An ecologist in Canada has discovered the worlds largest beaver dam which is visible from outer space and is so big that experts did not know what it was until the structure was view from a huge distance.
what an average beaver dam looks like.
The ecologist, Jean Thie, A Canadian national of Dutch origin made the discovery in October 2007 in Noth Alberta, Canada while looking at Google Earth images.
The animal made structure, according to reports is 850 metres long and is located at the edge of a remote area in Wood Buffalo National Park.
The structure is particularly extraordinary because, average beaver dams are of 10 – 100 meters length and it is very rear to find any which are larger then 400 meters.
The previous largest Beaver Dam was measured at 652 meters wide and was situated in Three Forks in the US state of Montana.
Experts who have spoken to a variety of TV channels and websites of the remarkable structure have said it is very probable that the beavers started to make the dam in the 1970’s and the structures carried on for generations.
Thie said to AFP “Several generations of beavers worked on it and it’s still growing,”
Image of the huge beaver dam located in Northern Canada
Spokesman for the Wood Buffalo National Park, which is the size of Switzerland, Mike Keizer said “We flew over the park last year to have a look at the dam. We found plenty of vegetation growing on the Dam indicating that it had been there for a while, a new dam would have a lot of fresh sticks, this one has grasses growing on it and it’s very green.”
The Parks employees have also said that there were two smaller dams on either side of the huge beaver dam which would merge in a few years making the structure up to a kilometre wide.
Beavers are the worlds second largest rodents and are famous for making dams to protect themselves from predators and to use the water to easily float food and building material for nests and to further expand dams.
At a point, North America had an estimated 60 million beavers but that figure dropped between 6 to 12 million in 1988 after hunting for the animals glands used as medicine and perfume and because the animals antics constantly interfered with human built structures.
