THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, July 13, 1994 TAG: 9407130416
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY FRANCIE LATOUR, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 77 lines
Beavers are back with a vengeance, and this time the City Council wants them stopped.
In an informal session Tuesday, members said previous attempts had failed to control the population of the furry, bucktoothed creatures.
Not only have beavers come back at Lake Whitehurst, but they are now gnawing their way through the trees at the Norfolk Botanical Garden.
Councilman W. Randy Wright, who spearheaded discussion of the issue, minced no words.
``We want to eliminate them,'' Wright said, ``Go back to trapping, pure and simple. Let's get them out of here.''
Mayor Paul D. Fraim practically threw up his hands as he relegated to City Manager James Oliver the task of finding a solution.
``I don't think the council cares how you go about doing it,'' he said.
``Just find a way and do it.''
William Binnie, an ecologist and director of horticulture at the botanical garden, came armed with photographs of chewed, decaying trees and of an eroding lake bank.
``It's a much bigger issue than the shoreline,'' Binnie said. ``When you have a 60-year-old tree girdled by a beaver, it turns a tree that was once a city asset - providing life and oxygen - into a city liability, because it has to be hauled off and disposed of.''
When the beaver problem surfaced two years ago, the City Council first tried trapping them. Then it turned to animal-protection groups, which offered to wrap threatened trees with wire.
Neither approach has stemmed the population, Binnie said. City officials were unable, however, to say just how many beavers are actually out there causing havoc.
``I'm all for the protection of animals,'' Binnie told the council, ``but you have to take both sides of the issue into account. There needs to be a balance between plants and animals in the environment.''
Dr. Charles Devine, who has lived on Lake Whitehurst's Hunt Club Point for 40 years and has addressed the council several times in the past with his frustration, brought a photo album documenting the damage by three dens of beavers around his property.
``It's simple: The trees protect the shore of the lake. When the beavers strip the trees, they die, they collapse into the water and the lake slides,'' Devine said. ``My biggest concern is saving the lake.''
Those who had fought for the beavers in the past were caught off guard by the session; none was on hand to testify.
``I'm flabbergasted,'' said Ruth Ann Hile, a Virginia Beach woman who heads the Save the Beavers Fund.
Hile, who found out about the meeting an hour after it ended, said that neither she nor representatives from Fund for Animals, a national group that has supported Save the Beavers' efforts, had been notified.
``How did the botanical gardens have time to find out about it and we didn't?'' she wondered. ``Whatever happened was underhanded. We felt betrayed by the city, because the last thing I heard, we were getting along great.''
Hile said she had received only two reports of complaints from the city this summer.
Norfolk Public Utilities Director Louis Guy said he did not know why the animal rights groups were not alerted.
Still, he said, the extensive damage done by beavers and the increase in complaints mean that something more needs to be done.
The city manager will present the council with a report next week on ways to solve the problem.
In other animal action, the council unanimously adopted an ordinance requiring licenses for cats and raising fees on those for dogs. Starting with the new year, the cost of a dog license will increase from $2 to $5 for a neutered animal and from $7 to $10 for others; cat licenses will cost $5 and $10. ILLUSTRATION: KEN WRIGHT/Staff
by CNB