The California Native Plant Society (CNPS) was formed in 1965 in the East Bay region. Today it is a statewide organization with thirty-three chapters. The East Bay Chapter covers Alameda and Contra Costa Counties. The state organization and the local chapters work together to increase understanding of California's native flora and to preserve this rich resource for future generations.

The flower in the banner at top is that of Grindelia hirsutula. Photo by Janice Bray

The 2011-2012 East Bay Chapter’s fundraiser for our Conservation Analyst has now begun. Letters have been sent to over 1,000 CNPS member households in Alameda and Contra Costa counties.

Our goal is to raise at least $35,000 to fund the half-time Conservation Analyst position that has become a key element in our Chapter’s conservation work.

The work of the Conservation Committee requires heavy doses of reading, reflection, research, networking and public meetings. It takes a group of people to assimilate large volumes of information and data, draw appropriate conclusions, create summaries and proposals and follow agency decision-making procedures., We need to do all those things, so that we can get on the agenda and explain to planners and the public the effect on native flora of a particular land use/development plan and what changes in the plan are needed to make it compatible with the protection of the flora. The Conservation Committee has discovered that despite the hard work and dedication of the volunteers, the help of a professional is needed for the Committee to deal with the enormous challenges it faces in carrying out its mission. The Committee was well served by the Chapter’s previous Conservation Analyst, Lech Naumovich. Mack Casterman has proved to be a strong and able successor, bringing an impressive array of skills and a powerful work ethic to the job.

As members of the California Native Plant Society, we have many reasons to value the often-overlooked living beings that constitute our state’s amazing native flora. We also have many ways we can act to preserve what we value. Important among them is to give generously to the 2011-2012 Conservation Analyst Fund.

Follow Mack on www.ebcnps.wordpress.com to understand how important and complex his work is.

A convenient way to donate is to click on the Paypal button below and follow the instructions.

If you prefer to give by check be sure to indicate on the subject line of your check that you are donating to the Conservation Analyst Fund, and send it to CNPS, East Bay Chapter, P.O. Box 5597, Elmwood Station, Berkeley, CA 94705.

Carol L.B. Castro
Conservation Analyst Fund Committee Chair

Volunteers Needed

The new park Supervisor at Sibley Regional Park is eager to have volunteers help with weed control.  In June, Janet Gawthrop, John Slaymaker and Wendy Tokuda showed up and hit a wall—a wall of broom.  On the up side, heading out on the shady trail, we saw all kinds of beautiful natives, including sword fern, snowberry and Douglas iris. In the field adjacent to this stand of broom there are many native grasses and Eriogonum nudum.  Undaunted, we ask for your help!  Please come attack the Genista on our now regular workday—the third Sunday of the month.  Sibley trailhead at 9 am.  The Park provides tools and snacks.

Photographs of native plants and related activity

East Bay Chapter Board Member Wins Conservation Award

ST. LOUIS–Holly Forbes, curator at the University of California Botanical Garden, has won the 2011 Star Award from the Center for Plant Conservation, located at the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis, for her work with rare and imperiled plant species. The award was presented on April 8 in conjunction with the Center for Plant Conservation’s national meeting, held this year in Denver, Colo., and recognizes individuals who demonstrate the concern, cooperation and personal investment needed to conserve imperiled native plants. [Read more]

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Calendar of Chapter Events

Native grassland in Knowland Park  Photo by Mack Casterman

For the last several months, EBCNPS has been hard at work on the Oakland Zoo’s proposed theme park development on the western knolls of Knowland Park.  In its current design, this development will directly impact one of the most sensitive areas of our “Foothills of South Oakland” BPPA.  The planned zoo footprint will result in the destruction of oak woodlands, Brittleleaf Manzanita Chaparral (Arctostaphylos crustacea crustacea Shrubland Alliance with rarity ranking of G2 S2), and acres of rare native Valley Needlegrass Grassland that in many experts’ opinions is one of the most pristine examples of native grassland in the East Bay.  The sad irony of this project is that the Zoo is marketing this theme park as a “conservation” project.  They have stated that the impacts to native plant communities can be justified by their own conservation message, embodied in the exhibits.  On display in this new exhibit will be California native animals that are now rare or extinct due to destruction of their native habitat.

The California Native Plant Society and Friends of Knowland Park have initiated a lawsuit under CEQA against the City of Oakland and the East Bay Zoological Society in approving the 56-acre theme park.  The lawsuit notes that the Zoo significantly changed its development plans since first receiving approval by the Oakland City Council in 1998.  The expansion was approved with limited environmental review at that time.  CNPS and Friends have long argued that the changes to the theme park plan merit a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR).  The City Council opted instead to accept a lower standard of environmental review, which allowed the updated plan to move forward without considering less damaging alternatives. 

The amendment recently approved by the City Council includes massive changes to the 1998 Master Plan.  Changes include the addition of a new 17,000 square foot veterinary hospital.  The new plan calls for increasing the size of an Interpretive Center by two stories and more than four times the square footage, and it moves the center to a visually intrusive spot on a ridgeline.  The amendment calls for a new aerial gondola ride over the rare chaparral and overnight camping area for 100 campers.  Animal exhibits have also been placed over biologically sensitive areas.

Currently, the Zoo is proceeding to build the Veterinary Hospital.  We are scheduled to attempt a mediated settlement on Aug. 22.  Meanwhile, there is a written agreement that the Zoo will not undertake building the perimeter fence and grading and widening the service road until May 2012.   Both of these last components have the potential for significant impacts to rare native plant communities at the project site.

The East Bay Chapter of CNPS wants to keep track of rare and endemic native plants and plant communities in the East Bay. Within our catalogue of native plant species there is an abundance of rarity: from Mount Diablo endemics to Pleistocene relicts; narrowly distributed taxa to peripheral populations; and species that have suffered extirpations from changes in vegetation composition resulting from the introduction of non-native plant species or directly from human development. Based on the CNPS Inventory of Rare, Threatened, and Endangered Plants of California, a total of 127 of these plant species are currently known from our Chapter area. These species are separated into five categories of rarity: [Read more about the EBCNPS Rare Plant Program referred to in the poster above.]