BEAVERS

BEAVERS

Mar 24, 2025 | ENVIRONMENT, WORLD

Beavers live where there is enough water to dive, they build the entrance to their burrows underwater for greater safety, then if the water level is not sufficient, they build a dam.

We learnt the ‘beaver – dam’ association of thought from an early age, do you remember any cartoons in particular?

I mention cartoons because the beavers I want to talk about are definitely characters.

The beavers I want to talk about live in Brdy in the Czech Republic.

The name of this area: Brdy comes from brdo meaning hill, precisely because it is a hilly/mountainous and wooded area.

The presence of a military zone in this area meant that the area was not affected by any urbanisation, thus preserving the naturalistic aspect: flora and fauna.

Having become an environmentally protected landscape for Brdy, it had become necessary to repair a drainage canal built by the army and restore the wetlands.

Huge and extremely expensive works, the plans for which had run aground under the weight of bureaucracy and waiting for appropriations.

But the beavers magically solved the issue by building a dam!

Zero cost and a great lesson to be learned.

Nature teaches us about life in harmonious balance.

‘Beavers always know what is best. The places where they build dams are always chosen in the right way, better than when we design them on paper,’ these words are from Jaroslav Obermajer, head of the Central Bohemia office of the Czech Agency for the Protection of Nature and Landscape (AOPK). 

What can I say?

I would use the words of Jules Verne:
Nature’s creative power is far beyond man’s instinct of destruction.

Do you know another similar case?

FILOSOFEGGIANDO IN ALLEGREZZA

FILOSOFEGGIANDO IN ALLEGREZZA

Aug 19, 2022 | JOURNEY FROM MUG TO MUG

Filosofeggiando in allegrezza is the blog that gives us a new stage of the Journey from mug to mug, and now I have plenty of joyful serenity for these pictures too!

As you may have guessed, the photo below the title is from Spain: Galicia, and to be precise it is from the Vigo Book Festival. 

As Feiras do Libro de Galicia take place every year in various towns and cities in Galicia, in the spring and summer months, with stalls run by booksellers, and an extensive program of parallel activities, such as readings, meetings with authors, exhibitions, book presentations, etc., that make these events a meeting of great cultural interest.

The writer who most universalized Vigo was Jules Verne, in a passage from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.

Have you read it?

I missed it until my son brought it home from the elementary school library, but there’s always time to recover, right?

In Verne’s novel, the Vigo estuary hides very rich treasures from the Battle of the Bay or Battle of Rande.

“So, Mr. Aronnax (…), we are in that same bay of Vigo. It is up to you to unravel its mysteries.”

The battle took place on October 23, 1702 between the Anglo-Dutch and Spanish-French coalitions during the War of the Spanish Succession. Spanish galleons arrived at the Vigo estuary laden with the greatest treasure that had ever crossed the Atlantic: gold and silver, jewels…

“The sand was littered with those treasures. Then, laden with that precious booty, those men would return to the Nautilus, deposit their burdens and resume that inexhaustible fishery for gold and silver.”

Since then hundreds of dives have been made in the waters of the Vigo Estuary in search of treasure. Without going any further, six battle-related wrecks were located and identified in 2011.

Thus, don’t you think that the quote chosen to introduce the Festival:

THE BEST STORIES BEGIN WITH GOOD COFFEE

is simply perfect?

If you want to discover further interesting anecdotes about Galicia, don’t miss the description of the trip here on Filosfeggiando in Allegrezza. 

Speaking of precious things then, here are two coffees from Monforte de Lemos!

So after Verne we can also mention Miguel Cervantes’ El ingenioso caballero don Quijote de la Mancha, precisely with reference to the Count of Lemos.

But about Monforte de Lemos you can ind more details on Filosfeggiando in allegrezza in the second part of the report.

And what about you? Where have you had your coffee lately?

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