Meet Your Neighbors: North American Beavers

Meet Your Neighbors: New York’s Natural World

In this series, we connect policy to nature – highlighting native New York species, what we have in common with them, and the roles they play in NYLCV’s policy agenda.

From the mountains and forests of the Adirondacks to the coasts of Long Island and NYC, our state is home to diverse natural worlds. Whales and dolphins spend their summers off the Brooklyn coast; songbirds migrate through NYC; bobcats and black bears roam the state’s forests, and bats stretch their wings in the last glow of our sunsets. That’s only the beginning. 

As New Yorkers, we have all kinds of animal neighbors. And they’re more like us than we might think; they depend on the same air, water and soil that we do; they’re part of the same ecosystems as us; and they’re vulnerable to the same environmental issues that we are. 

Welcome to Meet Your Neighbors: an NYLCVEF blog series where we introduce you to other kinds of New Yorkers – furry, feathered, scaly, and beyond – and explore how the policy priorities that we advocate for, at NLYCV, have implications across species lines. We are all part of New York, and usually, what’s good for our neighbors is what’s good for us.

We’re launching the series with New York’s official state animal: the North American beaver. 

Meet Your Neighbors: North American Beavers

By Georgia Good

(Photo credit: Pascal Bernardon)

Introducing beavers

Beavers are the largest rodents on the continent – they can reach 3.5 feet long. They’re mostly aquatic, with webbed feet and a body shape that help them swim powerfully. They communicate by slapping their tails on the water and depositing vanilla-like scents – and they have transparent eyelids that allow them to see underwater.

Like (human) New Yorkers, they’re famously industrious, resourceful, and adaptable. They work day and night to build and repair lodges and dams, which they use for safety and food storage – using strong teeth to cut down trees for construction and for food. Unlike us, their long incisors grow back as quickly as they’re worn down – and they’re orange, because they’re full of iron, making them especially strong. 

Like many of us, beavers form long-term monogamous relationships, and take parental care seriously – living with their offspring for up to two years, ensuring the young beavers can live and work independently by the time they leave their colonies. 

Beavers of New York: a history

When you think ‘iconic New York rodent’, you might think: ‘rat’. But beavers are a key part of New York history. In the 1600s, they were a major reason why the Dutch settled around New York Harbor, with 60 million beavers then existing across the state. The reason for the attraction, unfortunately, was the fur trade, which drove beavers almost to extinction by the late 1800s. 

But what follows is a conservation success story, showing that policy change can have powerful, concrete impact. At the start of the twentieth century, beaver population restoration began: collaborative, state-funded translocation efforts led to rapid population growth in the Adirondacks and beyond.

In 1975, beavers became the state animal, appearing on our state flag and seal. (Oregon objected, having already given beavers this title. The Conservationist Magazine offered reassurance: “Thanks to conservation, there are enough beavers to provide state mammals for both states.”)

The policy was highly successful: beavers were back. Recently, they’ve even been seen in NYC. 

Beavers of New York: today

Despite their growing presence in New York, beavers, like us, are facing threats. Human development on wild land is driving habitat loss and fragmentation. Water pollution is threatening beaver and ecosystem health. 

Here, what’s good for beavers is good for us. In our 2025 agenda, we advocate for wetland restoration – wetlands improve water quality through pollutant filtration, mitigate climate change by storing carbon, reduce flood and storm risks by absorbing water, enrich our lives, and protect coastlines from erosion. Wetland restoration is key to New York’s climate action and resilience plan – and protects beaver populations. 

Beavers actively support this mission: their dams help mitigate floods, improve water quality, enhance drought resilience, and increase biodiversity, providing habitat for fish, amphibians and birds. They are our climate and conservation partners. But they need places to do their work. 

The regional ecosystem programs that we support include: the Comprehensive Conservation and Management Plan for the Long Island Sound, the Hudson River Estuary Action Agenda, the Mohawk River Basin Action Agenda, the Delaware River Basin Restoration Program, and other comprehensive Great Lakes management initiatives. We’re advocating for enforcement of the parkland alienation process, to hold municipal governments accountable and protect parkland from inequitable land swaps, sales, and private development. And we’re calling on New York State to meet its 30×30 land and water protection goal, by streamlining its state land acquisition process and partnering with land trusts to acquire and protect more land.  

Through the years, beavers have faced hard times and bounced back. That’s what New Yorkers do. We’re facing hard times now, and places where land meets water are uniquely at risk. But by protecting and restoring these ecosystems, we can cut carbon emissions, drive climate resilience, and protect the health of New York’s diverse life forms – including humans, beavers, and beyond. 

Georgia Good is the Communications Fellow at the New York League of Conservation Voters. She’s a Steinhardt Graduate Scholar in Environmental Conservation Education at NYU, with a focus on climate communications and advocacy. She’s had comms roles at Climate Arc, the Centre for Climate Engagement, University of Cambridge, and Mercy Corps, and she has a BA in English from UCL, UK.