
PROTECT CONSERVE ENHANCE
Restore Woodland Canyon Creek
Even in cities, creeks flow! As cities are built, historic waterways generally get filled in, drained or piped underground. On Mount Sutro, we have a stream that has been buried for far too long! Woodland Canyon Creek begins at the summit of Mount Sutro with two tributaries that eventually converge in Woodland Canyon. Restoration of the canyon would result in a clear view of the creek and hopefully increase water flow. By planting native riparian species grown in our nursery, the canyon would serve as a biodiversity hotspot within Mount Sutro and San Francisco.
Native Plant Nursery
The Sutro Native Plant Nursery propagates thousands of locally sourced California native plant species for conservation. During the winter rainy months, these locally sourced native plants get planted at restoration sites to provide habitat and forage for our resident wildlife. Plants are also available for sale to the public for backyard habitat gardens!
Hike Mount Sutro
Did you know there is a multi-use trail system in the center of San Francisco? Come explore Mount Sutro's award winning trails and beautiful landscapes right here within city limits. All of our trails are the result of thousands of hours of volunteer effort. So come join us for a volunteer event or say hi if you see our volunteers working hard to keep the trails open for recreation.
Volunteer Events
& More
Spring Nature Walks: Natural History and Cultivating History
Saturday, March 18 | 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Conservation Volunteer
Wednesday, March 22 | 9:30 AM – 11:30 AM
Conservation Volunteer
Thursday, March 23 | 9:30 AM – 11:30 AM
Native Plant Sale
Saturday, March 25 | 10:00 AM - 2:00 PM
Conservation Volunteer
Wednesday, March 29 | 9:30 AM – 11:30 AM
Conservation Volunteer
Thursday, March 30 | 9:30 AM – 11:30 AM
Trail and Habitat Stewardship
Saturday, April 1 | 8:45 AM -12:00 PM
Conservation Volunteer
Wednesday, April 5 | 9:30 AM – 11:30 AM
Conservation Volunteer
Thursday, April 6 | 9:30 AM – 11:30 AM
Spring Nature Walks: Connecting Nature on Mount Sutro
Saturday, April 8 | 10:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Storm Impacts to Mount Sutro
As of February 2, 2023 - The following trails are closed to the public for the foreseeable future:
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Edgewood Trail
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Historic Trail from Medical Center Way Trailhead to Picnic Rock
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Medical Center Way (from Johnstone Drive to Parnassus)
Spring Nature Walks are Back!
Join us for a guided spring nature walk on the Mount Sutro Open Space between March and May! Our experienced leaders will lead you through the trails on a two-hour tour on a variety of focused topics. However, on each walk you'll learn about the unique ecology of the area and the efforts being made to preserve and protect it.
We suggest a donation of $20 per person to help support our continued stewardship of Mount Sutro. Hikes are limited to 15 people so an RSVP is required! Please register on our Eventbrite with the button below! You don't miss out on this chance to explore one of San Francisco's hidden gems!
Enhancing Mount Sutro's biodiversity, maintaining world-class trails and keeping the Mountain safe and accessible for all!
As 2022 comes to a close, we reflect on the past year and all the successes and accomplishments we have achieved! To highlight a few of our achievements we:
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Planted 2,760 plants
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Expanded native habitat by 37,460 square feet
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Grew over 7,000 plants
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Maintained and realigned 2,300 linear feet of trail
And so much more all thanks to the help of our community members!
But as we look ahead to 2023, we are excited to continue working towards our vision of connected native plant habitat on Mount Sutro, including uncovering and restoring Woodland Canyon Creek, expanding our Health in Nature program including public walks and mediations, offering paid positions to local high school students and young adults, and as always, to continue to improve access, biodiversity and connectivity on Mount Sutro.
Get to know more about how our 2022 went and what we have in store for 2023 through our 2022 Annual Report.
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Craig Newmark, founder of Craigslist generously donated a $25,000 matching grant and our community responded! Thank you so much for all of those who have donated!
As summer came to a close, Sutro Stewards took Craig Newmark, the founder of Craigslist, on a walk of Woodland Canyon. We stopped to appreciate native plants like red elderberry and California polypody fern, we talked about climate change and cyber security and pondered sure signs of water in Woodland Canyon. While there are outflow drains and our trail crews have built natural log channels to direct the flow of water, no water was to be seen on our August walk.
Woodland Canyon Creek is a seasonal creek that begins on the summit of Mount Sutro in two tributaries and flows through valleys and gullies, until it converges deep in Woodland Canyon. Water flows in the winter but is hidden under massive amounts of invasive Himalayan blackberry, cape ivy, and english ivy crawling along the rocky creek bed and up the trunks of dead and dying eucalyptus trees.
This is changing.
On June 18th, we had our first volunteer day to clear the creek bed of invasive overgrowth and three months later we had our first commitment to funding for the project! Craig Newmark will match dollar for dollar, any donation that comes in, up to $25,000. By December we had met our match! Thank you to all those whoa re committed to restoring this invaluable resource on Mount Sutro.
Your generosity will help us grow plants for the canyon, clear out invasive species, organize neighbors and advocate for inter-agency action to restore the creek while we collaborate with our partners, UCSF and SFRPD for long-term stewardship and near term impact. Finally, we will plant native, biodiversity enhancing, river loving plants with the winter rains. We expect to start planting in the winter of 2023-2024 and will be installing plants for years to come!

Health in Nature Shares Mount Sutro with New Communities
The Health in Nature program, in partnership with UCSF, is Sutro Stewards newest program, providing nature immersion experiences for positive health outcomes to underserved communities.
We invite groups on Mount Sutro and provide sensory scavenger hunts, native plant walks, Tai Chi and Qi Gong in the garden, mushroom explorations, monthly meditations in nature and chert circles. If you are interested in bringing your group to the mountain, please fill out this form.
Offerings open to the public!
Join us for the Health In Nature Mediation Series every 1st and 3rd Thursday, 12:00 - 1:00 PM, at the Aldea Center (155 Johnstone Dr, San Francisco, CA 94131). You can drop in anytime during the hour! This program is free and everyone is welcome.
Or join us for our community natural history walks on every last Saturday of the month from 9:30 - 11:30 AM. Family friendly! Our next walk (and last walk of this year) is October 29th and is a walk to honor the land and our ancestors. Please send an email to bridget@sutrostewards.org for further details and to sign up for the walk.