This post is the first in a series marking the 50th anniversary of the passing of Bill C-373, “An Act to provide for the recognition of the Beaver (Castor canadensis) as a symbol of the sovereignty of the Dominion of Canada,” edited by Blair Stein.
When the zoological gardens craze spread through Europe in the 1800s, the European beaver (Castor fiber) had already been nearly wiped out. Only a few thousand were left on the continent and these were far off the beaten track. Of course, by then, Europeans were well acquainted with the North American beaver (Castor canadensis), which had been a major financial driver of Canadian settlement. At the very least, Europeans were familiar with Canadian beaver products: felt hats, beaver pelts, and medicinal castoreum. If the zoos wanted beavers, they were going to have to be content with Castor fiber’s distant cousin Castor canadensis.[1]
This is what happened at Skansen, an ethnographic showcase for Swedish cultural heritage in Stockholm. Skansen opened in 1891, and the zoological collection focused on Nordic animals like reindeer and moose. In his book about Skansen published in 1893, popular writer and journalist Herman Ring noted that “If one wants to have a complete cultural picture, a part of the natural environment has to be there,” so the zoo would “accept animals, tame and wild, which belong to Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Finnish, and the polar area’s fauna.”[2]
In 1901, when Zoo Director Alarik Behm decided that Skansen should have beavers as one of the iconic Nordic animals, he had a problem: beavers had been extinct in Sweden since the 1860s. The obvious place to source beavers would have been the neighboring country of Norway, but according to a field survey conducted in 1881 and 1882, there were probably only around 120 beavers left there and they were protected.[3] So rather than go to Norway, Behm turned to Canada where beavers were more numerous. While Behm knew that these were not the same species as his Swedish beavers—the two scientific names appear distinct in his own scholarly texts—he probably thought they were close enough for zoo visitors. The Zoological Society in London, for example, had long kept North American beavers from Canada in their beaver pond.
Behm contacted the Swedish-Norwegian consulate in Montreal for help, who then passed the request on to the Hudson Bay Company, who in turn sent out letters to their agents in 1901.[4] In 1902, Skansen got an offer from Emanuel Ohlén (1861-1931), a Swedish immigrant to Canada. Ohlén offered to supply two beavers for the price of $200 plus transportation to Sweden. A letter from 22 August 1902 confirms that Ohlén received the money by wire transfer and hoped to bring the beavers that autumn.[5]
Behm had confidence that his Canadian contacts would provide the beavers. He updated the zoo’s visitor guidebook in 1903 with an entry for the anticipated beavers: “As this is written, two beavers have been bought in Canada on behalf of Skansen’s zoological garden although they have not yet been sent from that country.”[6] The same text appeared in 1905, but in the 1907 edition, the text disappeared because the Canadian beavers had not materialized. A newspaper article from November 1907 suggested that Skansen had not been able to obtain beavers from Canada because of the long and difficult journey.[7] Ohlén had not delivered the promised animals.
Then, somewhat unexpectedly, a Canadian beaver showed up at the zoo in 1909 through the work of another donor, followed by a second one in 1910.[8] Behm was able to put his text back in the zoo guide issued for 1910 under the rubric “Bäfver. Castor Canadensis Kuhl. Kanadischer Biber, — canadian beaver, — castor du Canada” along with a photo of one of his prized animals.[9] The guidebook’s suggested walking trail featured the beaver dam as one of the stops.
Yet between 1907 and 1909, thinking that Canada was no longer a viable beaver source, Behm had been working his connections with the Berlin zoo to get a European beaver. This was one of the very few zoos with a European beaver in their collection. In September 1910, three owls were sent from Skansen to Berlin in exchange for one young Rhône beaver.[10] Very quickly, Skansen seemed to have a surplus of beavers. But the euphoria was not to last. The European beaver died a year after his arrival “in an accident.” [11] The Canadian specimens were still alive so the guidebooks continued to highlight them with an updated photo.
In 1921, when Skansen once again hosted European beavers—this time on their way to a reintroduction site in northern Sweden—the text was modified to play up the “local” beavers and play down the Canadian ones. After a description of the European variety, the guidebook noted: “In a part of the same area there are two examples of the Canadian beaver. They are recognized by the darker fur and wider tail. These came to Skansen respectively in 1909 and 1910.”[12] The Canadian beavers in Sweden got sent to the back seat when the Nordic beavers arrived.
