Paddles the brown beaver, his two cartoonish front teeth seemingly designed for tree gnawing, has a message for children: Don’t damage the fragile cherry trees on the National Mall.
The National Cherry Blossom Festival kicks off Saturday, and the National Park Service is reaching out to thousands of youngsters who will be gamboling among the 3,700 trees that surround the Tidal Basin and the Washington Monument.
Please, Paddles asks, “Don’t pick the blossoms.”
Or shake the trees. Or break the branches.
“It’s a way in which to communicate to that age group the necessity of protecting the cherry trees,” NPS spokesman Bill Line said of the mascot, who is supposed to appeal to children 7 to 12 years old. “It’s a natural resource protection initiative.”
Paddles was unveiled last year, but the park service plans to expand his use.
But why the beaver? The semi-aquatic rodent was responsible for felling a number of cherry trees in the late 1990s. Toppling trees, after all, is what they do.
“We are trying in essence to reclaim the beaver,” Line said.
In the last decade, the NPS has lined the younger cherry trees – beavers don’t appreciate the taste of older sap – with black corrugated tubing.
“That is absolutely an effective block or prevention technique to the beavers,” Line said.
For more information, visit www.nps.gov/nama.
