California’s state park system is the largest and most diverse natural and cultural heritage holdings in the nation. Yet the century-and-a-half-old system has been in perpetual crisis mode for several decades, battered about by funding shortfalls and repeated threats of closures.
The Cotoni-Coast Dairies became a unit of the California Coastal National Monument in 2017. Following a two-year planning process, the Cotoni-Coast Dairies monument was slated to open in the fall of 2022. But that deadline has come and gone while the BLM navigates objections to the agency’s plan for public access.
Over 4,000 native plant seedlings were knocked over in broad daylight at the Friends of Sausal Creek's native plant nursery in Joaquin Miller Park, Oakland. At least 600 seedlings were lost, and the creek restoration organization estimates material damages as high as $8,000.
Want to do more outdoors than play? The Bay Area is rich with protected habitat that needs tending. Discover your community and get outside while doing good. Reach out to these organizations, and check BayNature.org/events for more.
California, the most biodiverse state, hopes to stave off the Sixth Extinction by protecting 30 percent of its lands and waters by 2030. How's that going?
January 2023 marks the 30th anniversary of the Trails Challenge—a beloved annual tradition that helps people of all abilities access the vast East Bay Regional Park District and inspires them to get outside.
Today, Midpen’s expertise extends beyond acquiring land for the public and into the complex work of restoring and sustaining it. It funds studies of local species—from burrowing owls to the marbled murrelet—and awards grants to improve accessibility, interpretation, and education.
Eucalyptus trees on Albany Hill are wasting away from blight. Some people may cheer—but these trees are also home to endangered monarchs.
"Peregrines are birds of the air," says one expert. "Prairie falcons are falcons of the ground." That makes them more sensitive to habitat loss throughout California, too.
Two landscapes stand divided by the hundred-year-old Yolo Bypass West Levee in Solano County. To the south of the levee’s U shape, canals tangle toward the sprawling Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta, which teems with wildlife. North of the levee, former … Read more
Big Basin State Park is not the lush, shady ancient forest it once was. In August 2020, 97 percent of the old-growth forest nestled in the heart of the Santa Cruz Mountains burned in the devastating CZU Lightning Complex fire. … Read more
Independent, nonprofit environmental journalism connecting people with nature in the San Francisco Bay Area.
