Charleville-Mézières (AFP)
20:30, the day falls on the Semois, a tributary of the Meuse. Suddenly, a ripple on the pond created by a dam-hut and the swimming of an animal: the beaver of Europe is indeed returned in the Ardennes, after having disappeared there during several decades.
"This is excellent news" rejoices Nathalie Mear-Caubel, engineer in charge of biodiversity within the Epama (public establishment of development of the Meuse and its tributaries).
Created in 1996 to build structures capable of curbing the floods of the river after the catastrophic floods of 1993 and 1994, Epama today wants to be at the forefront of the return of biodiversity in the watershed of the river. Meuse.
"A battle is under way," says Boris Ravignon, president of Epama and mayor of Charleville-Mézières (Ardennes). "The idea is to work on so-called umbrella species, protecting them by protecting all species and aquatic environments," he adds.
Among them, the otter and the Atlantic salmon, completely disappeared from the French Meuse basin as a result of the river's development operations and the degradation of the quality of the water, and whose return is envisaged in the medium term in the Ardennes.
"The salmon has been going back from the North Sea to Belgium for a few years now to reproduce, so the goal is to allow it to go back to France thanks to the arrangement of corridors on the dams built on the Meuse", explains Nathalie Mear-Caubel.
"For the otter, the last inventories made have identified very favorable environments" underlines the engineer "Water and Environment".
The progressively improved quality of the water of the Meuse and its tributaries as the preservation of the natural spaces are enough to attract these animals, according to the technique.
"You have to know that the Meuse plays a role of link between the populations of otters of the basin of the Seine and the Aube and those of Belgium and Luxembourg" she completes.
This is why the return of the beaver in the north of the Ardennes, from a small reintroduction in Belgium, is experienced as an encouragement. It signifies the good quality of an aquatic environment now more conducive to the reinstallation of the otter.
"Beavers have gone up the Meuse and its tributaries, and now all rivers are colonized by beaver families," says Mear-Caubel.
They have thus metamorphosed the tiny valley of the Hulle, a tributary of the Semois, classified Natura 2000, in a kind of bayou where successive slaughtered oaks cut beveled at their base, dams-huts, small bodies of water and mini-canals where beavers carry their nocturnal cargo of branches to be tasted.
"As an engineer, the beaver modifies its environment and promotes the biodiversity of the river," says Mear-Caubel. In fact, trout, sculpins, lampreys but also dragonflies, red frogs and other species called "fodder" have recaptured in large numbers this little corner of Ardennes forest.
Other species are also targeted by this battle for biodiversity, such as the endangered black stork - a couple of couples at most in the Ardennes - or pike.
"Pike are present on the Meuse but these populations are to be strengthened and stabilized by protecting in particular the environments where they breed, which will also help preserve the natural floodplains of the river," says Mear-Caubel.
She evokes in passing the transit of a few wolves in the Ardennes forest. "For the lynx, we do not know".
The mayor of Charleville-Mezieres, he does not despair of seeing the return of swimming in the Meuse. In this perspective, beaver, otter and salmon have become natural allies.
© 2019 AFP