Emily Fairfax

Emily Fairfax is an ecohydrologist, beaver researcher, and assistant professor of geography at the University of Minnesota. She is best known for her research describing how beavers create drought and wildfire resistant patches in the landscape. Fairfax and her research have been featured internationally in numerous written, radio, and television media programs about beavers.

Early life and education
Fairfax double-majored in Chemistry and Physics as an undergraduate at Carleton College, then went on to earn her Ph.D. in Geology from the University of Colorado Boulder. She was awarded a DoD NDSEG Fellowship for her doctoral studies, and completed graduate certificates in Hydrologic Sciences and in College Teaching while at the University of Colorado Boulder. Fairfax says that her interest in science developed at an early age—as a young child she told her that mother that wanted to walk on the rings of Saturn, but to not worry because she'd bring her car seat to be safe. She was a Girl Scout growing up and spent significant time camping outdoors and leading canoe trips in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, which she says kindled her interest in environmental science and wetlands in particular. She began to seriously think about beavers and their relationship to climate change when she watched the PBS documentary "Leave it to Beavers".

Career
Fairfax is an ecohydrologist, beaver expert, and science communicator. She was an assistant professor of Environmental Science and Resource Management at California State University Channel Islands from 2019 to 2023. In 2023, she started a new position as an assistant professor of Physical Geography at the University of Minnesota and is affiliated with the Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory. She was selected as an Environment Fellow by the Walton Family Foundation in 2024. Fairfax received the G.K. Gilbert Award for Excellence in Geomorphological Research from the American Association of Geographers - Geomorphology Specialty Group in 2024.

Research
Fairfax studies how ecosystem engineering by beavers increases the drought and fire resistance of wetland and riparian ecosystems in North America. She primarily uses remote sensing, modeling, and field work to quantify changes in ecosystem health before, during, and after disturbances in areas with and without beaver activity. Her study titled "Smokey the Beaver: beaver-dammed riparian corridors stay green during wildfire throughout the western United States" was the first scientific study to document beaver-created fire refugia and has garnered significant attention worldwide. Fairfax and this research have been featured in National Geographic, BBC, NPR,   PBS,  CBS News, ABC News, CBC News, AP News, Scientific American,  the Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times, amongst others.

Fairfax argues in her research that riverscape restoration and beaver conservation are necessary components of building landscape-scale climate resilience. She has testified before the Oregon State Legislature on the science of beaver-driven climate resilience and her studies are referenced in global, regional, and state-level land management planning documents. Fairfax worked with a team of engineers from Google to build a machine-learning image recognition model called EEAGER (Earth Engine Automated Geospatial Element(s) Recognition) that can identify beaver dams in satellite and aerial imagery, in hopes of expediting the field of beaver research and the implementation of beaver-based restoration projects.

Notable publications

 * Fairfax, E. & Whittle, A. (2020), Smokey the Beaver: beaver‐dammed riparian corridors stay green during wildfire throughout the western USA. Ecological Applications. doi:10.1002/eap.2225
 * Fairfax, E. & Small, E. E. (2018), Using remote sensing to assess the impact of beaver damming on riparian evapotranspiration in an arid landscape. Ecohydrology 11(7). doi:10.1002/eco.1993
 * Jordan, C. E.† & Fairfax, E.†. (2022), Beaver: The North American Freshwater Climate Action Plan. WIREs Water. doi: 10.1002/wat2.1592
 * Fairfax, E., Clinton, N., Zhu, E., Maiman, S., Shaikh, A., Macfarlane, W., Wheaton, J., Ackerstein, D., Corwin, E. (2023). EEAGER: a neural network for finding beaver complexes in aerial and satellite imagery. Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences. doi:10.1029/2022JG007196