One of our most popular school programs is an exploration of Riparian Ecology.
There is a universal fascination with flowing water, and all that lives in and around it. Elementary school classes, high school classes, and even occasional college groups all enjoy our stream programs.
Docents lead small groups of students along the riparian corridor, teaching them about the terrestrial flora and fauna as they walk. Tall sycamore, willow, alder, and bay trees grow along this healthy stream, providing shade and nutrients for aquatic species. Along the way, kids learn about the importance of streams to land animals, especially during the dry summers characteristic of our Mediterranean climate. Coyotes, bears, foxes, mountain lions and many different birds have been seen close to this creek.
Every group has a hands-on experience at our “stream station” where we invariably find a diverse collection of animals. Sometimes we see rare vertebrate species that make this clear, clean creek their home. Pacific pond turtles, coast range newts and three different kinds of frogs live in and around the stream.
Students visit the fish passage that was constructed under Highway 101 to help fish travel downstream to enter the ocean, and to make it easier for adult steelhead to swim up to their freshwater spawning beds from the Pacific. Before the Alisal Fire of 2021, we often observed small resident rainbow trout, and an occasional large steelhead that had come upstream from the ocean. Sadly, as a result of the flooding and debris flows that followed this fire, there are no longer any fish in the creek. We hope that, in the near future, a pair of steelhead will find their way in from the ocean to spawn and they will repopulate the stream once again.
Using buckets and nets, kids find aquatic invertebrates and we talk about their roles in the aquatic food web. Beginning with animals that feed on submerged leaves or on the green algae that covers the rocks in the streambed, students then learn about the many tiny carnivores that feed on these herbivores. We see tiny water pennies that move across stones as they graze on algae, and caddisfly larvae that build protective “houses” from plant material and sand grains. We observe water striders that are able to walk on the water surface due to the many hydrophobic hairs on their legs. There is great excitement when students find a giant water bug or toe-biter, especially if it is a male carrying eggs on its back. Nymphs of dragonflies and damselflies, stoneflies and mayflies are all part of the huge array of aquatic life that may be observed.
This program teaches students that there is far more to nature than usually meets the eye, thus they are encouraged to become keen observers. They learn about the huge diversity of life, they observe many fascinating adaptations, and they learn about life cycles of many different species. In addition, many interesting new words are introduced, and kids go home with an expanded vocabulary.
