What happens when an infrastructure project is stalled for more than seven years? In most countries, the project may have been shelved but the beavers in the Brdy region of the Czech Republic had different ideas -- one which has helped the authorities save over Rs 10 crore in expense.
According to a report in The Telegraph, the government's plan to build a dam in the Brdy protected landscape area could not get off the ground despite years of planning. Just when it looked like the project may never start, a colony of beavers managed to build the dam, right where it was required.
"The Military Forest Management and the Vltava River Basin were negotiating with each other to set up the project and address issues regarding ownership of land," said Bohumil Fiser, head of the Brdy Protected Landscape Area Administration.
"The beavers beat [us] to it, saving us CZK 30 million (Rs 10 crore). They built the dams without any project documentation and for free."
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Returning the landscape to its natural beauty
As per Radio Prague International, the dam was planned in the area where the military had built a drainage system years ago. The new dam was intended to stop the drainage and create a wetland to revitalize the local ecosystem.
"Beavers are able to build a dam in one night, two nights at the most. While people have to get building permits, get the building project approved, and find the money for it. But of course a digger working on his own could build it in about a week," said zoologist Jiri Vlcek
Experts inspecting the structure said they will last for a long time and even help the aquatic life to flourish with the rare stone crayfish, frogs, and other species, set to thrive in the new wetland conditions.
"We are already seeing the emergence of a small pond and surrounding wetland there," the PLA said in a statement, adding that the eight beavers were still hard at work creating new wetlands.
“Beavers are returning the landscape altered by humans to its natural beauty.”
Beavers are known for their natural dam-building instincts. Using nothing but sticks, mud, and stones, these semi-aquatic mammals are able to create such engineering marvels which continue to surprise the scientists.
