- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
To help prioritize lands for growth and conservation, the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) has been collaborating with local organizations and stakeholders to develop an innovative online regional mapping tool called SoCal Greenprint.
The SoCal Greenprint is the first database of natural resources for all six counties in the SCAG region – Imperial, Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties – and 191 cities in an area covering more than 38,000...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Under sunny skies, a cool breeze blowing off the ocean at Asilomar State Beach, California Naturalist Scott Van Tyle pulls out a knife and begins dissecting a seaweed root ball that had washed up on the sand. A group of fellow naturalists quickly gather around to see what tiny sea creatures call the massive tangle home.
Similar scenes were repeated frequently during the three-day California Naturalist conference in October. The legless lizards and gopher snake brought in by a Fort Ord Dunes State Park ranger, a family of raccoons under the dining hall deck, deer browsing among the cottages and a beautiful sunset drew quick attention from participants. It is this enthusiasm that defines California Naturalists, a community with...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
When actress René Russo appeared in a video (posted below) about “New Oak Threats,” she wasn’t acting. The veteran of big-budget thrillers like Lethal Weapon 3 and 4 and the Thomas Crown Affair expressed her personal convictions when she called for Californians to become educated and observant guardians of California oaks.
“I love our beautiful oak trees,” Russo said. “But there’s a new pest in town, and we could potentially lose every tree that we have. It would change the face of Southern California. It’s terrifying.”
The actress says the death of 80,000 oak trees in San Diego County since 2008 from...
- Author: Jeannette E. Warnert
Long before European settlers arrived in America, the Los Angeles River was an important source of food and water for native peoples. Europeans settled the Los Angeles area in part because of the river and the fertile alluvial soils it provided. The river and its tributaries frequently flooded and changed course, forming wide alluvial floodplains that extended across southern Los Angeles from modern day Santa Monica to Long Beach. When Los Angeles began its transition to teeming metropolis and settled these flat floodplains, the river's natural characteristics led to disastrous flooding.
In the interest of saving lives and property, civil engineers sloped the banks and encased them in more than 30 miles of concrete, a move that...
