The Beaver Puppet Collaborative is a joint project formed in 2026 with Minneapolis-based artists Kim Boustead and Jessie Merriam, and Dr. Emily Fairfax of the Fairfax Beaver Lab. Beaver Day Parade events were inspired in part by, and coincide with, BeaverCON, a national conference for wetlands and wildlife coming to the Twin Cities and put on by Beaver Institute, but are not directly affiliated or sponsored by Beaver Institute or the conference. You can read about all of these people and organizations below. 

Why puppets, you ask? 

Puppetry for education and advocacy has a rich history nationwide and especially in Minneapolis, where artists inspired by Bread and Puppet Theatre in Vermont created the first May Day Parade in Minneapolis in 1975. A great variety of puppetry workshops, theatres, and festivals exist in the Twin Cities, and many of them are focused on adult themes, though many are all-ages. Learn more about puppet history in this article and in this video by a University of Minnesota Heritage Studies and Public History student here. 

The Beaver Puppet Collaborative is....

• Dr. Emily Fairfax is an Assistant Professor of Geography at the University of Minnesota and affiliate faculty member at the St. Anthony Falls Laboratory specializing in ecohydrology. Fairfax uses a combination of remote sensing, modeling, and field work to understand how beaver ecosystem engineering can create drought and fire-resistant patches in the landscape under a changing climate. She is enthusiastic about greater understanding and support of beaver ecosystems in the Twin Cities and beyond, and co-created the beaver lodge art shanty in 2026. 

• Kim Boustead and Jessie Merriam both worked as artists-in-residence with the Minneapolis/St. Paul Long Term Ecological Research program (MSP LTER) from 2023-2025 and created art-ecology events called Rambles. They continue to collaborate on art-ecology events such as the Frogtown Climate Carnival (2025), Franconia Sculpture Park workshops, and more.

• Kim is a freelance artist and graphic designer who researches and creates unique workshops connecting invasive species and ecological issues with hands-on natural materials-based art activities.

• Jessie is an artist, public historian, and currently works as the Community-Engaged Research Coordinator for the MSP LTER on connecting communities with ecologists. 

Puppet Collaborators: 

• • Felicia Cooper is a puppeteer and performer who has created a variety of shows, experiences, and events in the Twin Cities and beyond. She makes puppet shows and art experiences which allow us to ask questions together, to be complicit in inquiry and mischief. She uses a practice of community and embodied research to inform her work. She is an affiliate artist of In the Heart of the Beast, where she hosts a monthly Puppet in Progress group, and produces the O.H.N.O. Puppet Show with Puppet Union. She helped start the first Minneapolis Crankiefest and was a coordinator for the 2026 May Day Parade. 

  • Foxie is bringing puppets to the people. He is a seasoned puppet fabricator and community mobilizer with experience deeply rooted in the Barebones and May Day Parade traditions of South Minneapolis. He is enthusiastically unleashing puppet power in fresh community contexts including the International Bog Day parade, Beltane Parade, Pro Palestine Puppet Parade, and is an unofficial cultural liaison between the Puppet Sister Cities of Minneapolis and Chicago. 

A sampler of local and national beaver research and advocacy

• “Why Beavers?” By Beaver Institute. Beaver Institute is a national nonprofit founded in 2017, their vision is to restore ecological balance with beavers. “Our mission is to be a catalyst for advancing beaver management and watershed restoration, training mitigation professionals, supporting scientific research, and increasing the public’s appreciation of the beaver’s critical role in creating climate resilient ecosystems.”
  (See below for information on their conference, BeaverCON, that travels to different cities every two years). 

• Friends of Bde Psin (Lake Hiawatha)
  Stewarding beaver habitat and beaver rehabilitation in Minneapolis.

• The Bell Museum, Minnesota’s state natural history museum, has beaver exhibits and a diorama, including a model of a prehistoric beaver! 

• Learn more about prehistory and more recent history of beavers from the Minnesota Historical Society (MNHS) from the Beaver Tales episode of the  “Unraveled” podcast. MNHS’s History Center “Then, Now, Wow” exhibit also tells some of the history of the beaver fur trade that nearly eliminated beavers from Minnesota and the nation, was a major economic driver of the early United States, and led to the establishment of Fort Snelling and settlement of this region. 

• BeaverCON, a national conference for wetlands and wildlife coming to the Twin Cities.

  • September 28 - September 30: conference, primarily at Macnamara Hall on the University of Minnesota east bank campus. 

  • This conference includes optional add-on field trips for registrants. 

  • Wednesday September 30, evening: a public (ticketed) reception for BeaverCON open to the public at the Bell Museum (more details to come). 

*Beaver Day Parade and associated events are cross-promoted by the conference, but not directly affiliated. Beaver Day Parade and workshops are free and open to the public.