Help Uncover Woodland Canyon Creek
As summer came to a close, Sutro Stewards took Craig Newmark, the founder of Craigslist, out on a walk of Woodland Canyon. We stopped to appreciate native plants like red elderberry and California polypody, 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 and finds low places, as it carves them deeper, until it converges deep in the canyon and flows into a pipe under Stanyan street. Hidden under massive amounts of invasive himalayan blackberry cape ivy, dead and dying eucalyptus trees and the english ivy crawling along the creek bed and up their trunks, water flows in the winter but is never seen because of all the overgrowth.
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. This 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!
Help support us at sutrostewards.org/donate
