Santa Barbara Channelkeeper

Keeping Watch for Clean Water

environment

Every Yard Counts in Addressing the Impacts of Climate Change

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The Santa Barbara Channel is vulnerable to the impacts of a changing climate. Your yard can help protect it. 

The Santa Barbara Channel is one of the most biologically productive ecosystems found on Earth. However, changing oceanographic processes, warming water temperatures, ocean acidification, and sea level rise produced by a changing climate are already affecting the health of marine ecosystems.  

We’ve seen recently how coastal runoff from intense rains and flooding flushes trash and debris into the Santa Barbara Channel, degrading water quality. We’ve also seen how high nutrient levels from coastal runoff contribute to harmful algal blooms. Yet our community can minimize some of these impacts by making a few changes in their own yards.  

By conserving water and managing runoff, focusing on soil health, and reducing emissions from lawn care equipment, each of us can lessen our yard’s climate impact while conserving resources and enhancing habitat. Here are a few ideas to implement in your landscaped space. 

Replace Your Lawn

Fertilizing, mowing, blowing, and irrigating a lawn leads to a sizable climate footprint. In 2011, an Environmental Protection Agency report found that gas-powered lawn and garden equipment emitted approximately 6.3 million tons of volatile organic compounds and criteria pollutants (carbon, nitrous oxide, and particulate matter), and 20.4 million tons of carbon dioxide. By planting a variety of native, drought-tolerant plants, trees, shrubs, and ground covers that don’t require high maintenance, you can reduce your landscape’s water use, while providing habitat for birds, pollinators, and beneficial insects. You can make the transition gradually over time by replacing a different patch of turf each year. In addition, many municipalities offer rebates when you replace your lawn with water-wise plants. 

Focus on Soil Health

Healthy soils are the base of thriving ecosystems. Soils rich with organic matter support healthy populations of beneficial organisms while retaining moisture and helping sequester carbon. 

Avoid using synthetic fertilizers. Synthetic fertilizers are not only extremely energy-intensive to manufacture, but they also provide more nitrogen than plants can absorb, contributing to polluted runoff and hazardous algae blooms in the ocean, lakes, and rivers that collect runoff. 

Alternatively, composting food and yard waste is a great way to build healthy soil in your yard. Organic material will improve the fertility, soil structure, and water-holding capacity of your landscape. Planting a cover crop is another way to support healthy soil since plants can help hold soil prevent runoff during heavy rains, protect soil from evaporation during droughts, and capture nutrients to prevent nutrient loss in runoff.  

Be Water Wise

Long periods of drought followed by heavy rains make it increasingly important for each of us to manage and use water wisely. Collecting water from your roof in rain barrels, a cistern, or storage tanks can help you to retain water for future use.  

It’s also a good idea to consider the permeability of your landscape and make the most of downpours by diverting stormwater to designated areas in your yard where it can infiltrate and recharge groundwater resources.  

When irrigation is necessary, drip systems tend to waste less water to evaporation and runoff than conventional sprinklers. Mulching around the base of plants can also help prevent moisture loss while nourishing the soil. 

Use People Power

Reduce your yard’s greenhouse gas emissions by limiting the gas-powered equipment you use to maintain it. Lawn and garden equipment like lawnmowers and leaf blowers account for up five percent of total air pollution in the United States. In fact, according to the EPA, one gas mower spews 88 lbs. of greenhouse gas CO2, and 34 lbs. of other pollutants into the air every year. For a climate-smart alternative, choose hand tools like reel mowers, shovels, and brooms. 

Resources: 

Santa Barbara County 
 
WaterWise Santa Barbara Landscape Rebate Program 

Green Gardener Program 

WaterWise Garden Contest 

Ventura County 

Ventura Water Turf Replacement Rebate 

Ventura Water Conservation Resources 

Drip Irrigation Retrofit Program 

Leveraging the Law to Protect Ocean Environments from the Effects of Finfish Aquaculture 

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Channelkeeper recently joined the Center for Food Safety, other environmental organizations, fishing groups, and the Quinault Indian Nation in suing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers over its issuance of Nationwide Permit 56, which authorizes the development of finfish farming structures in state and federal waters. We are challenging that the Nationwide Permit was approved without a thorough analysis of its potential detrimental impacts on our ocean ecosystems, water quality, public health, fishing communities, and endangered and threatened species. 

