California Invasive Species Action Week for June Second Saturday

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

This year Saturday, June 7 – Sunday, June 15 was California Invasive Species Action Week, a statewide, week-long event created to increase public awareness of invasive species in our state and to promote public participation year round in invasive species management.

For our June 14 Second Saturday event, we removed invasive mustard – including Short-pod Mustard (Hirschfeldia incana), Mediterranean Cabbage (Brassica fruticulosa), Oriental Mustard (Sisymbrium orientale), and Hedge Mustard (Sisymbrium officinale) – and Italian Thistles (Carduus pycnocephalus) from areas near the Park entrance that are being revegetated with native plants.

Some volunteers also did our usual trash pickup and greeted visitors at our booth.

Here are some photos of volunteers at work:

Weed workers getting ready.
Charlie with a bag of thistles.
Richard removing mustard along the fence.
Mustard pulling in progress.
Jessica pulling mustard
Trash collectors Noelle and Tracy with our CISAW display
Look at that! Eleven huge bags of mustard and thistles!

And a little “Before” and “After”:

Area by the storage shed before mustard was cleared.
Area by the storage shed after mustard was cleared.
Thistles under the oak tree by the entrance.
Under the oak tree after thistles were removed.

Solar Eclipse in the CWHP!

Posted on by friendsofthewildernesspark

Our Second Saturday event on October 14 coincided with a solar eclipse! Because the moon was at its farthest point from the earth, it didn’t completely cover the sun, and people in the path of totality saw a “Ring of Fire” eclipse. Here, however, the moon covered only about 70% of the sun. In the Park, the light was noticeably dimmer, and you could feel that the temperature dropped a few degrees.

The Friends had a poster explaining the what, when, and where of the eclipse as well as a safety remimnder. We had certified safe eclipse glasses that visitors could use to look at the eclipse. The most common comment was, “Wow! That’s really cool!”

Here are a few pictures: