LEWISTON — Maurice Morin watched Tuesday as Lewiston Public Works crews cleaned out a culvert on the Stetson Road — again.

Beavers did what beavers do, built a dam. But their dam has trapped water and at times flooded the road.

Despite strong hints for them to leave, like running a telephone pole through their dam, the beavers have stayed and kept rebuilding. During heavy rains, the plugged culvert has flooded the road, forcing the city to close it.

The beavers have to go, said Morin, who lives on the Stetson Road.

Crews have repeatedly come out “with a boat, a backhoe, trucks, foremen, workmen. Every time these people open it up, it’s costing us a lot of money. It’s ridiculous. The state should do something to let us take the beavers out,” Morin said. “A beaver is just a big rat with a flat tail.”

As a fur animal, the beaver is protected and can be trapped during beaver season, which is Dec. 1 to March 31, according to Maine’s Department of Inland Wildlife.

“We have invested quite a bit of time” at the Stetson Road beaver dams, said Lewiston Public Works Deputy Director Megan Bates. “I have calls in to the state” asking about options. She’s also talking to the town of Leeds. “They’re having their issues with beaver.”

Jon Elie, operations manager for Lewiston Public Works highway division, said the culvert is cleared for now, but the beaver problem isn’t settled.

Elie estimates the city has spent $3,000 to $4,000 in the last three years at the same location trying to clear dams out of the culvert. This year alone crews have been to the site three times. This week “we tried to do the best job we could. Winter’s coming,” Elie said.

Crews clean the culvert by ramrodding poles through. “We take telephone poles and hang them by a chain, then push them through,” slowly clearing the large pipe.

A plugged culvert is a real problem during heavy rains, he said. The water has flooded the road creating a pond 150 feet long, 6 to 8 inches deep. “We’ve had to close the road until the water subsides.”

Several years ago the city put in a “beaver deceiver,” a series of pipes that stick out of the culvert. The goal is to confuse the beavers and discourage them from rebuilding. The deceiver often takes water in without the trickling noise. The sound of water furthers the beaver’s drive; when they hear water, they seem to react with “here’s where I’ve got to plug it up,’” Elie said.

The deceiver worked for a while, but the beavers got smart and damned the culvert from the other side. “They went through the outlet of the pipe and clogged it,” Elie said.

This week crews took out the beaver deceiver, cleaned it out, put it back in and installed a grate on the other side of the culvert.

But the grate is not ideal. Vegetation clogs up the grate quite fast, Elie said. “It’s a difficult thing to maintain.”

After all the work, “there still is a family of beavers living there,” probably five or six, Elie said.

It’s time for Plan B (or C or D). Elie’s recommend trappers do their thing Dec. 1. “We need to trap them and get them out of there.”

But state wildlife biologist Scott Lindsay said when beaver dams threaten public roads, beavers can be trapped and relocated even when it’s not trapping season. “If it’s a safety problem, like a road flooded over, we’d consider that a high priority. You don’t want to risk your roads.”

Meanwhile the beavers have made an impression on Elie. While Stetson Road resident Morin says they are nothing more than a big rat, Elie said the beavers are industrious, hard workers. “I’d like to hire a couple of them.”

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Expert: Beavers causing more problems in Androscoggin

By Bonnie Washuk, Staff Writer

LEWISTON — More beaver trouble spots are popping up in the Androscoggin River valley, which indicates the population is on the rise, a state wildlife biologist said.

“The Androscoggin River valley does seem to have more reports in recent years, Lewiston-Auburn up through Litchfield, Leeds and Turner,” said Scott Lindsay, a regional wildlife biologist with the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife. He covers several counties but has noticed the problem in Androscoggin. “We are seeing more beaver.”

The town of Leeds has had a persistent problem with beaver dams in culverts, threatening roads. Public Works Director Jim McNaughton has been working on the problem for a couple of years, a town hall administrative assistant said Thursday.

Jon Elie, operations manager for Lewiston Public Works highway division, said he doesn’t remember beaver problems when he started with the city 29 years ago, but in the last three or four years, he’s dealt with more beaver trouble spots.

In additional to the Stetson Road, he’s dealing with beaver dams on the Foss Road, Bowdoin Drive off the College Road, the South Lisbon Road and Pinewoods Road.

Elie said he’s not sure if human development is encroaching on beaver turf, or if beavers are spreading out.

It’s the latter, Lindsay said.

One reason is that beaver hunting is down because the value of beaver fur is down. The population isn’t being thinned as it used to be. That means more beavers are building more homes.

Most beaver lodges don’t have multiple generations. “They will leave and establish a colony somewhere else.”

The Androscoggin River valley has a lot of natural wetlands and has historically been occupied by beaver, “long before people,” Lindsay said. Beavers natural predators used to include wolves and mountain lions, which haven’t been around for a century, he said. Today, beavers’ biggest predator is man and coyotes.

The beaver is a member of the rodent family, but can grow fairly large, up to 60 pounds. “They’re quite formidable. They’re all muscle,” Lindsay said. “If they’re out of water they’re not easy pickings.”

Beavers are a close family unit. Each has a male and female who both work to raise and feed their offspring, build and maintain dams. A typical beaver family size is five or six, two adults, two or three kids born this year, two from the previous year.

Beavers are allies to Maine, Lindsay said, adding they would not hurt people. “The benefit of beavers far outweighs problems,” he said. “That may not be consolation for the person whose backyard is flooded, but Maine has a lot of open space.” By building their dams “the beaver creates a lot of wildlife habitat.”