Vol.

12 #2

Winter 2005/06

Presidents Message

Community Build Planned:

Executive Directors Perspective Focus on Jepson Prairie Grazing for Restoration Volunteer Profile: Kate Mawdsley McConeghy Easement Rush Ranch Poems & Art Activities and Events

You Can Help Build New Rush Ranch Facilities

Marilyn Farley, Executive Director

At sunset on a late October day with sweeping views of the marsh to the south and west, the wind was still and the grasses took on a golden hue at Rush Ranch. The project team eyeballed the old barn, blacksmith shop and kit house, trying to decide on exterior design details for the planned new building. Ken Poerner, SLTs land steward, thought a simple look with whitewashed walls and gray roofing to match the existing ranch buildings seemed best. Rush Ranch Educational Council board member Mary Takeuchi wanted an intimate space in the patio for school children. Executive Director Marilyn Farley asked for facilities with low maintenance requirements. There was talk that a few of the large Patwin Indian grinding stones owned by SLT could become part of the patio landscaping, as well as native plants that tolerate brackish water. The goal was to design an attractive outdoor area that blends with the ranch and marsh environment.
This time next year, a brand new classroom and nature center with real flushing toilets will welcome the hundreds of school children and others who visit Rush Ranch every year. Visiting scientists will have office space, a bunkhouse, and a workroom for examining specimens collected from the marsh. A caretaker will move into a new residence and begin stewardship and security duties. The project will utilize solar and wind power, as well as a back-up generator for electricity and propane for heating. An official site of the National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR), Rush Ranch received a
Continued on page 2

Artists rendering of the new Rush Ranch Facilities

Presidents Message
Sean Quinn, President

Rush Ranch Community Build

Sign Up or Donate NOW!
Please use the envelope included in this issue of Vistas to sign up to pound nails, donate money or construction materials, or help in other ways. You can also donate money to our Rush Ranch routine and major maintenance fund to help ensure that many generations of Solano County residents will enjoy this new facility.

The donation of land or a conservation easement by landowners is an important tool for land trusts. Landowners who make donations benefit from federal tax incentives. These tax incentives for conservation have been the subject of considerable debate at the federal level.
Photo: Bud Turner, WildLight Photography

Volunteer Coordinator Needed

Solano Land Trust is looking for a Volunteer Coordinator to help recruit and schedule volunteers to help build. Ideally, the person selected would have good organizational and people skills and be able to donate 20 hours a week or more starting February 2006 or sooner. If you are interested, please contact Marilyn Farley, Executive Director, at 432-0150, ext. 201 or marilyn@solanolandtrust.org.

Federal tax law provides two tax incentives of particular interest to landowners. First, landowners who donate their property to a land trust can take the fair market value of their land as an income tax deduction, subject to the same limitations as other charitable donations. Second, landowners can donate a conservation easement and claim the fair market value of their easement donation as an income tax donation (subject to limitations in the tax code). The debate over these federal tax incentives began after a series of articles on conservation transactions were published in 2003 in the Washington Post. In early 2005, the Joint Committee on Taxation issued a report that recommended severe limits to the deductions landowners could take for donating a conservation easement. This Committee held a hearing in June 2005 to discuss specific reforms but did not release details. In mid-November, the U.S. Senate passed Senate Bill 1780 that included a significant expansion of the deduction available to landowners who donate a conservation easement to a land trust. The bill includes appraisal reforms, which appear to have been much needed. Key provisions of the bill are as follows: Extension of the carry-forward period for tax deductions from 5 to 15 years. Raising the cap on conservation deductions from 30% of a donors income to 50% and 100% for farmers and ranchers.

Community Build
Continued from page 1

Now the debate moves to the House, where the counterpart to the Senate bill does not include the items noted above. Land trusts throughout the nation will continue to lobby for this important legislation. If approved, the provisions of this Senate bill will assist Solano Land Trust in working with local landowners, particularly farmers and ranchers, who want to donate conservation easements.
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$500,000 grant from NERR to jump-start the construction project. The total cost is estimated at $1.2 million. Solano Land Trust is actively seeking other partners to help pay for construction, and volunteers to do an old-fashioned barn-raising starting in early summer 2006. Volunteers will range from members of the local building trades to residents who can do unskilled and skilled labor, such as carpentry, electrical, plumbing, and roofing. If you can volunteer to help with construction, please contact us now so we can plan our construction schedule. If you participated in the Lets Build a Playground Projects in Fairfield or Vacaville, you know how much fun a community build can be, comments SLT President Sean Quinn. This project will be more complicated, he adds, but with a general contractor, experienced journeymen and a good schedule, we expect everything to move smoothly. Scott Sheldon of Premier Commercial has jumped on board as project manager. Scott and his son, Austin, have visited Rush Ranch for years and are big fans of the property. Although contracted by SLT, Scott is also volunteering a great deal of his time and expertise. Scott has a track record for building quality projects on time and often with substantial savings. He developed the beautiful Solano County Office of Education in Green Valley, and is currently guiding an ambitious private school rebuilding project in Saratoga, California and a new school for Bethany Lutheran Church in Vacaville.

