“Step aside Jarosław Kaczyński, Donald Tusk has found a new arch enemy,” Csongor Körömi writes at the beginning of the article. The new strategy is aimed at preventing floods in southwestern Poland. Among those responsible for the situation the Polish Prime Minister named… beavers. 

“At a recent crisis team meeting Tusk raised the issue of dam and dike safety — which, he said, is being threatened by the furry animals,” the article says. 

“Sometimes you have to choose between love for animals and the safety of cities, villages and the stability of dikes,” Prime Minister Tusk said during a conference. 

As the author points out Prime Minister Tusk supports the idea of some researchers who claim that beavers may contribute to floods because of their own “water management”. Allegedly the dams created by those furry animals can “damage riverbanks, weaken levees through burrowing and cause a buildup of water.”

Politico consulted an environmental biologist, Mr Andrzej Czech on the beaver question. According to the expert, beavers are only a scapegoat and fell victim to a politically motivated search for those responsible for the devastating floods.

He also said that the government is pressured by lobby groups including hunters and farmers who want to get rid of beavers because of their reasons. 

The expert says that a decision to limit the population of beavers would lead to “mass destruction of habitats created by beavers, reduction of natural retention, violation of regulations and general anger. This is not the way to go.”

Source: Politico

Photo: Sutterstock

Tomasz Modrzejewski