About The Illinois Beaver Alliance

Mission:
The mission of the Illinois Beaver Alliance is to improve the health and function of Illinois watersheds, which will increase climate resilience, improve water quality, increase biodiversity, and create floodwater storage capacity; and to educate the public about the ecological importance of beavers and the modern tools for resolving human-beaver conflicts.

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Goals:

• Promote low-tech, process-based river restoration--the practice of using simple, low unit-cost, structural additions such as locally sourced rock, Beaver Dam Analogs, and anchored log structures that mimic functions and promote specific ecosystem processes--as well as beaver-related restoration to improve Illinois’ degraded watersheds.

• Educate stakeholders about the role of beavers in engineering, maintaining, and upgrading wetlands and healthy river systems.

• Educate the public about the ecological importance of beavers and how to resolve human-beaver conflicts by protecting trees with tree wrapping and using flow devices to prevent flooding caused by beaver dams.

• Share information throughout Illinois and with other states within the Western Great Lakes and the Upper Mississippi River Basin that share similar hydrology and water quality issues as Illinois.

• Encourage the creation of water quality credit markets in Illinois, which will provide economic opportunities for farmers through water quality credit farming, help POTWs meet permitting requirements, and improve overall water quality within Illinois watersheds.

 

Strategies:

• Reach out to stakeholders about process-based river restoration to generate interest in launching pilot programs in Illinois.

• Offer project planning and grant writing services to watershed alliances, soil conservation districts, and private landowners who wish to embark on process-based restoration projects and resolve beaver conflicts nonlethally.

• Provide matching funds for landowners who wish to install flow devices. 

• Identify or create curricula about the importance of beaver to Illinois freshwater ecosystems for use in schools and for community outreach. 

• Create fact sheets about resolving human-beaver conflicts.

• Create a beaver advocacy in a box kit in cooperation with the Beaver Institute.

• Help property owners resolve human-beaver conflicts nonlethally. 
   

President:

• Rachel Schick Siegel, Editor, Grant Writer, Writer, M.A.

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Advisory Board:

• Jeff Boland-Prom, Owner, Midwest Beaver Management, Beecher, Illinois

• Gloria Charland, Teacher, Co-Chair, Manitou Creek Watershed Alliance, a Water Sentinels campaign of the Woods & Wetlands Group of the Sierra Club in Illinois, Ingleside, Illinois

• Mike Luxem, Property Manager, Glenview, Illinois

• Hannah Malicky, Environmental Nonprofit Administrator; Bachelor's degree in Environmental Justice and Peace and Conflict Studies, Grinnell College

• Katerina Pestova, Clinical Affairs Lead, Abbott Labs; Ph.D. in molecular biology and MBA in finance/entrepreneurship, Glenview, Illinois

• Edwin Prom, Co-owner, Midwest Beaver Management, Beecher, Illinois. 

• Sandra Urban, Animal Rights Activist and Photographer, Glenview, Illinois

• Andrea Zavala, Student, Lake Forest College; Lead Research Intern for Manitou Creek Watershed Alliance

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Expert Advisory Board:

• Sharon Brown, Beavers Wetlands and Wildlife

• Mike Callahan, The Beaver Institute

• Heidi Perryman, Worth a Dam

• Kevin Swift, Swift Water Design

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Alliance Partners:

​Illinois Beaver Alliance organizational partners share our mission to improve the health and function of Illinois watersheds, which will increase climate resilience, improve water quality, increase biodiversity, and create floodwater storage capacity; and to educate the public about the ecological importance of beavers and the modern tools for resolving human-beaver conflicts.

• Partners may collaborate on public education and outreach efforts about the ecological importance of beavers and the modern tools for resolving human-beaver conflicts. Partners will be credited on all collaborative efforts.

• Partners may refer beaver-related inquiries and matters to the Illinois Beaver Alliance so that it can serve as a centralized information clearinghouse.

• The Illinois Beaver Alliance may collaborate with or provide assistance to partners on process-based river restoration projects.

• The Illinois Beaver Alliance may collaborate with or provide assistance to partners to resolve human-beaver conflicts.

• Partners agree to be named on our website with a link to the partner's website.

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The Illinois Beaver Alliance is an affiliate of the Illinois Environmental Council.