[T]ogether we can protect and conserve the beauty of California. As the population of the state grows, we need to inform ourselves and others so that we can make sound planing and management decisions. We need to inspire and educate so that others will also care and wish to protect our natural heritage.
The Sierra Nevada is a jewel of biodiversity. Humans have tremendous power to influence the future of the region. The decisions we make will be felt for generations. We are the vote and political voice of the Pika and Wolverine. I encourage you to take these three steps to help make a difference.
- Get yourself out into the field! Connect again with how much you love the mountains, how it moves you and gives you solace. then when the time comes to act, you are full of the freshness and energy that wild places give.
- Bring a friend. Introduce others to the joy of exploring nature and the peace that comes from this connection. Many people have not had the opportunity to discover this for themselves. By helping a friend, loved one, or neighbor open themselves to nature you will have changed their lives forever and added one more person to our growing community of stewards.
- Connect with others who love nature and work together to protect it. By joining a community we are more motivated, coordinated and effective than we are in isolation. In the Bay Area, consider joining your local chapter of the Audubon Society and the California Native Plant Society. In the Sierra Nevada, There is an amazing group that is making a difference in the Northern Sierra. Please join with and support the Northern Sierra Partnership. Also consider joining Friends of the Inyo, or The Mono Lake Committee, (both in the eastern Sierra) the Yuba Watershed Institute or Protect American River Canyons, (both in the western Sierra) your local chapter of the Audubon Society or California Native Plant Society or The Wilderness Society. Grass-roots groups are springing up all over the range where people are coming together. The Sierra Nevada Alliance is a great resource to all of these groups.
There is great reason to have hope. Wolverine once again prowl the Sierra. Recently it was even captured on video! Based on DNA studies, the recently photographed wolverine has come all the way from the Rocky Mountains to do its part in repopulating the Sierra with wildness. If it can come all that way, we can to do our part too. I invite you to join us as nature stewards. Look in the mirror and see the "fierce green fire" in your own eyes.