Revegetation:
The revegetation effort has focused on replacement of introduced grasslands with native vegetation and planting of riparian woodlands including both California Valley Oak/Northern California black walnut woodland and red will thicket. For replacement of introduced grasses to be successful, this requires more than the planting of native bunch grasses and the removal of introduced forbs and grasses. Efforts limited to this approach often fail due to the aggressive, competitive nature of introduced species that can readily outcompete the natives as they did when they first became established.

In order to change the site conditions to favor native forbs and grasses, we have established a riparian woodland in the northwest corner of the property in an area previously dominated by introduced Harding grass. This area is shown in the Figure below. The shaded microclimate of a riparian woodland promotes the replacement of Harding grass with native bunch grasses. Additionally, the establishment of a riparian woodland will create a refuge for wildlife using the restored marsh habitat and add significantly to the wildlife value of the project.