Executive Directors Perspective:

Holiday Thank-Yous and Giving
Marilyn Farley, Executive Director

This is the time to think about our many blessings! SLT is thankful to have a large and diverse group of supporters. We have in common a love for our properties and a desire to share the land and what we know about it with others. Read about volunteer Kate Mawdsley in this issue and youll see what I mean. Since becoming executive director in May, Ive learned that we have many supporters who are busy doing their thing. SLT has stewards, farmers, beekeepers, caretakers, docents, hike leaders and others we rely on for advice, expertise and support. Retired teacher Jim Steinert couldnt wait to get me out to Jepson Prairie. Yes, I had been there before, but this tourearly last June when the vernal pools were filled with waterwas special. He put on his wading boots and retrieved a larvalstage tiger salamander and a tadpole shrimp for me to see. He has the permit and the knowledge to do this or it wouldnt have happened! Jim is part of a group of scientists, ranchers and others organized by the University of California Natural Reserve System who looks out for Jepson Prairie. The Rush Ranch Educational Council (RREC) sponsors an annual open house and facilitates visits from local school children. Mary Takeuchi organized an exhibit of Native American artifacts at the Anheuser-Busch plant in Fairfield. She and president Joel Mooney represent RREC on the National Estuarine Research Reserve project committee. Our board of directors often goes beyond the call of duty. Frank Andrews and Bob Berman have advised SLT since its founding. How many would accept a 20-year commitment to attend monthly board meetings and the like! Farmers Ian Anderson and Jeff Dittmer trekked out to Dixon to make sure a site for burrowing owls could still be farmed. Board President Sean Quinn, City of Fairfields director of planning and development, has donated hundreds of hours of professional expertise, helping negotiate conservation easements, mitigation deals and land purchases. SLT staff members have been a joy to work with. A familiar refrain around the office is, Ken will do it. (Thats land steward Ken Poerner.) On weekends, bookkeeper and office manager Kirsti Muskat can often be found volunteering with her three children. Sue Wickham, our Sky ValleyCordelia Hills resource management plan coordinator, frequently says, Oh, I know about that. I can help! Similar stories could be told about many other volunteers, board members and staff. Last, but certainly not least, I am thankful for the many donors large and small who contribute regularly. When a particularly generous donation came in this September, I called the donor, Fairfield resident Joyce Kaumeyer, to thank her and to inquire about her interest in SLT. Simply put, she likes the work were doing to preserve our open spaces. SLT has ambitious plans for the year ahead. To continue stewardship of our open space preserves and farm easements, we rely on you. Please add us to your holiday giving list and be assured your contribution will be put to good use.

Rush Ranch
There is an un-managed stillness here. It rises from the wetlands, muting the cacophony of civilization visible in the distance, a day or more away by walking the animal trails, by paddling across the many sloughs. Cement and concrete did not prosper here. Iron and steel were applied: barbed wire, metal fence posts, farm implements. They rust, quietly. Airplanes fly over, engines bigger than the ships of Columbus. Their sound is temporary. It does not touch the ground. The grasses wont let it. Inside their silence the wetlands are laughing. John Pray, Fairfield


A Prairie Land Companion:

Jepson Prairie Preserve

Jepson Prairie Preserve is one of the few remaining vernal pool ha 1980 and transferred to Solano Land Trust in 1997, the prairie r System (Davis campus). Located south of Dixon and east of Fairfi to learn what Solano Land Trust and partners are doing to restore other docents help the public to understand, appreciate and celeb

The Greater Jepson Prairie Ecosystem:

Grazing to Restore the Land
Results are coming in from the first year of grazing research at Jepson Prairie. With guidance from the Jepson Prairie Management Committee, Ted Swiecki and Liz Bernhardt of Phytosphere Research have completed the first season in a three-year study of sheep grazing in the Greater Jepson Prairie Ecosystem, which includes Jepson Prairie, Wilcox Ranch and Calhoun Cut. The goal of grassland management at Jepson is to promote native grasses and forbs while suppressing non-native weeds (see Vistas, V. 9, #2). Julian Meisler, former conservation planner for SLT, worked with Swiecki and Bernhardt to raise funds and plan for the study. The grazing management program will help SLT learn when and how sheep grazing can be used to meet conservation goals. Swiecki and Bernhardt face the daunting challenge of running a controlled experiment in an outdoor laboratory. Management of grassland vegetation at Jepson Prairie is more complex than it appears on the surface, says the research team. Rainfall varies drastically from year to year, a mosaic of different soil types are interspersed within pastures, and grazing preferences of sheep change with the season. The researchers have set three kinds of plots in carefully selected sheep-grazed pastures. The first is in the open, inconspicuously marked, and
Ben Wallace, Conservation Project Manager

