Harmonee Planting Day

VCRCD has held three planting days at the offices of the Ventura County Watershed Protection District near the Santa Clara River. There are several parking islands we were able to convert to monarch butterfly and other pollinator habitat under our Wildlife Conservation Board grant, Harmonee. Each time, we collaborated with people from ARC Foundation of Ventura County, a non-profit established to empower county residents with intellectual and developmental disabilities to reach their full potential. They were excellent gardening students and really enjoyed helping and learning about the habitat.  

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Wildfire Conference

Thank you to the over 200 participants of the inaugural California Wildfire Conference. Participants from all parts of the United States and beyond gathered at the Ronald Reagan Library to collaborate on how to best address wildfire.

Partner organizations, Ventura Regional Fire Safe Council and Ojai Valley Fire Safe Council, helped VCRCD prepare for the conference and supported field trips on the last day of the conference.

This conference was hosted by the Ventura County Wildfire Collaborative and was organized by VCRCD Conservation Coordinator, Mason Thurmond, and our partner, Coastal Quest. Funding for the conference was provided by CalFire and California Climate Investments. For more information about presenters and to view conference recordings please click the link below.

Hands on Pollinator Lesson

Red Oak Elementary School students had the opportunity to learn about local pollinator species and help install a new pollinator garden in their school.

Students learned why pollinators are important for a healthy ecosystem and they were able to choose their own California native plant to install on their school grounds.

Thank you to Oak Park Unified School District Staff and the students for making this day a huge success.

Oak Park High School Planting Day

Things are really rolling for our monarch and pollinator habitat conversions for the Oak Park Unified School District. The District identified weedy and little-used areas on their campuses where we could apply our grant funding through the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy and from U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The second area we tackled was a small bioswale in the high school parking lot. Participants from the high school Our Futures Club and Friends of Oak Park Open Space helped to beautify this small but prominent space.  

Wildfire Youth Program

Heidi Ortloff, our Education and Outreach Coordinator had the pleasure to talk to a group of first graders about wildfires and preparing for evacuations.

Programs such as these help young students learn the importance of preparation and teach valuable coping skills to handle emergencies.

These presentations are possible due to our partnership with the Red Cross who supplied the materials and training.

If you are interested in booking a presentation for your students please email info@vcrcd.org

Localizing California Waters Conference

VCRCD staff, Monica Matthews and Emily Nye, attended the Localizing California Waters Conference in Yosemite. Their presentation "Land Management and Community Organizing for Watershed Health" featured many of our core programs such as wildfire resiliency, habitat restoration, pollinator conservation, and community support for watershed health.

Thank you to the conference organizers and Regina Hirsch from Watershed Progressive for inviting VCRCD to present.