Earth Day Around the Bay, 2011
Looking for ways to celebrate Earth Day? No matter which side of the Bay you're on, there are great events with wildlife watching, cool eco stuff, and even hands-dirty habitat restoration. Don't miss it!
Category: Stewardship
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.
‘Seal the Deal!’
Dr. Marty Griffin has been working for decades to protect open spaces and wildlife along the Marin and Sonoma coasts. In January 2011, Bay Nature recognized him with our first-ever Local Hero award in conservation advocacy. His advice for getting things done? “Seal the deal!” And figure out how to pay for it later.
Big Plans for Wild Lands
When it comes to the challenge of preserving biodiversity in the face of climate change, population growth, and other pressures, you have to think big. A new regional plan does just that with a proposal for a comprehensive Conservation Lands Network whose implementation would help ensure the preservation of diverse habitats essential for the survival of healthy populations of native species.
Restoration at Redwood Park in Los Altos
Redwood Grove Park near downtown Los Altos has the fingerprints (and footprints) of volunteers all over it. Palo Alto-based nonprofit Acterra is leading restoration at this 5.9-acre park.
SF Bay in Goods Hands (Thousands of Them)
In December 2010, Kay Kerr died at 99 years old. Kerr, along with Sylvia McLaughlin and Esther Gulick, founded the Save San Francisco Bay Association. Now, Save the Bay is turning 50 and turning out as many volunteers as ever. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory marks 30 years of its critical work banding and studying birds.
Putting Open Space on the Map
If you want to know something about getting around the Bay Area, ask Larry Orman, executive director of GreenInfo Network, board chair for Bay Nature, and the first director of Greenbelt Alliance.
Saving Land, From Hilltops to the Bay
For over 30 years, Lennie Roberts has been one of the Bay Area's leading voices for open space protection and against sprawl. Roberts has played a key role in many critical open space battles on the Peninsula and in the South Bay. She also played a major role in the effort to create the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District in 1972.
LEJ’s SF EcoCenter Wins EPA Environmental Justice Award
Nestled deep in the Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood among a tallow rendering plant, a wastewater treatment facility, a concrete plant, and one of the state's largest Superfund sites, the EcoCenter built by Literacy for Environmental Justice may just be the Bay Area's most innovative green building. And the federal EPA agrees.
The Crazy Broom Lady of the Oakland Hills
Longtime television anchorwoman Wendy Tokuda now spends many days in the East Bay hills, finding endangered manzanitas and communing with pileated woodpeckers. All because of her obsession with an invasive weed called French broom. And her years of effort are paying off.
Surrounded by Nature in San Francisco
Ever since an epiphany with pickleweed in Oakland as a kid, Asha Setty has wanted to learn as much as possible about native plants. She started working for the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy more than 12 years ago as an intern, and now she helps get the word out about projects happening at GGNRA.