The tension between Canadian beavers and Nordic ones also showed up in reintroduction projects. Finland’s beaver history follows very closely the Swedish one. The last beaver in Finland died in 1868, just three years before the last confirmed beaver in Sweden. In 1935-36, only 13 years after the first Swedish reintroduction, 19 beavers from Norway were reintroduced in Finland. But in 1937, seven Castor canadensis were also set out in Finland. The Canadian beavers were incredibly successful in Finland: estimates in 1999 were that their population had reached 12,000 whereas the European beaver population introduced the year before was only 1,500. Because North American beavers are not native to Europe, they are classified as an alien, invasive species in Finland.[13] Eradication of the Canadian beavers in Finland was proposed by a group of scientists in 2012, but such a program has never been carried out.[14]
Sweden could have ended up with the same Canadian beaver problem. After a proposal for beaver reintroduction to Sweden using European beavers from Norway was launched, one commentator wrote a letter to the reintroduction coordinator suggesting that Canadian beavers would be a better choice.[15] The letter writer, Johan Larsson, had been a fur trapper in Canada for 8 years (1905 to 1914 with a one-year hiatus). He believed that beavers could be brought over from Canada to repopulate Sweden. He noted that he had seen Canadian beavers doing well in captivity, as well as living in the wild near human habitation. He thought that it could be particularly advantageous for the two types of beavers to crossbreed to strengthen the blood lines (we know now that this is not possible). Luckily for Sweden, this suggested introduction route was not taken, and Canadian beavers remained only in zoos.
As Castor canadensis has now been an officially-recognized Canadian icon for 50 years, this history shows that Canadian beavers also made their way to the Nordic countries on the other side of the globe, serving as icons of Canada elsewhere.
[1] These two animals are both beavers and look similar, but they cannot interbreed because C. fiber has 48 chromosomes and C. canadensis has 40.
[2] Herman Ring, Skansen och Nordiska museets anläggningar å Djurgården (Samson & Wallin, 1893), 69-70 .
[3] Robert Collett, “Om Bæveren (Castor fiber), og dens Udbredelse i Norge fordum og nu,” Nyt magazin for naturvidenskaberne 28 (1883): 11-45
[4] “Bäfrar på Skansen,” Kalmar, 21 Oct 1901, 3.
[5] Letters from Emanuel Ohlén, 16 July 1902, and telegram from Ohlén, 11 August 1902, Skansen Zoologiska trädgården innkommende korrespondens, Ämbetsarkivet, Nordiska Museet, Stockholm.
[6] Alarik Behm, Skansens Zoologiska Trädgård Kort Vägledning för Besökande (Nordiska Museets Förlag, 1903), 12.
[7] “En bäfverfamilj till Skansen,” Östgötposten, 29 November 1907, 2.
[8] Redogörelse för Nordiska Museets utveckling och förvaltning, år 1909 (P.A. Noustedt & Söner, 1911), 45; Redogörelse för Nordiska Museets utveckling och förvaltning, år 1910 (P.A. Noustedt & Söner, 1912), 31–32.
[9] Alarik Behm, Skansens Zoologiska Trädgård, Kort Vägledning för Besökande (Nordiska Museets Förlag, 1910), 36–37.
[10] Letter from Zoologischer Garten Berlin to Alarik Behm dated 28 September 1910, Skansen Zoologiska trädgården innkommende korrespondens, Ämbetsarkivet, Nordiska Museet.
[11] Alarik Behm, Nordiska Däggdjur: 177 bilder från Skansen (J.A. Lindblads Bokförlags Aktiebolag, 1922), 132; Redogörelse för Nordiska Museets utveckling och förvaltning, år 1911 (P.A. Noustedt & Söner, 1913), 45.
[12] Alarik Behm, Skansens Zoologiska Trädgård Kort Vägledning för Besökande (Nordiska Museets Förlag, 1922), 9
[13] https://vieraslajit.fi/lajit/MX.48250
[14] Howard Parker, Petri Nummi, Göran Hartman and Frank Rosell, “Invasive North American beaver Castor canadensis in Eurasia: a review of potential consequences and a strategy for eradication,” Wildlife Biology 18, no. 4 (2012): 354-365.
[15] Letter Johan Larsson to Eric Festin, 6 June 1921, folder C32.2 Bäverinplanteringen, 1920-1922, Jamtli archive, Östersund, Sweden.
