Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 17, 1993 TAG: 9302170106
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By DAVID M. POOLE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
BEAVERS ONLY GUIDED BY LAWS OF NATURE
Jerry Gross' property has become a wildlife habitat since a colony of beavers set up housekeeping on Mill Creek 20 years ago.The beavers have dammed the creek, creating a series of ponds where geese, wild turkey, deer and many varieties of birds can be found.
"The beaver," Gross said, "is quite an environmentalist."
But some Bent Mountain neighbors would love to skin the furry little creatures.
Neighbors complain that the beaver dams have flooded their property - killing trees, ruining garden plots and transforming part of one man's cattle field into a bog.
Gross admits the dams have become a problem. But he and his neighbors have been unable to arrive at a solution because Gross insists that no harm come to the beaver colony.
"He likes the beavers," neighbor Robert Brown said. "What can I do if he likes the beavers?"
Landowners have asked Roanoke County to do something, but county officials say the situation is outside their jurisdiction.
Roanoke County Attorney Paul Mahoney has become something of an expert in beaver law since he was asked to look into the matter last summer.
After studying the state code and researching Supreme Court decisions, Mahoney concluded that Roanoke County has no authority to intercede on behalf of landowners whose property had been damaged.
Animal control officers cannot trap or kill the beavers without Gross' permission because the dams are on private property, Mahoney said.
In addition, removing the dams could run afoul of federal wetlands protections laws, he said.
Supervisor Lee Eddy, who represents Bent Mountain, suggested that the four or five affected landowners sit down and try to come up with a solution.
Gross has suggested installing a series of pipes that would bypass the beaver dams and reduce the water level upstream.
But the pipes could cost a lot of money - and they might not work.
Phil Shelton, a biology professor at Clinch Valley College in Wise, said diligent beavers usually have found a way to gum up pipes installed in other areas.
Destroying their dams also doesn't do any good because the colonies immediately will get busy repairing them. The only sure solution is to trap the beavers and move them to an isolated stream where they won't bother anyone, Shelton said.
Beavers, which were trapped into near extinction in the 1800s, have recovered to the point where they have become a nuisance.
"It's got so now that there are not many places to move them," Shelton said.
The Bent Mountain colony has built a series of at least four dams that stretch about one-quarter mile along Mill Creek near Bent Mountain Elementary School.
The original beaver pond has grown to about an acre, created by a dam nearly nearly 100 yards across.
The creek is so clogged that water has begun to back up on land upstream. Robert Brown said the water already has claimed 2 acres, including his garden spot.
"It's getting worse all the time, just creeping up," Brown said.
George Allen Stone, who lives on U.S. 221, said a small portion of his cattle field has been turned into a boggy area unsuitable for grazing.
Stone said he will lose more and more of his land if the beavers are allowed to continue. He believes the only solution will be to shoot or trap the beavers.
"I don't know how they're going to be stopped otherwise."
Gross is adamant about saving the beavers, whose progress he and his wife, Mary, have followed for 20 years.
There were no beavers when the Grosses moved into a house on a hill above Mill Creek in 1959. The beavers later arrived and set to work transforming their bottom land into a series of ponds.
In the evenings, the Grosses like to stand on a porch overlooking the creek and watch the beavers gnawing at trees and patching their dams.
"We enjoy the wildlife and the birds that come here," he said. "If they drained the pond, all we'd have to look at is a mudhole."