Nationwide Permit 56 allows the installation of cages, net pens, anchors, floats, buoys, and other structures in marine and estuarine waters over the outer continental shelf. It’s the primary program that will be used to permit all future finfish aquaculture development in federal waters throughout the United States. However, the groups who have filed the legal action are concerned that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers skirted mandatory environmental review processes when it issued this permit.  We claim that the agency failed to consult, as required by law, with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service, as about potential effects on threatened and endangered species protected under the Endangered Species Act, nor consult on the impacts to Essential Fish Habitat under the Magnuson-Stevens Act. Further, the Army Corps lacks the legal authority to take this step in the first place without new authority from Congress, which it has not gotten. 

The Nationwide Permit 56 originated from a Trump-era executive order promoting the rapid expansion of industrial marine aquaculture facilities under the guise of addressing pandemic-related food insecurity. Federal officials have begun identifying locations as potential sites for commercial aquaculture operations. The Santa Barbara Channel—along with areas in the Gulf of Mexico and waters off Marina del Rey, California—was selected by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration as one of the first areas to assess for future aquaculture development. The Santa Barbara Channel currently has two active aquaculture projects along the coastline.  

Certain types of aquaculture projects, such as those for shellfish and seaweed, generally may have benefits that outweigh the drawbacks. However, offshore aquaculture operations for finfish (such as tuna or tilapia) present significant risks to the environment. These include, but are not limited to: 

  • water quality impairment from dead fish, fecal waste, and antibiotics; 
  •  spread of disease that can impact populations of wild fish caught by commercial, recreational, and subsistence fishermen; 
  • escape of farmed fish into the natural environment, risking the genetic integrity of wild populations; and 
  • depletion of small fish populations that are used as feed for farmed fish and thus, less available for wild fish, birds, and marine life. 

In addition, there is currently no regulatory program in place to adequately oversee aquaculture operations in federal waters or strong standards to protect the marine environment from the impacts of finfish aquaculture.  

By signing on to this lawsuit, Channelkeeper hopes to ensure that all appropriate precautions and measures are in place to protect the Santa Barbara Channel from the potentially destructive impacts of industrial, offshore finfish aquaculture.   

Connecting Kids with Nature to Spark Wonder and Inspire Environmental Sensitivity

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If you’ve ever followed a hermit crab’s footprints across a tidepool, built a fort in the wilderness, or listened closely to a bird’s song, you understand the sense of wonder and quiet joy that activities in the wild can inspire. For kids, the natural world can be a place of curiosity, creative play, and discovery. 

A growing number of studies suggest that connection with nature has significant physical, psychological, and academic benefits for kids. Time in the wild can also inspire greater sensitivity to the surrounding world, a deeper understanding of environmental issues, and real-life opportunities to practice problem-solving. 

Channelkeeper’s education programs aim to nurture environmental awareness and stewardship in young people with the understanding that today’s youth are the decision-makers of tomorrow. Their environmental ethics are critical to our planet’s future. By fostering a connection between young people and the natural world, we hope to inspire the next generation of clean water leaders. 

To extend our discovery-driven curriculum beyond field trips and classroom visits, we’ve gathered a few fun, hands-on educational activities for young explorers and families to experience together. Learn about how water moves through a watershed and the ways in which it can become contaminated. Discover the fluid dynamics of the water cycle. In addition, we’ve included some special places to explore with activities such as rock hopping in Mission Creek at Rocky Nook Park, tidepooling at Coal Oil Point, bird watching at the Goleta Slough, and reading inspiring stories in the shade of a tree.

We hope that you share these activities with a special child in your life and enjoy a moment in nature together.

Activities:

Make a Watershed 

Have you ever wondered where water goes when it rains? In this simple activity you can make a model watershed and watch how the water flows over the land.

