Tag Archives | California Native Grasslands Association

THIS IS IT: Last chance to protect Knowland Park!

By on November 9, 2014 in Campaign Updates, Featured on Homepage, Nature & Wildlife, Oakland Politics

Please come to Oakland City Council meeting

Tues 11/18 starting 5:30 pm

Oakland City Hall at 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza

Council Chambers, 3rd Floor

Please RSVP here if you can attend: bit.ly/knowlandmeeting.

Beautiful & wild Knowland Park is home to native wildlife, including rare and threatened species, and it was deeded to the city of Oakland to remain a public park forever. The Oakland Zoo wants to take over the heart of it (77 acres of prime habitat on western ridge) for an exhibit of species that are now regionally extinct due to development! …plus restaurant, gift shop, offices and meeting rooms, and a gondola ride that will transport Zoo visitors uphill to the ridgetop development. This is not conservation. Once the chain-link perimeter fence goes up and the richest portion of Knowland Park is bulldozed, it’s gone forever―habitat significantly damaged, no free public access. Continue Reading →

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Sierra Club Expresses Serious Concerns about Zoo Expansion Location

By on August 1, 2014 in Campaign Updates, Featured on Homepage, Nature & Wildlife, Opinions & Editorials

Oakland Zoo’s proposed expansion into Knowland Park goes from bad to worse

July 28, 2014

10272777_228030487396164_7927941693625751956_oThe Sierra Club has grown increasingly concerned about the California Trails exhibit that the Oakland Zoo proposes to build on the ridge line of Knowland Park. The City of Oakland approved the fifty-six-acre project in 2011 on a fifteen-year-old Mitigated Negative Declaration. Since then, however, the permitting agencies have provided significant pushback to the zoo’s claim that the project would have no significant environmental impacts. The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) recommended that the project be built within the zoo’s existing footprint to avoid significant impacts to rare plant communities and to the threatened Alameda whipsnake. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), meanwhile, sent the zoo’s application back to the drawing board, noting that the project is at best conceptual.

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BioBlitz to SAVE KNOWLAND PARK on Sunday, June 1

By on May 26, 2014 in Nature & Wildlife

48_20120107_rgs_7191A BioBlitz is an intensive one-day study of biodiversity in a specific location, bringing scientists and volunteer citizen-scientists together. We’ll look for birds, mammals, reptiles, butterflies, insects, spiders, trees, flowers, mushrooms, even slime molds! Continue Reading →

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Earth Day Rally a Success!

By on April 22, 2014 in Campaign Updates, Nature & Wildlife, Oakland Politics

“What kind of conservation organization applies for a permit to kill threatened species?”

BabyWithSign

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Alert – Sign the Online Petition on Change.org!

By on June 13, 2013 in Campaign Updates, Featured on Homepage, Nature & Wildlife, Oakland Politics
Knowland Park from above, © 2013 Steve Whittaker

Knowland Park from above
© 2013 Steve Whittaker

ACTION ALERT!

As you know, the zoo can’t start the bulldozers until they obtain special “incidental take” permits from state and federal wildlife regulatory agencies to allow them to “accidentally” kill threatened Alameda Whipsnakes during construction.

Through our public records act requests, we have learned that the zoo continues to deny the existence of the special maritime chaparral community that provides habitat for the whipsnake – and that they are claiming the removal of parts of the chaparral will actually BENEFIT the snake. But a new report by Dr Shawn Smallwood, a wildlife biologist with a PhD in ecology who is a researcher at UC Davis, suggests this claim is based on no scientific evidence whatsoever – and concludes that: “given the extremely limited distribution of Alameda whipsnake and the permanent constraints imposed on the whipsnake’s capacity to expand (i.e., recover) via habitat restoration or habitat enhancement due to human encroachment, the loss of any additional habitat could appreciably diminish the whipsnake’s chance of survival and recovery.” The clock is running – a decision must be made by early September. Continue Reading →

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