Methow Okanogan Beaver Project is dedicated to improving the function and resilience of the Methow and Okanogan watersheds through our five strategic pillars of action: watershed restoration, beaver coexistence, education and outreach, beaver relocation, and beaver policy. Learn more about these pillars below.
Watershed Restoration
Methow Okanogan Beaver Project conducts riparian restoration projects across the Methow and Okanogan watersheds. We focus on low-impact, low-tech, low-cost, highly effective restoration strategies that mimic natural processes to increase structure, vegetation, and complexity in degraded creek systems. Through our restoration projects, we improve biodiversity, water storage, water-quality, and wildfire resistance, helping to contribute to a more resilient future for the Methow and Okanogan watersheds.
Beaver Coexistence
In addition to conducting Beaver-based Restoration projects, MOBP is dedicated to improving coexistence between humans and beavers in our watersheds. We provide services like tree-protection and flooding management to landowners facing beaver-related challenges, helping our neighbors to experience the incredible ecosystem benefits of beavers, while mitigating unwanted effects like flooding and loss of desired trees.
Education and Outreach
Through classroom visits, field trips, educational public events, and workshops and trainings for restoration professionals, MOBP works with people of all ages and backgrounds to explore and share watershed ecology, beaver biology, relocation techniques, and coexistence strategies. We believe that community engagement is key to building more sustainable, resilient, and biodiverse watersheds and look forward to every opportunity to connect with, teach, and learn from our community.
Beaver Relocation
At MOBP, we'd love it if every beaver/human conflict could end in coexistence, but for a variety of reasons, that isn't always possible. In situations of irreconcilable conflict, we provide live-trapping and relocation services. We relocate these beavers from private lands to our restoration sites where they become important partners in watershed restoration, helping us slow and spread water and restore complexity to degraded stream systems.
Beaver Policy
Methow Okanogan Beaver Project is engaged in state and national policy-making to modernize beaver management. We provide expertise in creating management policies that conserve and restore healthy beaver populations and promote greater use of beaver restoration as a landscape-scale restoration tool to repair degraded river systems.