  • Crumple up a piece of plain office paper and then smooth it back out most of the way- it should remain a bit crumpled, showing small ridges (high points) and valleys (low points). 
  • Imagine that this paper is a section of land. Find the ridgelines (the tops of the fold-lines). 
  • Use a washable blue marker (not permanent) to color along the ridgelines on your land. The blue color from the marker will help you follow the path of the precipitation.
  • Use a spray bottle of water to create a rainstorm over your land. The goal is to create gentle sprays of mist. 
  • Spray the bottle once, and observe the precipitation. Has the water begun to move in your watershed? If not, then lightly mist again, until the precipitation starts traveling on your watershed. 
  • As your rainfall accumulates, observe the pathways where the excess rainfall travels.

Explore your watershed. With your finger, trace your stream (the path of the blue marker) all the way back up to where it starts at the top of the ridge. When you reach the top, this is the edge of the watershed for your stream and lake. Trace the entire edge of the watershed with your finger by following the ridgeline.  Everything inside, the downward-sloping area you have just outlined is the watershed for your stream or lake.

Find the Solution to Pollution 

  • Gather up 4-5 clean glass jars, masking tape, paper coffee filters, and a magnifying glass. 
  • Collect water from different sources including tap water, a creek or lake, or even the ocean making sure to label each jar with the water source.
  • Fit the coffee filters just inside the mouths of additional large, wide-mouthed jars. 
  • Take one of the water samples, and slowly pour the water through the filter into the other jar. Repeat for each water sample, pouring it into a new jar with a fresh coffee filter. 
  • Open each filter and examine it through the magnifying glass. 
  • Analyze the filters. Which filter is the most discolored? Which filter caught the most particles? Did any of the samples leave a colored residue on the filter? 
  • Discuss how the water in creeks, rivers, and the ocean can become polluted. Where do pollutants come from? 
  • A major cause of water pollution in Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties is nonpoint source pollution, or contamination that comes from more than one source. As water runoff moves over land, it picks up and carries natural and human-made pollutants into our creeks and rivers, which eventually drain into the ocean. What steps can we take to reduce water pollution in our area?

Create a Water Cycle Model

  • Use a permanent marker to draw the water cycle on a Ziplock bag (if possible, reuse a plastic bag for this activity). You can create your own interpretation of water collection, evaporation, condensation, and precipitation or follow this easy video.
  • Pour about ⅓ cup of water into the bag. You can add one or two drops of blue food coloring to the water if you choose, but it’s not essential.
  • Find a sunny window and tape the bag to the glass.
  • Check in on the water cycle bag at different times throughout the next few days. Do you see water droplets form along the bag from the condensation? Eventually, you may see streaks along the side of the bag as the droplets grow and drop down the side, representing precipitation. From there, the water will recollect and pool at the bottom, mimicking the water cycle we experience on Earth.
  • Rinse out the plastic bag and reuse it for other household needs!

Outdoor Adventures:

Visit Mission Creek in Rocky Nook Park
Rocky Nook Park is not only free to visit, its creek area is a special place to connect with nature. Practice your rock hopping skills and get to know Mission Creek’s pools while looking for tadpoles. How many different kinds of water bugs can you find? Pick up 5 pieces of trash to leave the park a little cleaner than you found it.

Low Tide Beach Walk
Check the tides and head to the beach to explore during low tide! How many creatures can you count? Can you find the wrack line, the horizontal line on the beach where kelp, driftwood, and insects collect? This accumulation area plays an important role in beach ecology. How many hermit crabs can you find in a tidepool? Can you find a sea star? Their populations are just starting to recover following a wasting disease. Be sure to leave them on the rock where you observed them! Check for low tides at Tide Predictions – NOAA Tides & Currents

Some of our favorite tidepools to explore include Tarpits Beach in Carpinteria, Leadbetter Beach in Santa Barbara, and in the Campus Point Marine Protected Area at Coal Oil Point in Isla Vista.

Watch the Birds
We’re so lucky! The Santa Barbara area has so many great opportunities to observe birds, including many species that pass through seasonally. Have you ever spotted a red tail hawk? How about a snowy egret? We challenge you to find your favorite bird! What sort of habitat does it prefer? What does it like to eat? What sounds does it make?

