Tag Archives | California Native Plant Society

Sierra Club Expresses Serious Concerns about Zoo Expansion Location

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

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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Snakes, Lies, and Cutting Red Tape: How the Oakland Zoo is Gaming the System

Earth Day demonstration against the Zoo’s Proposal - Photo by Karen Smith

Earth Day demonstration against the Zoo’s latest proposal – Photo by Karen Smith

It is difficult to imagine the Oakland Zoo proposing anything more outrageous than their plan to build an environmentally destructive “conservation” exhibit on the richest and most sensitive lands in Knowland Park, but in their latest proposal the preposterous trumps the outrageous. The upshot of their bold move toward endgame is that not only would the public lose far more park land than initially approved, but all public access to the very best native plant habitat in the park would be legally barred forever.

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Earth Day Rally a Success!

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

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Wild Oakland Sponsors Free Park Tour on April 12

 Park users will be fenced out of the heart of the park where the vast majority currently walk and observe wildlife and native plants.

Have you ever been to Knowland Park? Wild Oakland invites you to join the California Native Plant Society on April 12 from 12 noon – 2:00 pm to visit Oakland’s Knowland Park, a 500-acre wildland park and home to diverse native plant communities and wildlife. We’ll tour the native grasslands — depending upon rain, we may have wildflower displays, a look at the East Bay’s largest fairy ring of puffballs, oak woodlands, lichens, and rare maritime chaparral. Continue Reading →

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