Eager Beavers Worry Hofers

WAITSBURG - Al - though Cindy Hofer loves the beavers who visit the family farm on the banks of Coppei Creek, she gets nervous when they settle in.

Last week, she and her husband, Gary, asked an expert to come take a look at one beaver dam clogging the creek behind their more than 100-year-old house.

Ice coated the logs and branches where the half-frozen creek tried to move over, under and around the beavermade barrier. The dam hasn't been a problem yet, but the Hofers are worried about what happens in the spring, when runoff spills down out of the Blue Mountains and through town, raising the level of the Coppei dramatically.

"We've actually never flooded," Gary Hofer told Tom Schirm, area habitat biologist for the Washington State Fish and Wildlife. "But we've come very close. We've had water seep into the basement, up in the horse pastures and in the outbuildings."

Schirm, who works out of Dayton, agreed to stop by the Hofer place last week to take a look at the beaver dam. Cindy and Gary Hofer were anxious for Schirm's expert opinion on how to tackle the problem.

"It's amazing how a simple beaver dam can be surrounded by such complicated bureaucracy," Cindy Hofer said, referring to the process for getting a permit to remove the obstruction.

Schirm agreed that the application paperwork itself can be daunting, but once it's filed through Olympia it can be granted within just a few days to a week or two out of his office, he said. State law requires the department to respond to applications within 45 days.

"Normally we work with landowners to try to do what they want to do within the laws protecting fish resources or fish life," Schirm said. In the Touchet Valley, most of the salmon and steelhead runs are federally protected.

For over 100 years, the Hofer ancestors would take tractors and graders up and down the Coppei every year, clearing the debris and cleaning up the stream in general.

"But you can't do that anymore," said Gary Hofer, whose family came to farm wheat in the Touchet Valley in the 1800s.

The Highway 12 bridge over the Coppei was raised years ago to give more clearance for flooding and spring overflows, but homes like that belonging to the Hofers are still at ground zero, just a few yards over flat ground to the banks of the stream.

Several times the whole family has had to race out into the back yard to build a wall preventing the gushing creek from flowing right into the family home.

To remove the dam partially blocking the creek now, the Hofers would need to wade out into the icy stream, reach into the rushing waters to wrap chains around the debris and use a tractor to pull the dam out.

So they've decided to "wait and see." They'll hold off, if they can, until the ice begins to melt and they can better guess what the creek will do to get around the blockage.

Beaver activity, prevalent in the area, can be beneficial outside of town. Dams slow down the river, making it more hospitable to fish, and raise the water table, Schirm said.

But in areas near homes or property, or flood-prone zones, they can be a nuisance.

To remove or modify a beaver dam, landowners must have a hydraulic project approval permit issued by WDFW for work that will use, obstruct, change, or divert the bed or flow of state waters, according to state code. A permit application can be obtained from the WDFW Regional Office or online.

In instances of "imminent threat to life and property," as Schirm put it, property owners can address a stream blockage more quickly with an emergency permit.

For more information on beaver activity, troubleshooting and permits, visit http:// wdfw.wa.gov/living/beavers. html.