Visit the Goleta Slough, Lake Los Carneros, and Santa Barbara Bird Refuge for some excellent birding and check out the free ebird app for help with bird identification and cool facts!

Read books outside!

Have you ever read a book with your feet in a creek? How about under a tree? Borrow a few books from your local library or find them online and head outdoors! Some of our favorites include:

  • Once Upon a Watershed by Dianne Bennett
  • The Big Book of the Blue by Yuval Zommer
  • Deep in the Ocean by Lucie Brunelliere
  • All the Way to the Ocean by Joel Harper
  • The Little Creek that Could by Marc Angelo
  • The Lorax by Dr. Seuss
  • The Watcher: Jane Goodall’s Life with the Chimps by Jeanette Winter

New Report Outlines a Comprehensive Approach to Prevent Ocean Plastic Pollution

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[En Español]

How can we address the global issue of plastic waste? A new report published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS), titled Reckoning with the U.S. Role in Global Ocean Plastic Waste, not only evaluates the United States’ contribution to plastic production and waste generation, it also offers recommendations for reducing the amount of plastic that makes its way to the ocean.

The NAS study, required by the bipartisan Save Our Seas 2.0 Act of 2020, reports that the U.S. generated more plastic waste in 2016 than any country in the world—a total of 42 million metric tons (MMT) and estimates that in 2016 about 1 to 2 MMT of US-generated plastic waste entered the environment in the U.S. and abroad. Previous studies estimate that globally 8 MMT of plastic waste enters the world’s ocean each year.

The report found that the leading sources of ocean plastics include stormwater systems, wastewater discharges, atmospheric deposits, trash from boats and ships, beach waste, and transport from inland areas by rivers and streams.

These findings underscore the urgent need for enhanced tracking and monitoring to gather comprehensive data and address knowledge gaps by employing technologies such as sensors, biochemical markers, and tracers, as well as the implementation of standardized measurements to collect meaningful data sets that are scientifically robust and comparable.

Recommended Interventions

What steps can the U.S. take to reduce the amount of plastic waste entering the ocean? The report recommends that a variety of interventions be implemented across various stages of plastic’s path from source to ocean.

As a fundamental step, the study suggests that the U.S. reduce overall plastic production to affect change throughout the waste stream. And, with system-wide solutions in mind, the report also recommends that the U.S. improve waste management infrastructure and accelerate innovations in material and product design to develop plastic substitutes that degrade more quickly or are easily recycled.

Physical interventions include frequent cleanups, improving the methods used to remove plastic waste from the environment such as extracting plastic waste from stormwater, and reducing the amount of plastic waste that enters the ocean directly from vessels via the establishment of waste disposal infrastructure, incentives for land-based disposal of fishing nets and gear, better tracking methods, and increased enforcement.

Ultimately, the report recommends the creation of a federal research and policy strategy that focuses on identifying and implementing interventions throughout the plastic life cycle.

The NAS report not only provides an informative assessment of the U.S.’s contribution to the global ocean plastic problem, but it also offers actionable recommendations that, if implemented, may position the US as a global leader in reducing plastic pollution and creating a more circular economy. In this sense, the report presents an opportunity to effect positive change and transform our nation’s approach to mitigating plastic pollution.

What Can We Do?

As an organization, Channelkeeper works to reduce the flow of plastic pollution to the ocean through an array of advocacy, monitoring, outreach, and education initiatives and as a lead community voice supporting the transition away from single-use plastics. We conduct cleanups, advocate for local ordinances to minimize distribution of these single-use plastic items by using less harmful alternatives, and we support a film plastic recycling program in partnership with Abblitt’s Fine Cleaners that converts plastic waste into pellets used for decking and other household materials.

On an individual level, each of us can take steps to reduce the flow of plastics into the environment. We can lessen the plastic used in our lives and choose products that come in minimal packaging. We can leverage our purchasing power to choose more sustainable options by purchasing secondhand items and products in bulk, and by reusing items rather than buying new ones. We can also simply recycle the plastic items that we use. Finally, we can support government policies that reduces plastic use. Support government initiatives at the city, county, state, and federal level to reduce the use of single-use plastics and hold businesses accountable for the packaging they produce.

