Yuba Watershed Institute

Fire in the Sierra Nevada: Virtual Panel Discussion

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Zoom link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83340491831?pwd=Q2R0VHhMVk15dU1zWDVOVlpBbFNoZz09
Call in: +1 669 900 6833, Meeting ID: 833 4049 1831, Passcode: 757324

The Yuba Watershed Institute (YWI) is collaborating with Sierra Forest Legacy, South Yuba River Citizens League, Fire Safe Council of Nevada County, Sierra Streams Institute, and Open Canopy LLC to bring you an evening of learning and discussion about the history of fire in the California landscape.

Following these two lectures, a panel discussion will focus on how examining historical cultural burning and what we know about factors influencing fire severity can drive management of our increasingly fire-prone forests.

This public event is in support of the Spring 2021 Cal-TREX Yuba prescribed fire training workshop, during which representative from local non-profit organizations will receive training in prescribed fire skills. Prescribed Fire Training Exchanges (TREX) are a nation-wide program coordinated by The Nature Conservancy.

For more information about this event, contact the YWI at info@yubawatershedinstitute.org.

Need a good romp in the woods? Fungus Foray 2020

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Want to see what treasures await us in the forests of the Yuba River watershed?

Join the Yuba Watershed Fungus Foray and Wild Mushroom Exposition on December 12-13, 2020 at the North Columbia Schoolhouse Cultural Center (17894 Tyler Foote Rd., Nevada City, CA 95959). Please note: this is a different location than the previous several years.

The event will be significantly scaled down and completely outdoors in order to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

At the Fungus Foray, on December 12, we have space for 6 participants in each of the 7 foray groups. Each group will leave the Schoolhouse at a different time on Saturday morning or early afternoon and drive to a separate foray location. Participants will drive separately in single-family groups and will maintain 6 ft. of distance at all times. Purchase Tickets for the Yuba Watershed Fungus Foray (12/12/20)

On Sunday, December 13, the Wild Mushroom Exposition will take place outside the Schoolhouse, and participants can sign up to view them and talk to our mushroom experts during 1-hour shifts throughout the day. Each shift is limited to 12 participants. Masks or face covering will be required, and proper social distancing will be encouraged. Purchase Tickets for the Wild Mushroom Exposition (12/13/20)

PLEASE NOTE: The Sunday Wild Mushroom Exposition will be cancelled in the event of rain. All ticket-holders will be reimbursed in full if the event is cancelled.


Help support the work of the Yuba Watershed Institute!

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Nikko Garvin demonstrates the use of an edging mill to make wood slabs during YWI’s “Working with Local Wood” workshop in July 2019

Dear friends and supporters of the Yuba Watershed Institute (YWI),

Wildfires, power outages, and the rising cost or cancellation of homeowner’s insurance are making it more challenging to live in the Sierra Nevada region.

There is a question I hear a lot these days: what are proactive steps we can take to reduce fire risk in our neighborhoods? One answer has become clear. We have to learn how to live with fire, just as indigenous peoples have for thousands of years before Euro-American settlement of this area.

There are steps each of us can take, such as hardening our homes and maintaining the proper vegetation clearances around structures. There are also actions we must take that require cooperation on a neighborhood scale or larger. For example, it takes cooperation to:

  • Maintain landscape-level fuel breaks that can slow fire behavior, allow for safe evacuation during a fire, and provide a safe place for fire personnel to attempt wildfire suppression;
  • Reduce the risk of high-severity fire on public lands that border our neighborhoods;
  • Protect the places we love to recreate by improving ecosystem resiliency to climate change, droughts, and bark beetle infestations;
  • Reintroduce healthy fire to these landscapes using prescribed burning; and
  • Preserve ecological values like wildlife habitat, clean water, and native plant diversity while reducing fire danger.

The YWI was founded 30 years ago to facilitate this kind of cooperation. In recent years, we’ve raised over $800,000 from state and private sources for planning and implementation of forest health and fire prevention projects on 1,200 acres of public lands on Nevada County’s San Juan Ridge.

And just this year, the YWI has begun working with neighborhood groups and Firewise Communities in other parts of Nevada County to replicate the success of our work on the San Juan Ridge.

We need your help to spread the vision of healthy forests supported by an active, engaged community of land stewards.

Please consider supporting this important work by starting or renewing your YWI membership today!
Join at www.yubawatershedinstitute.org/membership/

Your generous support will also help us provide other programs the community has grown to love, including:

  • The annual Yuba Watershed Fungus Foray and Wild Mushroom Exposition;
  • Our annual publication Tree Rings: The Journal of the Yuba Watershed Institute, where we bring you essays, artwork, and poetry on current watershed-related themes; and
  • Popular educational field programs, volunteer events, and evening and weekend workshops.

We are grateful for your past support and hope that you will be inspired to help the YWI by contributing at an increased level. Thank you for your enduring dedication to preserving the biodiversity of the Yuba River watershed and beyond!

Sincerely,

Chris Friedel
Executive Director

Register today for July 13 “Working with Local Wood” workshop

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Working with Local Wood

Learn How to Harvest, Handle, Process, & Mill Local Wood to Quality Lumber

JULY 13, 2019
9:30 AM to 4 PM
North Columbia Schoolhouse Cultural Center
17894 Tyler Foote Rd, Nevada City, CA 95959

$25 for YWI members ($35 for non-members)

Milling your own lumber is more than cutting boards from a log. The presenters at this Saturday workshop have many decades of experience working with local woods. Presenters include: Len Brackett (traditional timber framer); Bob Erickson (furniture maker); Theo Killigrew des Tombe (timber faller & mill operator); Robert Beauchamp (mill operator); and Nikko Garvin (mill operator).

More information and registration