The San Francisco Bay Area is bejeweled with hundreds of parks and open space preserves as well as a rich set of laws and policies meant to ensure the survival of vulnerable species and ecosystems. Real people made this happen through a dedicated call to stewardship.
While living for a while on the Monterey Peninsula, I found myself drawn time and again from the cafes and shops of Pacific Grove down to the waters of Monterey Bay. Sometimes I would just sit on a bench and look for sea otters resting and feeding their pups in the undulating kelp beds. My time in Monterey was a small but privileged window into the wonderful diversity that makes the central coast of California one of the richest marine ecosystems in the world...
When I stand on San Francisco’s Ocean Beach and look west, it’s difficult for me to comprehend that we humans can have any impact of consequence on a body of water that is so vast, let alone impacts that are … Read more
In February 2007, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey reintroduced H.R. 1187, a bill to expand the Gulf of the Farallones and Cordell Bank national marine sanctuaries to include the entire Sonoma coast and parts of Mendocino, making those areas off-limits to oil … Read more
Forty miles northwest of San Francisco, the San Andreas Fault slips into the Pacific Ocean, creating Tomales Bay, the outlet for countless creeks and rills in rainy West Marin. But for over 100 years, fresh water from Lagunitas Creek has … Read more
Thanks to the efforts of dozens of volunteers, a biologically rich watershed on the Russian River has become one of the newest additions to our state park system.
Tending the Wild: Native American Knowledge and the Management of California’s Natural Resources, by M. Kat Anderson, University of California Press, 2005, 526 pages, $39.95 A common belief among those who are not of California Indian ancestry is that California … Read more
In 1930, UC Berkeley botany student Mary Bowerman accepted a professor’s assignment to identify all the flowers on Mount Diablo. “Little did I know 65 years ago that my senior project would become my life’s work,” explained Bowerman, who died … Read more
At the northern edge of San Pablo Bay, a salt marsh harvest mouse hides beneath the protective cover of a pickleweed plant while a red-tailed hawk searches for breakfast. Only about six inches from the tip of its tail to … Read more
From the early 1980s until his death in 1992, Bob Walker took photos that captured the beauty of the East Bay's wildlands, and his advocacy marshaled public support for protecting those landscapes, leading to the purchase of more than 30,000 acres for public open space. In fall 2007, a new book of Walker's work gave us the opportunity to revisit the luminous landscape photography of this local conservation hero.
The Country in the City: The Greening of the San Francisco Bay Area, by Richard A. Walker, University of Washington Press, 2007, 404 pages, $35 University of Washington Press In his new history of Bay Area conservation and environmentalism, Richard … Read more
