Ben Lamm

well, then it can lead to full degradation of the ecosystem.

And so we see that with large herbivores like mammoth and bison and others.

We see that with certain aquatic animals like blue whales.

We see that even in predators like wolves, right?

There's an awesome study about Yellowstone where when they removed the wolves from Yellowstone and culled them in 1925, the park started to degrade.

Now, the park didn't go away.

But what happened was all of these different herbivores, like the deer and elk and stuff like that, they started overgrazing.

They started overpopulating.

They stopped migrating.

They got sedentary.

And so they ate everything.

The closest food source was along the river, and that's where all of the water was.

So they ate all there.

Well, then there's no beavers actually kind of work in this like really interesting kind of like circumference of where they build their dams.

Well, then there's nothing that the beavers could then go use that was mature enough from a tree perspective to go build dams.

Wow.

Yeah.

So it's crazy.

They've actually mapped that the reintroduction of wolves has actually not only increased biodiversity into Yellowstone, but it's also reshaped rivers in Yellowstone.

Yeah, it's crazy because when I think about it, when a beaver dams at the river, it actually starts to expand.