Major restoration event planned for Shipley Nature Center

NATURAL PERSPECTIVES

In only a few short months, the Friends of the Shipley Nature

Center have taken great strides toward their goal of restoring and

reopening the nature center in Central Park. The group hopes to prove

that they are up to the challenge on Saturday, from 9 a.m. to noon,

when they formally kick off their restoration efforts with a major

celebration at the center, which is on the west side of Goldenwest

Street near Talbert Avenue.

According to group’s president, Stephanie Pacheco, the morning

restoration party will include members of the organization, 60 Boy

Scouts, a troop of Girl Scouts, a group of 50 members of the Church

of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a UC Irvine ecology class and

members of the general public.

People will assemble at the nature center at 9 a.m. to receive

training in removal of nonnative plants and planting of trees and

shrubs. Then, they will head off to various corners of the 18-acre

preserve to transform the landscape, supervised by weed managers

Kelly Keller, Bill Neill, Lori Whalen and park ranger Dave Winkler.

Event organizer Lori Whalen has arranged for refreshments, a

native plant sale, a silent auction, a flea market and booths from

environmental groups such as the Amigos de Bolsa Chica. Tall Pony and

the Arkansas Wildman will provide live music starting at 9 a.m.,

followed by bagpipe player Andy Scott at 11:30 a.m.

It’s gratifying to see how the community has pitched in for this

event. Rainbow Disposal will donate dumpsters and hauling for the

weeds, Brea Green will donate composting services to turn the weeds

into mulch and United Rentals will donate small equipment to help

sift and load the debris. Many local artists and businesses have

donated items for the silent auction as well.

The Friends of the Shipley Nature Center are encouraging members

of the general public to stop by, see restoration in progress, buy

some native plants to take home, bid on the auction items and share

in the fun this Saturday.

This major event will be the first time that the nature center and

interpretive building have been open to the public since the center

closed in early October. Starting sometime in 2003, the Friends of

the Shipley Nature Center plan to reopen the nature center once a

month so the public can view the progress being made on restoration.

Over the next few years, we will see the weed-choked nature center

transformed into a more functional preserve filled with native

plants. Removal of nonnative plants will help reduce the spread of

invasive pest plants, improve habitat for local wildlife, conserve

water, suppress fire danger and improve property values of

neighboring homes. After restoration, the center will be better able

to fulfill its mission of environmental education in an urban

setting.

Landscape architect Guy Stivers’ ambitious plans for the center

include a 300-foot stream to improve the water quality of Blackbird

Pond and 50,000 additional plants in six different habitat areas. He

has designed separate areas for butterfly, hummingbird,

drought-tolerant and native plant demonstration gardens. His vision

includes an amphitheater where school children can begin their tours,

as well as composting and vermiculture demonstration areas.

The goal is to transform the nature center from a weed repository

into Orange County’s leading facility for environmental education.

Saturday actually isn’t the first day of restoration. Far from it.

The city of Huntington Beach, joined by the Tree Society and Friends

of the Shipley Nature Center, have been hard at work for a long time.

The city actually began restoration in 1999 with a $35,000 weed

removal project funded by the Robert Mayer Corp. The city has

continued with removal of tamarisk, myoporum, passion vine, pampas

grass, Brazilian pepper trees, giant reed and other nonnatives that

have crowded out the native plants and degraded the habitat value for

birds and other wildlife.

The main problem seems to have stemmed from the nature center

being on the same watering system as the rest of Central Park.

Without attention to the nonnative plant growth that such watering

encouraged, the center became overrun with weeds.

No more. The Friends of the Shipley Nature Center have declared

war on the weeds with regular search and destroy missions. Once the

nonnatives are removed from an area, the volunteers can plant native

trees and shrubs.

The Tree Society and Friends of the Shipley Nature Center, along

with various scout groups, have already planted nearly 200 trees in

and around the nature center. Rainbow Disposal already hauled away 75

tons of giant reed in the past year, a donated service valued at more

than $5,000.

On Saturday they’ll haul more. It is wonderful the way the

community is chipping in with donated goods, services and labor.

Good things are happening at the Shipley Nature Center. Come out

this Saturday and see for yourself.

* VIC LEIPZIG and LOU MURRAY are Huntington Beach residents and

environmentalists. They can be reached at [email protected].