Stewardship Projects

Before transferring our properties to public agencies, Save Mount Diablo
conducts volunteer work projects to clean up debris and hazards, improve habitat and provide trails for recreational opportunities. Recent and active stewardship projects on our properties include:

Marsh Creek I

REI Volunteers Build a Trail at Marsh Creek-I
When Save Mount Diablo buys a property we look for ways to create recreational opportunities and enhance habitat. Our 9-acre Marsh Creek-I property was the perfect place to team up with the new REI store in Brentwood for trail building. On a hot day in June, 30 volunteers put in a hard day’s work to create a new 2,000 foot loop trail that leads visitors up an oak covered slope to beautiful ridgeline rock outcrops and then back down to the bottom of the property.
View more photos, Trail Building at Marsh Creek I.

Marsh Creek II

Marsh Creek II
Debris Removal
Our stewards removed two truck loads of debris that had been dumped on Marsh Creek-II before our purchase of the parcel. Many of our properties front rural roads and debris can attract additional illegal dumping. Vigilant monitoring allows us to keep the properties clean. View more photos, Trash Removal

Marsh Creek IV

Marsh Creek-IV Stream Restoration
When Save Mount Diablo bought Marsh Creek-IV in May 2009, we became the owners of a beautiful section of Marsh Creek and two acres of flat weed-covered flood plain. Marsh Creek IV contains a creek segment lined with mature sycamores, oaks and willows and provides habitat for the threatened California red-legged frog. With grants from REI and the Contra Costa County Fish and Wildlife Subcommittee, our Stewardship Committee will fence the flat and expand the creek corridor’s riparian woodland. The split rail fence around the property will be made with recycled, hundred year old redwood posts saved from our Irish Canyon property when we replaced the fence there.

Marsh Creek-IV Gazebo
Our land stewards relocated a 2,500 pound gazebo teetering on the banks of Marsh Creek away from the creek corridor to a less sensitive, higher elevation location on the property.

Marsh Creek-IV Fencing
Using hundred year old redwood posts recycled from fencing removed in Irish Canyon, our stewards built a 500 foot, split- rail fence on the boundary of MC-IV, to prevent off-roading which could disturb native vegetation and habitat.

Marsh Creek-IV Restoration
With the help of hundreds of volunteers, many of them high school students, we removed non-native invasive plants and replaced them with 480 native plants along the banks of Marsh Creek.

Mangini Ranch

New Trails at Mangini Ranch
Save Mount Diablo’s 208-acre Mangini Ranch contains many hidden treasures not reached by fire roads. With the help of the East Bay Trail Dogs, we have constructed four new trails totaling more than a mile in length that allow visitors to experience more of the property. One trail joins a fire road at a pedestrian bridge across Galindo Creek, a donated Eagle Scout project.  In the future Mangini will be connected to the surrounding open space system; for now visitors can join SMD tours.

Mangini Ranch Oak Restoration
We fenced young buckeye tree seedlings to improve their survival rates despite grazing pressure.

View more photos of stewardship on Mangini Ranch, Building a Bridge at Mangini Ranch

Irish Canyon

Irish Canyon – Transfer, Trails, and Restoration
Save Mount Diablo transferred our 320-acre Irish canyon property to East Bay Regional Park District in the Fall of 2010 to help expand the corridor connecting Mount Diablo State Park and Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve. Before Save Mount Diablo turned the property over, we restored oaks and wetlands and built trails. We installed 3.5 miles of fencing to manage cattle grazing, protect a creek corridor and allow oak restoration.

Irish Canyon Tree Planting
We planted blue, live and valley oaks on this property impacted by over a hundred years of homesteaders, and continued watering trees planted the prior year.

Save Mount Diablo's First Vehicle

Save Mount Diablo’s First Vehicle
Thanks to grants from REI and the HEDCO Foundation, Save Mount Diablo purchased a Polaris Off-road Utility Vehicle (OUV). The OUV has helped our hard working volunteer stewards to complete a myriad of projects on our properties.

Past Projects
View photos of our Pond Restoration at Chaparral Spring

Trail Building at Marsh Creek I

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Trash Removal

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Building a Bridge at Mangini Ranch

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Removing a Gully and Pond Restoration at Chaparral Spring

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