Fern Ravine Habitat Restoration!

Join us on Saturday, June 6th from 9:00am - 1:00 pm at Fern Ravine in Joaquin Miller Park, Oakland, CA. Come meet your neighbors, enjoy the beautiful redwood forest, and help protect your local watershed!

We'll be working together to:

• Pull invasive grasses (Ehrharta grass, Sourgrass) and other invasive plants (Cape ivy, Forget-me-not)
• Water new native plantings that were placed during this past wet season to ensure their success
• Place mulching in areas with fresh native plantings to protect them from invasive plant take-over
• Install wooden split fencing to protect important habitat from pedestrian and cyclist activity

Free parking in the Redwood Bowl Staging Area across the street. Please bring a water bottle, sun protection, pants, long socks, and closed-toe shoes. Gloves, tools, water and SNACKS will be provided! No experience is neccessary and all ages are welcome. Event will occur rain or shine!

Please sign the following waivers to make check-in quicker:

• Friends of Sausal Creek online waiver
• City of Oakland online waiver (must be filled out once per calendar year)

Site background: Fern Ravine in Joaquin Miller Park, Oakland, CA is a unique intersection of redwood forest, grassland, and wetland ecosystems. The site includes Fern Ravine Creek, part of the headwaters of the Sausal Creek Watershed. Downstream of Fern Ravine Creek, Sausal Creek currently hosts rainbow trout populations, and has historically hosted steelhead trout (salmonid) populations.

Logging and grazing in the nineteenth century, and heavy recreational use since the 1920s has resulted in the replacement of native plants with invasives, soil compaction, erosion, and sedimentation. Invasive plants such as Ehrharta Grass, Cape Ivy, Wood Sorrel and French Broom have spread aggressively in the area, outcompeting the native plants and reducing biodiversity. This has degraded the soil quality and increased erosion, resulting in sedimentation in the creek which is detrimental to the water quality.

Friends of Sausal Creek has been restoring the site since 2010 and has made extraordinary progress reestablishing habitat, increasing native plant cover, and improving ecosystem functions. Their work serves dual purposes of conserving biodiversity and mitigating climate change in Oakland. Join us in contributing towards these goals, preserving this beautiful site and improving habitat for rainbow trout!

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Host or Publisher Sarah Dunwoody