In November of 2022, every Californian will have an opportunity to take action against plastic pollution by voting in support of the California Plastic Waste Reduction Regulations Initiative. If passed, the law would require the State to take steps to reduce plastic waste including requiring that single-use plastic packaging, containers, and utensils be reusable, recyclable, or compostable. It would also tax producers of single-use plastics and use the revenue to fund recycling and environmental programs.

We invite you to learn more about this upcoming ballot initiative and support federal legislation like the Federal Break Free from Plastic Act of 2020, which would hold plastic producers fiscally responsible for collecting, managing, and recycling or composting their products after consumer use and would establish minimum percentages of products that must be reused, recycled, or composted.

Reducing the amount of plastic waste that finds its way into the environment will require the combined efforts of legislative action, producer responsibility, and consumer pressure. Channelkeeper is pleased to support the transition away from plastic and continues to take an active role in pollution reduction through ocean pollution monitoring and prevention, in addition to political advocacy and community education.

Volunteer Spotlight: For Sue Sadler-Paré Cleaning up the Beach is Personal

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Sue Sadler-Paré feels a profound connection to the ocean and she explains that she’s happiest when she’s in, on, or under the water. As often as she can, she heads to the beach to walk her dog, take in the beauty, or go for a swim. She’s always picked up trash along the way, but in the midst of the pandemic, she noticed an increased amount, so she started taking bags with her and picking up trash as she walked. 

“I didn’t quite get in the longer walks I had hoped for, but I felt it was more important for me to pick up the plastic cup that 500 people had just walked by. It was driving me crazy. I had to do something—and that motivated me to take action.”

To date, Sue has collected more than 340 pounds of trash. She’s an extraordinary advocate for pollution prevention and a true watershed hero who makes fighting for the Earth and the environment her everyday goal.

Sue has always loved the ocean. She grew up in Laguna Beach, moved to the mountains of Big Bear for high school, was drawn back to the coast for college in Santa Barbara, and never left. Living by the water, she explains, was a high priority.

Her relationship with the ocean is intimate. As a diver, swimmer, and beach walker, she has had extraordinary aquatic experiences and felt nourished and cared for by the ocean throughout her life. So it’s no wonder that she feels very protective of the Channel. In fact, cleaning up trash along the water’s edge is almost a gesture of reciprocity and gratitude.

“The ocean has always been so good to me that it feels meaningful that I’m able to give back to her. I liken it to assisting my mother when she got older and couldn’t do things. I was able to help her out and feel like I was making a difference.”

Sue feels a strong sense of responsibility to clean up the beaches near her home, so she tends to focus on Haskell’s Beach and Goleta Beach, with occasional neighborhood cleanups around Calle Real and Fairview. She is 1000% committed to pollution prevention and does whatever it takes to remove litter from coastal areas and get the job done right. On more than one occasion, she has had to request outside assistance because the trash was more than she could handle on her own. Now that’s dedicated!

Several months ago, Sue recruited a friend to join her on cleanups and they’ve enjoyed spending extra time together outside laughing about the odd items that they discover while doing something positive for the environment. The duo recently cleaned up Fairview Avenue and stuffed Sue’s car with debris. They participate in Watershed Brigade cleanup events and appreciate the sense of camaraderie the Watershed Brigade provides and the knowledge that there are other like-minded folks who are out cleaning up our community. Plus, Sue explains, the challenges and prizes make it extra fun.

It’s Sue’s personal sense of responsibility for the environment and her commitment to act locally to reduce pollution that make her such an inspiring force for good.

“When I see trash on the beach and it may be seconds away from being washed into the ocean, I feel a sense of urgency,” she explains. “It’s become much more of an issue of ‘if not me, who?’ We know what’s going on with the climate crisis and ocean pollution, and it’s not going to get better if we don’t take action. There’s no way I’m going to look past that cigarette butt that’s sitting in the sand. They say if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem and that’s really resonated for me.”

We’re deeply grateful for heart-driven volunteers like Sue Sadler-Paré, who make it their mission to create a cleaner, healthier community. You inspire us every step of the way.

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