For Tamalpais stands sentry,
like a lighthouse, over the Golden Gate,
between the bay and open ocean,
and looks down indifferently on both.
Robert Louis Stevenson
Mount Tamalpais is described by Robert Louis Stevenson as indifferent to the world below, looking down upon the lands that today make up Mount Tamalpais State Park, the Marin Municipal Water District, Marin County Open Space, and the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. The mountain is also indifferent to these myriad jurisdictions that have divided it up and created a mix of overlapping and sometimes contradictory management plans.
In the spirit of overcoming these arbitrarily imposed boundaries, and in an effort to foster cooperation and collaboration between state and national parks, the Friends of Mt Tam joined together with the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy for a volunteer work day. It was a small group of volunteers who gathered at Camp Alice Eastwood on Saturday, September 14, to inaugurate what will hopefully be an ongoing working collaborative.
The idea for state and national parks working together on Mount Tamalpais has been around for a long time, but this recent push has its roots in a meeting that took place earlier this year at the Marin Art and Garden Center. Organized by the Marin Municipal Water District (MMWD), the meeting brought together representatives of a number of conservation groups that have worked over the years to preserve and enhance the environment of Mount Tamalpais. These include Friends of Mt Tam, Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, Marin Conservation League, Tamalpais Conservation Club, as well as governmental agencies that manage these lands such as MMWD, Marin County Open Space District, California State Parks, and the National Park Service.
This was the beginning of a “Tamalpais Lands Collaborative,” that MMWD Watershed Manager Mike Swezy hopes will “address natural resource management, visitor experience, volunteer opportunities and other inherently cross-jurisdictional needs in a more efficient and holistic way.” The first part of this process is for all of the stakeholders to learn to work together. I saw an opportunity to do this when Naomi LeBeau, Community Program Manager for the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy’s Marin Park Stewardship, told me about changes underway in her program. They normally have their volunteer work days at Muir Beach, but the beach is closed now until November as part of the restoration project. Because of this, stewardship programs have moved inland for the time being, tackling the removal of invasive species around the fringes of Muir Woods. An area was identified along the fire road below Camp Alice Eastwood, where a massive amount of French broom has taken over the edge of the redwood forest.
This area is in Mount Tamalpais State Park, close to the border of Muir Woods National Monument, so it seemed like a natural place for state and national parks to come together and tackle a problem. We set up an initial volunteer work day as a trial run, getting the necessary approvals and involvement of both state and national park officials. Taking on the overwhelming challenge of removing French broom seemed like a fitting task for our collaborative goals.
French broom (Genista monspessulana) is a member of the pea family and native to the Mediterranean regions of Europe. It has been introduced in other Mediterranean climates around the world, including South Africa and Australia, and has flourished as an invasive noxious weed. It is estimated to cover almost 100,000 acres in California. Broom spreads quickly, and one mature plant can produce thousands of seeds in a season. To make matters worse, the seeds remain viable for up to 50 years, making this a very difficult plant to eradicate completely. Not only does it crowd out native plants, but it is also toxic to wildlife and highly flammable.
French broom is very deep-rooted and can be difficult to pull out. The task is made much easier by a weed wrench, a very handy tool that has a saw-toothed grip that is placed around the base of the plant. A lever is then pulled down to force broom out the ground, roots and all. With the tools of the trade in hand, we headed out from Camp Alice Eastwood down the fire road to the horseshoe curve where vast patches of broom have overtaken a wide area. We set to work.
After an hour and a half, we took a break from pulling broom and walked back to the campground for a snack. While munching on a gourmet selection of garden-grown tomatoes, sweet tangerines, and tortilla chips and salsa, we traded stories about Alice Eastwood, the namesake of this campground. Located on the site of the Muir Inn, which burned down in 1923, the campground was dedicated on May 1, 1949. Alice Eastwood herself was there for the honor, which took place just a few months after her 90th birthday and retirement from the California Academy of Sciences.
Alice Eastwood is an inspirational character for all who love Mount Tamalpais and who carry with them throughout their lives a curiosity about the world. Perhaps the most famous story about her takes place on the morning of April 18, 1906, when the massive earthquake and fire struck San Francisco. Concerned about her plant collections at the California Academy of Sciences, she walked from her home on Russian Hill down to Market Street, where the Academy was located at the time. The city was in ruins and the fire was rapidly encroaching on the Academy building.
Alice entered the heavily damaged building and was heartbroken to see the collapsed roof and shattered marble staircase. Undaunted, she made her way up the damaged staircase by clinging to the railing until she reached the sixth floor, where her collection of plants was housed in the Herbarium. She fashioned a makeshift carrier from her apron, tied it to a rope, and lowered one bundle of plants after another down to the first floor, where a waiting custodian unloaded them. She managed to save 1,500 plant specimens, and only stopped when the fire got so close that she had to flee the building.
Filled with the inspiration and dedication of Alice Eastwood, we returned to the broom patch and began one last push. Mount Tamalpais State Park Supervising Ranger Ryen Goering, who was a big help in setting up the work day, stopped by to give us some encouragement.
We knew that there was far more broom than we could remove in one day, so we identified a significant area and focused on clearing it completely. We formed a large circle around the patch, each of us taking a strategic position, gradually working our way inward until we could see each other through the dense broom. As the end of the work day drew near, we decided to finish this one area even if it meant taking a little bit longer than our allotted time. The symbolism of coming together was not lost on us, as the patch became so small that we were all right next to each other, pulling out the last stalks of broom. This was a great representation of state and national parks coming together to accomplish a task.
With the broom gone from one area, small patches of native plants were unveiled, reveling in their liberation. Sticky monkey flower and woodland strawberry came into view, no longer struggling under the abusive broom. This was a great sight to see, a small victory that gave us a great sense of accomplishment.
As we packed up our tools at the end of the work day, we talked about working together again in the future. This day was just the beginning of what will hopefully be a long and productive collaboration on Mount Tamalpais.
Friends of Mt Tam is the nonprofit cooperating association that supports Mount Tamalpais State Park. New members are always welcome, especially those who love to volunteer as guided hike leaders, work at the Visitor Center, talk about history at the Gravity Car Barn, or help out at the Astronomy Programs in the Mountain Theater. Whether a member or not, anybody can sign up on the website for announcements about upcoming special events such as the next collaborative volunteer work day.
The Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy is a nonprofit organization that supports the Golden Gate National Recreation Area. They have an extensive Calendar of Events that take place throughout the many units of this diverse park, including Muir Woods, the Presidio, Alcatraz, the Marin Headlands, Fort Funston, Mori Point, and the newly added Rancho Corral de Tierra.
The deer, raccoons, skunks, and coyotes that roam the slopes of Mount Tamalpais, along with the woodpeckers, ravens, and hawks that fly in the skies above, don’t understand there are lines separating all of the different jurisdictions that segment the map of the mountain. Those of us who love the mountain should all work together, forgetting about artificial boundaries.
