How COVID-19 Relates to Our Ecology
By Nancy Padian, board member. Nancy is a medical researcher, epidemiologist, and former executive director of the Women's Global Health Imperitave. She is among the world's foremost experts on AIDS, and worked in Southern Africa for the last 35 years.The global...
Meet Our Volunteer Photographer Kristen Russell
Sonoma Ecology Center is blessed to have many fabulous volunteers without whom we could not accomplish so much. This month we focus our lens on a tremendously talented volunteer whose work you see in our newsletters, emails and social media posts on a regular basis....
A Message From Our Executive Director, Richard Dale
It’s been a shocking year for the planet that supports us, hidden from many of us because our attention has been absorbed by dealing with a global pandemic and a social fabric worn thin from centuries of injustice. But life on earth is in crisis all over. Just...
Prescribed Burn Planned for Van Hoosear
Controlled or “prescribed” burns were used by indigenous people for centuries before Europeans arrived here. It is an effective ancient art and science that promotes both fire resiliency and biodiversity. Last year’s prescribed burn of about 30 acres at Van Hoosear...
Honoring Earth, Honoring Volunteers
Sonoma Ecology Center and our illustrious, dedicated volunteers help us honor Earth every day, and we’d like to thank them for helping us take care of little patches of our planet right here in Sonoma Valley. In partnership with One Tree Planted and Simply Solar,...
Another Dry Year
The warm, sunny days we have been enjoying the last several weeks are delightful, but we shouldn’t be enjoying so many of them at this point in what should be our rainy season. “This year is shaping up to be one of the driest on record in our region, with over 50% of...
Harvest Market is Open
The Harvest Market at Sonoma Garden Park is open and selling fresh, organically-grown produce and olive oil again. There is not much better than eating food that comes from the land where you live, and that’s just what we offer every Saturday from 9 a.m. to noon in...
A message from NEST student, Alexandra Huerta
As someone who has always admired the grandeur of the outdoors and has an ever-present curiosity for exploring, understanding and preserving our natural world, studying environmental science just made sense. As a Southern California native, my summer days as a youth...
Can Sonoma Valley Save the Kenwood Marsh Checkerbloom?
In the summer of 2018, right after his job interview at Sonoma Ecology Center, botanist and ecologist Jason Mills drove north up Sonoma Valley to Kenwood in search of a plant on the brink of extinction. After a little poking around he found it: a handful of Kenwood...
How Kenwood Marsh Turned Sonoma Valley into a ‘Fountain of Fountains’
“Sonoma is a fountain of fountains.” So wrote Father Jose Altimira in 1823, while seeking the ideal location for Mission San Francisco Solano, California’s northernmost mission and Sonoma’s founding edifice. In writing those words—Sonoma es un manantial a...
Getting to Know Dr. Dan
For many years before settling with his family in Sonoma Valley, Dan Levitis was an “itinerant scientist” as he puts it, traveling the world, doing field work, taking academic posts, and gaining experience as a scientist and teacher. Born in Washington, D.C. and...
Sonoma Valley’s Long-Term Forecast: Dry Times Ahead
When it comes to high temps and low rainfall, new records are constantly being set—and the current rainy season is following that trend. So far our Valley has received less than five inches of rainfall, a fraction of what’s needed, resulting in low streamflow,...
Watch Nature Heal at Sugarloaf
With most trails reopened, green shoots growing and animals returning, Sugarloaf Ridge State Park is the place to be to see the land recover from wildfire. The park—operated by Sonoma Ecology Center on behalf of the California State Parks system—has reopened all but...
Our Parks Remain Open, but Events Are Canceled
In response to the coronavirus pandemic, Sonoma County has imposed a new stay-at-home order starting Saturday, Dec. 12 and ending Saturday, Jan. 9, 2021. This order will result in the following changes to Sonoma Ecology Center’s events and services: * At Sugarloaf...
Three Years Later, the Cat Came Back
Beloved SEC Employee Deb Hennessy Reunited with Her Beloved Cat Mordecai The wildfires of 2017 were harrowing for Sonoma Valley residents. For Deb Hennessy, they led to the loss of a four-legged friend. In the early morning hours of Oct. 9, 2017, Deb, a Glen Ellen...
Post-Fire Work and Wattle Workshops Mark Start of Rainy Season for SEC
As the season’s first rains begin to fall, and with dozens of burned structures left behind by the Glass fire, Sonoma Ecology Center has hit the ground running—or more precisely, wattling. With the relaunch of our Watershed Protection Program—designed to shore up the...
SEC Relaunches Its Post-Fire Watershed Protection Program
In 2017, wildfire left behind dozens of burned structures—a hazardous situation should rainwater wash their toxins into nearby streams. To prevent that from happening, Sonoma Ecology Center created its Emergency Watershed Protection Program, which mobilized...
In Our Divided Post-Election World, Nature Still Holds the Key
By Richard Dale While on a morning walk following this week’s Presidential Election, I found it hard not to feel overwhelmed and anxious over the outcome. Still, nature, as it often does, soon crept into my worried, looping mental soundtrack, suggesting that there are...
How Wild Animals Cope with Wildfire
Some Species Fare Well, Some Don’t—but Overall, Populations Appear to Rebound Humans fled by the tens of thousands in Sonoma and Napa counties this summer as the Glass Fire bore down on their communities. But other species’ homes and communities were threatened too,...
Red Barn Remembrance
‘It served as habitat for our feathered and furry friends, a cool refuge for hikers on hot or rainy days, and a picturesque backdrop for the occasional photographer’ Venerable barns are special places, Breck Parkman says, with special meanings for those who know them....