Yesterday was a beautiful day, perfect for the scheduled visit to our ranch of 45 fourth-graders from San Rafael, as part of STRAW (Students and Teachers Restoring a Watershed), a program of Point Blue Conservation Science. STRAW volunteers, managed by Point Blue staff, install and maintain plantings on ranches, providing an educational experience for the children, while enhancing the ranches’ soil and water-retention properties, providing habitat for birds, bees and other wildlife, and helping to capture atmospheric carbon and sequester it in the soil.
The project on our ranch was to plant a multi-species hedgerow, next to a windrow of Monterey cypress we planted a few years ago. The site was a beehive of activity, with the fourth-graders and their teachers and chaperones digging and lining holes with gopher protection, and planting 4 different species of plants: coyote brush, coffee berry, California sagebrush and blue-blossom Ceanothus. In coming weeks the project will be finished by a class of 7th graders on another field-day.
We are so grateful to STRAW for this project, which will provide wildlife habitat, support for pollinators and carbon sequestration, as well as a wind-break for our sheep. And I really appreciated the enthusiasm of the kids, their focus on the work, and their questions about the animals we raise here on the ranch.
