This year, we are thrilled to celebrate the 100th birthday of San Francisco-based Save the Redwoods League and 100 years of protecting and caring for redwood forests. The League has played a large and important role in the conservation movement here in California, and by inspiring organizations around the country and the world. In the early 1900s they raised awareness and concern for the long-term survival of the West Coast’s ancient and sublime redwood groves, which eventually led to the protection of more than 204,000 acres of coast redwood and giant sequoia forestland.
“One hundred years ago, the ancient redwood forest was disappearing at an extraordinary pace,” says Sam Hodder, president and chief executive officer for Save the Redwoods League. “Thanks to the unwavering commitment of League supporters and partners over the past century, we saved the world’s most iconic forest from elimination. But our work is just beginning. Throughout this landmark year, we will be announcing major initiatives, scientific discoveries and our vision for the future of the redwood forest. Today, we begin with new and expanded programs to connect yet more people to redwoods this year and beyond. To walk among these giants is to look upon the original face of nature and experience the incomparable majesty of the world’s tallest and largest living things.”
“The redwoods, once seen, leave a mark or create a vision that stays with you always,” wrote John Steinbeck in Travels with Charley: In Search of America.
“From them comes silence and awe. It's not only their unbelievable stature, nor the color which seems to shift and vary under your eyes, no, they are not like any trees we know, they are ambassadors from another time.”
The redwoods, ambassadors from another time, can live for more than 2,000 years, representing some of Earth’s largest and oldest organisms. They form a unique ecosystem that allows for many species to live their entire lives in the towering trees’ canopy or in its shallow underground root systems. But in a fraction of their natural lifespan, especially in the latter half of the 19thcentury, logging decimated old-growth redwoods and threatened to wipe them out entirely.
The coast redwood territory covered about 2 million acres in the 1700s. Today, about five percent of those old-growth forests have been preserved. Giant sequoia groves currently occupy 51,000 acres, of which all but 3,000 are protected. - Saving the Redwoods: From Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove to Headwaters Forest, by Joseph H. Engbeck Jr. |
Save the Redwoods League was founded in 1918 to protect these awe-inspiring forests before it was too late, and to plan for their enduring future. Over the last 100 years, the League has, among its many achievements:
- created 66 redwood parks and reserves
- pioneered science-based forest restoration and stewardship
- helped to form the California State Park system, made a case for greater park funding, and provided expertise in land acquisitions and conservation as the State Park system grew
- served as a trusted conduit through which the public - including everyday people, visitors from around the world, and wealthy philanthropists - could contribute to redwoods preservation
“Unlike most public works such as buildings and highways, parkland is an appreciating asset—worth more in the future than at the time of acquisition,” explains Joseph H. Engbeck, Jr., in A Concise History of Redwoods Conservation in California. “By bringing portions of redwood territory back into public hands and continuing to advocate for those resources as administrations and policies changed, the League and others made certain that ancient redwoods would persist for our benefit and that of generations to come.”
The Moore Foundation has supported Save the Redwoods League since 2005 for their work in conservation planning and land acquisitions in the San Francisco Bay Area. The League’s work aligns with the foundation’s goal of preserving the special character of the Bay Area. With this support and the contributions of many other donors, the League has played a vital role in preserving and enhancing habitat for native plant and animal species in the Bay Area—which in turn helps preserve the region’s unique biodiversity and natural beauty.
Looking ahead to its next hundred years, Save the Redwoods League remains committed to protecting ancient redwood forests from destruction, but the threats to the ancient trees are more complex now. With climate change, intense fires, and conversion of land to other uses, the League’s work to protect, restore and connect people with redwood forests has become more important than ever.
How you can help protect redwoods:
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