WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.540 --> 00:00:02.760 We have been told by our ancestors 2 00:00:02.760 --> 00:00:06.450 that in the early days of us, the two legs, 3 00:00:06.450 --> 00:00:08.820 being upon the Earth, 4 00:00:08.820 --> 00:00:11.970 the responsibility for maintaining the cleanliness 5 00:00:11.970 --> 00:00:14.940 of our waters, the purity of our waters 6 00:00:14.940 --> 00:00:17.130 was assigned to Beaver. 7 00:00:17.130 --> 00:00:19.500 Beaver was known as the architect. 8 00:00:19.500 --> 00:00:22.620 He was able to build a series of dams 9 00:00:22.620 --> 00:00:25.230 along all of our waterways, the feeder creeks 10 00:00:25.230 --> 00:00:27.180 that enter into the major rivers, 11 00:00:27.180 --> 00:00:28.350 and when he did this, 12 00:00:28.350 --> 00:00:31.080 he was able to capture all those impurities, 13 00:00:31.080 --> 00:00:32.220 those types of things 14 00:00:32.220 --> 00:00:37.220 that would impact the quality of our waters. 15 00:00:37.410 --> 00:00:42.240 And in doing so, he created a mosaic 16 00:00:42.240 --> 00:00:46.260 of freshwater marshes all throughout our homelands. 17 00:00:46.260 --> 00:00:49.320 And in these marsh areas, animals like the deer 18 00:00:49.320 --> 00:00:53.370 and the beaver and the wild turkeys, 19 00:00:53.370 --> 00:00:56.490 they would all take advantage of all the different types 20 00:00:56.490 --> 00:00:59.730 of growth that occurred all around the marsh areas. 21 00:00:59.730 --> 00:01:03.030 So it became a very balanced ecosystem. 22 00:01:03.030 --> 00:01:06.420 And they were able to be so successful 23 00:01:06.420 --> 00:01:07.980 in building these dams 24 00:01:07.980 --> 00:01:11.040 that they captured a lot of the fresh water. 25 00:01:11.040 --> 00:01:14.490 And this fresh water was to the point in which the amount 26 00:01:14.490 --> 00:01:17.280 of salinity that goes into the Potomac River, 27 00:01:17.280 --> 00:01:21.810 that point where in Mallows Bay National Marine Sanctuary, 28 00:01:21.810 --> 00:01:26.810 it was all brackish water all the way up to 29 00:01:26.910 --> 00:01:29.430 the Indian Head Naval Base to the Mattawoman Creek. 30 00:01:29.430 --> 00:01:33.330 All of that was brackish water back in the time of contact 31 00:01:33.330 --> 00:01:38.330 with the colonists and once the fur trade came along 32 00:01:38.820 --> 00:01:41.910 and the beaver population with our homelands was wiped out 33 00:01:41.910 --> 00:01:44.760 and the tobacco plantations came in 34 00:01:44.760 --> 00:01:46.890 and started clearing away their dams, 35 00:01:46.890 --> 00:01:50.670 they released all that fresh water into the Potomac 36 00:01:50.670 --> 00:01:53.190 and pushed the salinity level of the waters, 37 00:01:53.190 --> 00:01:58.140 the salt waters, back down to the lower part of Nanjemoy, 38 00:01:58.140 --> 00:02:01.440 to the southern tip of the national marine sanctuary. 39 00:02:01.440 --> 00:02:04.830 So we continue to tell the story of how 40 00:02:04.830 --> 00:02:07.530 the original role of the beaver was to protect 41 00:02:07.530 --> 00:02:11.490 as a water protector and now we, as two legged, 42 00:02:11.490 --> 00:02:15.150 the humans, it is our responsibility to help the beaver 43 00:02:15.150 --> 00:02:18.270 and become caretakers of our waters. 44 00:02:18.270 --> 00:02:20.103 Waters is sacred to our people. 45 00:02:21.180 --> 00:02:22.950 Part of the role that the beaver does 46 00:02:22.950 --> 00:02:26.460 in protecting the waters is to create a series of dams 47 00:02:26.460 --> 00:02:28.260 and when they create these dams, 48 00:02:28.260 --> 00:02:31.230 these dams last for about six or seven years. 49 00:02:31.230 --> 00:02:33.000 And what they do, they pile up sticks 50 00:02:33.000 --> 00:02:35.460 and sticks on top of each other year after year, 51 00:02:35.460 --> 00:02:39.000 and the water table behind the dam gets larger and larger. 52 00:02:39.000 --> 00:02:42.390 And therefore, the dam has to get bigger and bigger. 53 00:02:42.390 --> 00:02:46.020 And during this process, all those impurities 54 00:02:46.020 --> 00:02:48.570 that may have washed into the waters 55 00:02:48.570 --> 00:02:50.760 are captured behind that dam 56 00:02:50.760 --> 00:02:54.510 and then as time goes by, 57 00:02:54.510 --> 00:02:57.480 the bottom part of the dam begins to deteriorate, 58 00:02:57.480 --> 00:02:58.980 so the beaver moves on. 59 00:02:58.980 --> 00:03:01.650 And what that has done behind, it creates that marsh, 60 00:03:01.650 --> 00:03:05.040 that marsh area is still resident, 61 00:03:05.040 --> 00:03:09.360 that open plane of habitat 62 00:03:09.360 --> 00:03:12.030 will stay that way for many more years 63 00:03:12.030 --> 00:03:14.700 until the next generation of beaver comes back in. 64 00:03:14.700 --> 00:03:19.410 So a beaver dam may be empty for six, seven years, 65 00:03:19.410 --> 00:03:23.070 but if the population is left not bothered, 66 00:03:23.070 --> 00:03:25.710 then a new set of beavers will come in 67 00:03:25.710 --> 00:03:29.040 and reestablish that dam and that process is cyclical. 68 00:03:29.040 --> 00:03:32.880 So it's always a new process from generation to generation, 69 00:03:32.880 --> 00:03:35.493 moving from dam to dam, protecting the waters.