visually as well as through written data the changes of the ecosystem. Visual inspection during post-treatment site visits will be used to determine effectiveness of treatments. Maintenance will be performed as necessary on dams and subsequent releases of more beavers until we reach the desired objectives outlined above. Use PIT tags to individually identify released beavers to track movement and successes of transplants.

USFS, USU, UDAF, UDFFSL BLM, local landowners. Funds from this project will support the projects of all WRI partners in need of beavers for restoration.

We will determine if the interest is present and viable for any future efforts of duplication of this project. It is hoped that this project will ultimately become more efficient and less costly; the trapping cost should one day be incurred by the landowner/land manager where the beavers are being removed from and the cost will be limited to quarantine care and transport.

We expect the project to improve riparian area productivity, on public and private lands, by enhancing the water table and serving as a local example of rangeland/riparian practices that can be beneficial to livestock, especially if they are paired with livestock management techniques such as off-channel watering and rotational grazing techniques. This should increase the amount and quality of forage and distribution of water across the landscape as well extend these benefits longer into the summer. This project will provide an increased opportunity in the future for the public to trap beavers. It will improve and potentially establish new fishing opportunities across the state. It will enhance wildlife populations and increase hunting opportunities.

07/01/2023

06/30/2024

2024

An agreement with Utah State University (USU) Beaver Ecology (BERC) was created so funds could be transferred to them for operation and management of their team and facilities. BERC and UDWR staff worked with landowners with nuisance beaver issues to live trap beavers both by BERC staff and volunteer trappers. BERC reimbursed trappers $100/ live beaver. UDWR selected sites for beaver release. BERC check beavers in their facilities, inserting PIT (Passive Integrated Transponders) tags into each tail. Hired an instructor to teach a course about living with beaver strategies to city, state, and federal agency partners.

Thirty-five beavers were trapped and relocated in FY 24. Trapping timing is dependent on weather and so trapping commenced when nuisance calls began coming to the DWR, usually mid-April. Beavers were captured using either Hancock style traps, box traps, or snares. These beavers were released in two creeks in the Raft River Mountain Range, North slope of the Uintah Mountains (West Fork Blacks Fork released - 09/18/2023, East Fork Blacks Fork - released 09/29/2023) and two locations in Cache Valley(July 2023, June 2024). Beavers were released on private, state, and federal land. We stopped trapping mid-october because it is thought releasing beavers beyond this date decreases chances of survival. DWR staff returned with a PIT reader that was deployed for ~1 week at one Raft River site and only this site to see if translocated beavers could be detected. One of the beavers released 2 months prior was detected. All other sites are being monitored to assess establishment by visual either by drone or walking surveys looking for signs that beavers are still in the area. These signs include; new dams and chews on vegetation. For all sites that we were able to monitor there were signs that beavers had established. More time will be needed to confirm the success of those release sites. Post release monitoring at West Fork Blacks Fork and East Fork Blacks Fork indicated releases were successful and beaver are reestablished. Beaver ponds/lodges were observed at both sites. We will be placing a PIT tag reader at no more than two of the other release sites but only at the more accessible sites. We will rely on visual surveys for confirmation at the other sites. Early June 2024 we hired the director of Beaver's Northwest, a non-profit in Washington state that installs living with beaver strategy structures. We had ~30 participants from multiple city, state and federal agencies come to the Living With Beaver strategy course at Hardware Wildlife Management Area and Temple Fork. During this course we were trained how to install Culvert Exclusion Fencing and a Pond-leveler. Since this course there have been more structures installed on Hardware WMA, near Park City and within the UWC National Forest. We plan on doing a private landowner focused course in the future put on by DWR and Sageland Collaborative.

This project will be ongoing as long as funding is available. More focus on beaver establishment rates would improve this program. Release sites will be visited 1 or 2 times a years to check on beaver activity and document stream restoration.