[CINC] March 14, 2012 FSTS Lecture: Restoring a Rare Coastal Wetand on SCI

[Shauna Bingham]

March 6, 2012
For Immediate Release
Yvonne Menard, Channel Islands National Park (805) 658-5725

*Restoring a Rare Coastal Wetland on Santa Cruz Island*

Biologist Paula Power will discuss a large-scale effort by the National
Park Service and The Nature
Conservancy to restore the coastal wetland at Prisoners Harbor on Santa
Cruz Island during the
March “From Shore to Sea” lecture.

Prisoners Harbor, once the largest coastal wetland on the Channel Islands,
was important habitat for
wildlife, native plants, and migratory waterfowl. The value of this project
is significant as coastal
wetlands in California are increasingly rare—over 90 percent have been
eliminated.

Power will describe how the wetland habitat was reduced by 50 percent in
the late 1800s and early
1900s when former island owners filled it with rock and gravel and
channelized the creek. These
changes degraded the wetland ecology and its function as a natural
floodplain.

To restore the wetland’s natural function and ecology fill was removed and
the landscape reshaped
to return it to its former condition. This will allow it to flood
naturally. The project included the
removal of non-native species and planting of native vegetation to improve
the riparian and
woodland habitat.

Power, a restoration ecologist for Channel Islands National Park since
2004, is the wetland project
lead. Prior to her work with the National Park Service she was a research
botanist with the U.S. Fish
and Wildlife Service in Texas. Paula has a bachelor’s degree in ecology and
evolution from the
University of California at Santa Barbara and a master’s degree in biology
from Texas State
University.

This lecture will be held on March 14, 2012. The “From Shore to Sea”
lecture series is sponsored by
Channel Islands National Park to further the understanding of current
research on the Channel
Islands and surrounding waters. The lectures occur at 7:00 p.m. on the
second Wednesday of March,
April, May, September, October, and November at the Channel Islands
National Park Robert J.
Lagomarsino Visitor Center, 1901 Spinnaker Drive in the Ventura Harbor. The
programs are free
and open to the public.

This publication is available on line at:
www.nps.gov/chis/parknews/newsreleases.htm

-- 
Shauna Bingham
Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary
113 Harbor Way, Suite 150
Santa Barbara, CA 93109
805-884-1460
805-568-1582 (fax)
http://channelislands.noaa.gov/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www.rain.org/pipermail/channel_islands_naturalist_corps/attachments/20120306/7b81df4d/attachment-0001.html>