The Stew Crew

Rebirth, renew, revive

After a long pause, I'm ready to return to sharing the beauty of this place through my eyes. I'm now a mother of two beautiful children. My focus changed. But I remain dedicated to the preservation of our native lands so that my kids can grow up in the wild. So they can know the smell of heat on sage. So they can wonder. And wander.

the end

And that was the end of the blog of the land steward.

two slough years

It has now been two years since beginning this job at the Slough. It's so cliche to say that time flies, but it does. It really does. And I'm sure I've said it before, but it takes a long time to get to know a place. In fact, things change so much and so constantly, and cycles can be so long, that I may see something new in ten years that I've never seen before.

The connections have been the most amazing part of all of this. My connection to the place I grew up. Connecting the waters I spent ten years cleaning and bringing kids to (and the dream of restoring Carr Lake), mingling with the waters of the Elkhorn Slough. My husband's first student film about the Slough and his latest award winning film, Home for Hawksbill, in the docent den library. Not to mention the simple and deep connection to place.

After all these years working with people in different places and different habitats, I'm convinced the key (one of the keys at least) to conservation lies in repeated exposure to place. Taking time to get to know it, to be in it. This is a translatable concept to any relationship one might have. Maybe I have my head in the clouds. Maybe my experiences are a bit narrow, but I was not an "environmentalist" by any means growing up. I became so passionate about this stuff in my mid 20's when I was thrust into it for a year, outside in one place, learning and doing, definitely connecting, and something clicked. I wonder about this all the time - what does it take to make people care about taking care of the natural areas around where they live?

Let me climb down from my horse and realize the bubble I live in, the community I am immersed in, and the struggle most are engaged in. Let me do what I do and continue to love it and hope the exchange keeps happening.

Cheers to two years.

volunteers

They are the best of the best. The heart and soul. The reason I do what I do.

this blog is officially re-titled

I've decided to re-title this blog so that it will not tie me solely to restoration at the Elkhorn Slough or the Elkhorn Slough to me.

It's been fun and enlightening to reflect on what I do and what I see at work, but I'd like this blog to expand a bit. Until I do this, here are some great moments from the Elkhorn Slough Reserve.

images of the week

My new favorite tool - the scythe. I'll need to dedicate an entire post to this amazing tool later. But this is what it can do in about one minute without gasoline.

While pulling cape ivy under the oaks in Long Valley (the other vegetation is mostly native blackberry returning!)

I found this interesting hairy growth under a leaf. I have no clue what it might be/come.

Highlight - I was lucky enough to get close to this beautiful kingsnake!