Some more parts of Slovakia are seeing the return of beavers after more than a century of their absence, with fishermen spotting the animals most recently along a stretch of the Vah River in 'Stredne Povazie' ('Central Povazie') in western Slovakia.
Dozens of felled trees and gnawed stumps along the river according to Ľubomír Malo, mayor of the village of Potvorice in the western Slovak district of Nove Mesto nad Vahom (Trenčín region), one particular beaver even put on a show for a local fisherman recently. “I would have none of it, so I went to see for myself, and I found felled trees, part of them immersed in the river and part of them on the river bank. I believe that they've come back here, because over the last few years have seen a massive improvement in the quality of the river water,” said Malo. Peter Novacik of local civil association Brectan ('Ivy') noted that beavers were officially pronounced extinct in the then Czechoslovakia in 1977. The last traces of beavers were spotted near Bratislava in 1910. Beavers used to be common on Slovakia's territory before they were killed off, most probably by humans and industrialisation.
