Eleana Colby knows all too well how the removal of a beaver dam can divide a community.
In Bow, where she lives and serves as a select board member, disputes over beaver dam removal have flared at least twice in the past three years – pitting neighbors against one another and straining relationships with town officials.
Now, as a state representative, Colby hopes to ease those tensions with a new bill designed to bring clarity and communication to the process.
“I hope that we bring mutual respect to the table and the understanding that if you have a shared resource amongst your neighbors, that we bring back conversations and respectful dialogue,” Colby said.
House Bill 1530 would require landowners to notify neighboring property owners when a beaver pond crosses property lines and one owner plans to lower the water level or remove a dam.
The bill would also call for an informational meeting, coordinated with the municipality, where neighbors can discuss the proposed work.
Even groups that maintain trails in town would be required to notify abutters before altering a beaver dam, even if the work takes place on town-owned property, which was the case in Bow.
Colby said that these meetings are not intended to give neighbors or municipal officials decision-making authority.
“They are just meant as a place to meet, a mediation,” she said. “We’re trying to bring abutter notification to the table so that people don’t wake up and see that the pond in their backyard is now missing, regardless of who owns the beaver impoundment.”
Bow’s beaver dam battles
That exact scenario played out in Bow in 2022. A pond on town-owned land was drained after concerns arose that a beaver dam had raised water levels enough to potentially flood a nearby bridge leading to a main trail network used by hikers, runners, and snowmobilers. The beavers were trapped and killed.
Abutters weren’t notified ahead of time. They only discovered what had happened when they were left staring at mud and debris where a pond once stood.
Credit: Sruthi Gopalakrishnan
A similar situation unfolded last year at another Bow pond built by beavers, often called nature’s engineers. Maintenance work was done to manage water levels, again without notifying abutters.
Tension rose, and the controversy ultimately led town officials to place a temporary ban on draining local ponds. Now, anyone except the Department of Public Works has to come before the town’s select board before doing any work on beaver-built structures.
Bow wasn’t alone when it came to the issue of beaver dams. Other communities, including Hopkinton, have faced similar conflicts.
Beaver lodges act as dams to following water and create wetland habitats for fish, birds, turtles, and amphibians. But the same dam-building prowess that benefits ecosystems can also cause flooding on public and private property.
Colby’s bill does not change existing emergency provisions in state law.
In situations where a beaver dam poses an immediate threat to life or property, landowners or municipal officials may still remove a dam or install flow devices without a permit or prior notification, as long as heavy machinery does not enter the water and no filling or dredging occurs in or near wetlands.
Another aspect of the bill is to reduce the number of calls to the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services and New Hampshire Fish and Game.
Colby said that when incidents like these occur, state agencies receive a high volume of calls, largely because state law is unclear.
“The intent was to cut down on the work involved and the confusion,” said Colby. “Hopefully, neighbors can be neighborly.”