Eager beavers drown Poles

Above: The european beaver (castor fiber ) and its distribution.

Massive floods in Poland have claimed the lives of 15 people - and beavers are partly to blame. The  rodents live in large populations along the river Vistula, and have tunneled through flood defences.
Beavers have been reintroduced into mainland Europe since the 1920's, and British evironmentalists

are eager to introduce them into Britain, arguing that as they have previously existed here, they are a natural part of the British scene.It seems a doubtful argument, which could also be made for the re-introduction of the woolly rhino. The Britain in which the beaver thrived has vanished for ever. The creatures which limited their numbers - the wolf, the lynx and the bear - are no more. In Scotland, where campaigners are particularly keen to re-introduce the beasties, there has been massive deforestation. And here is another problem; we have all been told repeatedly that the felling of trees is  a Bad Thing - yet here are these creatures repeatedly chopping them down. If the trees involved had been cut down by humans, we would have been told of the grim consequences for wildlife. yet what is the news from Cotswold Water Park, where beavers were introduced in October 2005?

It is all a matter of spin.