Beaver Day 2026. Between a thriving wetland and an official’s desk

April 7 marks International Beaver Day, established in 2009 to commemorate the birthday of Dorothy Richards, a scientist who devoted 50 years to studying the world’s largest rodents. Their importance for ecosystems is greater today than ever before, yet still overlooked.

A history of destruction and recovery

The Eurasian beaver (Castor fiber) historically inhabited vast areas from Western Europe to the Chinese-Mongolian border. Unfortunately, as an animal valued for its fur, tasty meat and substantial fat reserves, it was nearly exterminated. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), at the beginning of the 20th century only about 1,200 individuals remained across the entire continent. Only with the recovery of populations did it become more widely recognized how strongly the presence of beavers affects water retention and the functioning of water-dependent ecosystems.

After World War II, large-scale beaver reintroductions began in Europe, using eight relict populations that had survived in countries including Germany, France and Norway. In the 1920s, beavers returned to Scandinavia and Russia, and by the mid-20th century they were being introduced into ecosystems in the Baltic countries, France and Switzerland. Further programs were launched from the 1980s in most European countries, and in recent years also in the United Kingdom. As a result, by 2020 the beaver population on the continent had increased to about 1.5 million individuals.

Beaver Day, or about a small animal with a big impact

The reintroduction of beavers has proven to be more than just a boost to biodiversity. These industrious rodents reshape river and stream landscapes, transforming them into wetlands that provide habitat for hundreds of species of insects, amphibians, fish and birds. They retain water in the landscape, protect against droughts, floods and fires, and additionally support the storage of vast amounts of carbon in nature.

Because beavers act in favor of nature: habitats, other animals and the climate. Human interests are not their priority. Paradoxically, however, the greatest hostility toward these ecosystem engineers comes from farmers, for whom the quantity and quality of water resources in regions are crucial.

What is the situation of beavers in Poland?

We asked Dr Andrzej Czech from the Jagiellonian University for a comment. For years he has been working on nature-based solutions and actively advocating for these furry ecosystem engineers:

The situation of beavers in Poland is… strange. We struggle with either a lack of water or an excess of it. At the same time, we are getting rid of an ally in the form of the beaver, which alleviates the effort of these struggles by storing at least 200 million cubic meters of water in dispersed systems across the country, increasing biodiversity and improving water quality. This is made possible by a terrible bureaucratic schizophrenia. It will end in disaster if we continue to rely on outdated procedures and fail to take beaver matters into our own, human, good hands.

On his blog, Dr Czech points out the ease and thoughtlessness with which decisions are made in Poland to cull beavers or destroy their dams and lodges. In his view, permits to violate the species’ partial protection are often issued without field visits or hydrological assessments.

This year’s International Beaver Day, however, brings a glimmer of hope. Following a wave of public protests, on April 3, 2026 the Regional Director for Environmental Protection in Gdańsk announced that Polish Waters – the Gdańsk Catchment Management Board had withdrawn its application for a permit to destroy dams and burrows and to scare away beavers on 160 canals and rivers in the Pomeranian Voivodeship. The Minister of Climate and Environment, Paulina Henning-Kloska, commented on the decision with the words: Nature wins! The beaver is an excellent engineer creating natural micro-retention, thanks to which we retain water in the ecosystem. After this decision, beavers can continue their work and their defenders can sleep peacefully.

On Beaver Day, it is hard not to mention the book by Agnieszka Hobot Why do beavers build dams?, which explains in an accessible and vivid way to children how beavers influence the landscape and why they play such an important role in nature. Sensitivity to such relationships is worth developing from an early age. With adults it is often more difficult, as they tend to assess beaver activity through the lens of their own losses and inconveniences: a flooded meadow or a fallen tree.