San Carlos Green has led the effort to improve Vista Park, a native vegetation, no chemical pilot site.

They have accomplished a great deal:

• Native plants are already blooming and the wildflowers we planted are sprouting.
• San Carlos Green’s fourth volunteer day held in March 2008 was a great success installing two 1,000+ sq ft. experimental restoration plots in the meadow area.
  1. The first they laid down newspaper to smother the invasive grasses, covered that with several inches of
  compost and hydro seed.
  2. The second they roto-tilled, covered that with several inches of compost and hydro seed.
  3. Parks staff provided the wonderful compost. It was perfectly timed and placed and almost all of it was used.
• We will determine which method is most successful by the number of weeds that show up in the plots.
• This fall, we will plan restoration of the entire grassy hill using the most effective method.
• Note that these plots were placed at the very south end of the Park to avoid any interference with July 4 festivities.
• The neighbors seem to be pleased with the entire project.

Thank you to San Carlos Green for their leadership and to Gachina Landscape Management who provided most of the labor, the grass & wildflower seed and recruited the company that did the hydro seeding. Special thanks from San Carlos Green to Councilmember Omar Ahmad for his all of his time and hard labor.

To-date San Carlos Green and community volunteers has:

• Held 4 volunteer days with more than 65 volunteers.
• Weeded 90% of the landscaped areas.
• Installed water efficient irrigation.
• Planted more than 250 native plants – some of which are already blooming.
• Initiated two experimental restoration areas on the meadow to eradicate all the non-native grasses.
• We are now working on signage and keeping up with the weeds.

Photos: "Before Weeding", "Hard at Work", "After Planting", "MP Rotator irrigation heads" (uses 60% less water than normal sprayers), "Experimental plots for eradicating invasive grasses" and "Restoring native grasses"

Thank You for Taking Green Action!

www.sancarlosgreen.org

Ann Iverson
Iverson Marketing Communications
650/592-5862
cell 650/766-9303
ann@iversonmarcom.com
www.iversonmarcom.com