The Beaver a keystone species

Beavers play a key role along rivers and streams. They take care of the natural maintenance of the banks. With their chisel-shaped incisors, they gnaw down entire trees – to eat them, to dam up streams, or to build lodges. Their annual wood requirement is as much as 4,000 kilos: in this way, they keep tree growth in check, create clearings where plants and flowers can grow again, ensure a varied structure and age composition of the forest, and provide large quantities of driftwood, a collective term for all the dead wood along and in the river.