Arcadia Woodlands Follow-up

Here's a visual reminder- from Terry Miller's article and photos in the Arcadia Weekly- of what happened to the Arcadia Woodlands:



Further to my last post regarding their needless destruction, there have been some exciting consequences. There was an enormous emotional response not only in Arcadia but in other cities. This resulted in the activists who had been fighting to save the invaluable woodland realizing that if this energy could be harnessed something magically positive could grow from the tragedy. So today they organized a meeting, held in Eaton Canyon Natural Area County Park, at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains in Pasadena.

Together with a group of fellow Santa Monica Treesavers I participated in this meeting. The general idea- still to be finalized- is to set up a kind of "umbrella" group, enabling all the diverse like-minded groups and individuals to pool resources and help each other. Thus we would become a more knowledgeable, empowered force.

During the meeting we heard many moving stories from the speaker's of their tireless efforts to protect this land. It was good to hear of the experiences of one of the young tree sitters- Julia Posin- who had joined Treesavers as a student at Santa Monica College, when we were being trained by John Quigley to defend our Downtown Ficus trees.

Following this energising meeting, unfortunately we only had a short time to see something of Eaton Canyon- but it was delightful enough to make one want to return there. I will show a few images of what caught my eye, starting with a Native Oak- similar to those of the lost Woodlands:


And here is the remains of one that has rotted away but can still maintain a bunch of foliage:



On closer examination, I was fascinated by the intricate patterns that had formed in the decayed trunk:




Walking by the clear water of a mountain stream, here were yet more patterns:



Let's hope- figuratively speaking- that something wonderful grows from the acorns of those felled oaks...