“The Last Hurdle” Photograph by Rozanne Rapozo wins Friends of the Gualala River’s Environmental Award at the 2008 Art in the Redwoods Festival “The Last Hurdle” by Rozanne Rapozo Friends of the Gualala River (FoGR) sponsored an award at the Art in the Redwoods Festival in 2008, for the seventh year in a row. A cash prize contributed by the …

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

The American West at Risk summarizes the dominant human-generated environmental challenges in the 11 contiguous arid western United States – America’s legendary, even mythical, frontier. When discovered by European explorers and later settlers, the west boasted rich soils, bountiful fisheries, immense, dense forests, sparkling streams, untapped ore deposits, and oil bonanzas. It now faces depletion of many of these resources, …

For information on more recent events, see: Fireworks over the Gualala River estuary? Update: June 25, 2008 Today, the 1st District Court of Appeals rejected the appeal by the Gualala Festivals Committee. The Coastal Commission’s order stands: no fireworks over the Gualala River estuary without a permit. Update: June 19, 2008 The Gualala Festivals Committee canceled their controversial plans to …

Sonoma County Regional Parks, in partnership with California Native Plant Society – Dorothy King Young and Milo Baker Chapters, and Friends of the Gualala River, is embarking on a wild land weed control project at Gualala Point’s coastal bluff and sand spit. The target is bush lupine, one of the most troublesome wildland weeds of the North Coast’s dunes, bluffs, and sandy …

Thursday, May 15, 2008, 7:00 p.m. Gualala Community Center 47950 Center St., Gualala Friends of the Gualala River presents a public program featuring Matthew Deitch, Ph.D. from the Center for Ecosystem Management and Restoration. “If the steelhead and coho that were once abundant in coastal California are to have any chance of recovering in the 21st Century, agencies and stakeholders …

Advice puts Eel River diversion plan on shelf by Glenda Anderson The Press Democrat March 12, 2008 [excerpt:] A recently revived proposal to divert water from a protected portion of the Eel River near Dos Rios has been quietly shelved following a negative legal opinion. “For now, we’ve put the whole Dos Rios thing on hold,” Mendocino County Water Agency …

Gualala River Alchemy! Saturday, August 24 1:00 p.m. Annapolis Winery Be there at the first, fun kick-off event in a public campaign to convince the third largest corporate winery in the world to spare 154 acres of Gualala River’s redwood forest from the chainsaw.   Read more → Stop Clearcutting California Thursday, March 21 7:00 – 9:00 p.m. Gualala Arts Center Clearcuts behind …

Annapolis (Sonoma County, California) Friends of the Gualala River presented a natural history digital slide show of the Gualala River and its watershed, wildlife, and vegetation, to the kindergarten through fourth grade classes of Horicon School in Annapolis, on Friday, February 8, 2008. The slide show followed the path of a helicopter “field trip” of the lower Gualala River, featuring …

by Peter Baye This letter was published in the Independent Coast Observer on January 25, 2008. Editor: What’s in a name? Will something called a “soil retention system” rather than a “retaining wall” conserve the natural, mature coastal bluff vegetation along the river bank? In a word, no. Regardless of whether the scenic coastal bluffs along the Gualala River bank …

by Britt Bailey, Director Environmental Commons This Open Space article was published in the Independent Coast Observer on January 25, 2008. There are a myriad of opinions with respect to Mr. John Bower’s proposal to build a retaining wall or retaining structure on the bluff in Gualala. Speaking for Environmental Commons, I’d like to clarify our reasons for opposing and …

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

by Peter Baye This letter was published in the Independent Coast Observer on February 22, 2008. Editor: The ICO’s editorial on “The Surf project” (February 15, 2008) is right about the benefits of a new downtown building layout that opens up coastal views. But it misses the point entirely about the nature and problems of “piecemealing” the bluff project ahead …

by Karl Anderson This letter was published in the Independent Coast Observer on January 25, 2008. Editor: With his new proposal John Bower would seem to acknowledge that a large concrete wall in the Gualala River estuary would be an eyesore. But his “soil retention wall” ignores the fact that the bluff is stable and does not need to be …

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.

Friends of the Gualala River protects the Gualala River watershed in Northern California and the species living within it.