Volunteers Fight the Tide of Disappearing Wetlands

The Bay Area's wetlands have been badly battered, but restoration work aims to bring them back.

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Few people will see the marshland that Beth Moseley helps spruce up during her volunteer outings to an industrial stretch of bayfront. Its hidden solitude from San Francisco鈥檚 hustle and bustle is one of the reasons she often visits the restored wetland to watch birds.

鈥淢ost of the work we do is pulling weeds,鈥 said Moseley, a 61-year-old resident of the city鈥檚 Mission district, who has been joining the 探花精选 Society鈥檚  at the  for several years. 鈥淚t鈥檚 kind of like the bay is taking care of itself.鈥

The fruitful growth of the salt marsh over the last decade offers a germ of briny hope in a region where wetlands have been paved, diked and invaded by weeds at a rate unmatched elsewhere in the U.S.

An exhaustive  this month based on more than 1,000 wetland surveys conducted in 2011 concluded that while nearly half of the remaining wetlands in the Lower 48 are in 鈥済ood鈥 condition, just one-fifth of the wetlands in the West are doing that well.

The findings portend problems nationwide as seas rise, with planners valuing the respite that coastal ecosystems can offer from floods and erosion-inducing waves. The 119-page assessment contained particularly bleak news from the West, where wetlands are the least widespread and in the sickliest condition overall nationwide.

Drainage projects, dams, paving and invasive species are so rife though the West鈥檚 remaining wetland areas that the EPA found three-fifths of them in 鈥減oor鈥 condition. In none of the other three regions did the EPA find more than two-fifths of the wetland area to be in poor condition, which was the worst of three scores assigned to wetlands.

The assessment analyzed coastal mangroves and marshes as well as mountain meadows, bogs and other ecosystems straddling water and land.

Half of the 220 million original acres of wetlands growing hundreds of years ago in the Lower 48 have been destroyed, . That destruction was not captured by the EPA鈥檚 new assessment.

鈥淲e only assessed sites that were existing wetlands in 2011,鈥 EPA spokeswoman Monica Lee said in an email. 鈥淭o properly put the results of (the assessment) into context, it鈥檚 useful to remember that approximately 50 percent of wetland acreage has been lost.鈥

By growing taller as seas rise, marshes and other wetlands are increasingly being valued for their ability to buffer worsening floods and waves as the climate changes. Seas rose  last century and are rising more quickly now as climate change worsens. Seas may rise  this century, creating unprecedented problems for coastal communities.

As well as helping to combat the effects of rising seas, wetlands filter pollution from water, provide habitat for salmon and clapper rails and keep carbon dioxide 鈥攕lowing global warming.

In California, the destruction of wetlands has been even more severe than in the rest of the country. An estimated 90 percent have been lost from the Golden State in less than two centuries. The causes of the spectacular decline of the wetlands of the West are rooted in a happenstance of geography and urban and industrial development.

Steep and jagged Western seasides naturally contain fewer wetlands than flatter American regions. Many of the West鈥檚 few marshlands were concentrated along the riversides and banks of San Francisco Bay, which is part of a vast estuary. Those banks have been paved over and built upon as the Bay Area population has swollen quickly in recent decades to beyond 7 million.

鈥淭hat鈥檚 one of the most urbanized estuaries in the country鈥攊f not the world,鈥 said , a Smithsonian Environmental Research Center coastal ecologist who is based in Nevada and works nationwide. 鈥淭here鈥檚 a squeeze that鈥檚 happening with the wetlands. There鈥檚 just a finite area.鈥

Ships berthing at busy ports throughout the bay are constantly introducing invasive species. That has left the region with some of the worst infestations of wetland weeds anywhere in the country. Nonnative plants were found at high levels in 72 percent of the EPA鈥檚 wetland surveys in the West.

鈥淎t certain times of the year, a whole different kind of weed takes over,鈥 said Moseley, the volunteer. She said Pier 94 wetland volunteers plan to battle infestations of invasive sea lavender during their next monthly outing. 鈥淚t just grows like crazy.鈥

The Bay Area鈥檚 marshes may have been badly battered, but its residents and leaders are also leading the nation in .

The findings from the EPA鈥檚 new assessment didn鈥檛 surprise scientists, who already work closely with damaged wetlands and have front row views of the damages catalogued in the new report. 鈥淚t serves to inform policy makers in Washington,鈥 said  of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. 鈥淚t does serve to raise the level of awareness.鈥

The Pier 94 wetland restoration was a small project. The marsh began growing naturally after a shoreline on Port of San Francisco property slumped into the water. The emergent marsh was fostered a decade ago by a public project that cleared away paving, tires and other heavy trash, helping plants take root.

The volunteers are constantly picking up trash that鈥檚 been freshly deposited on the resurgent wetland. 鈥淚t鈥檚 really special to kind of see how it鈥檚 transformed itself,鈥 Moseley said.

On a grander scale,  and salt-harvesting ponds are being  from the North Bay to the South Bay in an effort to restore marshlands, generally on waterfront property owned or purchased by a public agency. Bay Area voters are  to help fund the work.

Bay Area agencies in 1999 published a vision of restoring 100,000 acres of tidal marsh. Since 1999, restoration work has begun and in some cases finished on 42,000 acres, state figures show. A  commissioned by California cited an imminent rise in rates of sea level rise in calling for the work to be urgently accelerated.

Measure AA, which would create a new $12 a year parcel tax in the nine Bay Area counties to help fund wetland restorations, shares a ballot with California鈥檚 presidential primary election this week. The measure is being  of the region鈥檚 business and conservation groups, but , who say the structure of the tax would be unfair.

Moseley visited City Hall last week and voted in favor of Measure AA鈥攚hich would impose the proposed new fee on her landlord if two out of three voters cast ballots in its favor. 鈥淚 certainly would be glad to give $12 for this,鈥 she said.

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