Sheep grazing at Jepson Prairie: Phytosphere Research

grazed by sheep. The second is fenced off from the sheep and will be allowed to grow throughout the duration of the experiment. A third plot is fenced off but mowed by robo-sheep (weed whackers) to the same level that sheep graze the open plots. Swiecki and Bernhardt measure the plant cover and composition in the plots in spring. Burrows Hamilton, the rancher who runs sheep on the preserve, moves his sheep on and off pastures following a schedule provided by the researchers. Careful analysis of the data provides insight into how sheep grazing can help manage specific problems. For example, mima mounds (small hillocks) tend to be populated by exotic species like medusahead and yellow star thistle, while surrounding swales (depressions) have higher concentrations of native species such as semaphore grass and goldfields. The 2005 grazing season shows that mounds and swales are grazed differently as the season progresses. Early in the season, sheep tend to graze the mounds more heavily, especially when the swales are full of water. During the peak flowering period in April, sheep clearly prefer grazing in the swales, to the apparent detriment of the native species growing there. The prominence of Jepson both as a research site and a habitat for rare and endangered species adds particular importance to management of the preserve and the Greater Jepson Prairie Ecosystem. As the research generates new results over the course of the three-year study, we will understand how sheep grazing interacts with the plant community, and that will help us use strategic grazing patterns and treatments to nudge the system in the direction we want it to go.

abitats and native bunchgrass prairies in California. Purchased by the Nature Conservancy in receives research and management support from the University of California Natural Reserve field off Highway 113, Jepson Prairie provides critical habitat to hundreds of species. Read on e and protect the land through grazing and follow Kate Mawdsley into the field where she and brate this Solano County treasure.

Docent Training Classes

Five Tuesday evening classes and four weekend morning field trips with regional experts prepare docents to lead walks at Jepson Prairie. The many classes include: Introduction to California Vernal Pools, Carol Witham Human History of Jepson Prairie, Kate Mawdsley Introduction to Vernal Pool Invertebrates, C.J. Addington Flowers of Jepson Prairie, Jane Hicks Birds and Mammals of Jepson Prairie, Dr. Andy Engilis & Dr. Doug Kelt Solitary Bees and Pollination Ecology, Dr. Robbin Thorp Sheep Grazing at the Preserve, Burrows Hamilton (rancher, grazing leaseholder)

Kate Mawdsley:
Volunteer in Action
Aleta George, Vistas Editor

As a child, Kate Mawdsley roamed the woods in search of wildflowers near her home in Wilmington, Delaware. Years later, after marrying, moving to California, starting a family, and becoming a librarian at UC Davis, Mawdsley rekindled her love of wildflowers by hiking Solano Countys fields where she discovered a whole new world of spring flowers. When a UC Davis colleague told her about the docent program at Jepson Prairie in 1987, she not only jumped in with her hiking boots laced, but also took the docent training five years in a row. The Jepson Prairie About seven years ago, the spring tours Preserve docent program began to incorporate talks about the rare aquatic began in the mid-1980s invertebrates that inhabit the vernal pools, such as under the guidance of endangered vernal pool fairy and tadpole shrimps. The Nature Conservancy. The 1973 Endangered Species Act protects When the Conservancy endangered and threatened creatures and dippers asked docents to take need special training to be included on the permit over the administrative issued by the US Fish and Wildlife Service. tasks in 1992, Mawdsley Mawdsley also helps with spring burn rose to the occasion and preparations, walks transects in search of rare has served as the docent plants, and on occasion gets to drive a tractor. Kate Mawdsley coordinator ever since. She enjoys working with docents and the public Its extraordinarily satisfying to get to know because she wants to communicate why Jepson a place so well, says the 65-year-old Mawdsley. Prairie, and other places like it in California, are The richness of fauna in the lake and incredible so special and worth preserving. density of flowers is beautiful. Public tours take place at 10:00 a.m. on Mawdsley is quick to point out that the Saturdays and Sundays in the spring (note time program is planned by a group of devoted docents change if youve visited in the past). Special including Jane Hicks (SLT board of directors), tours for schools and other groups are offered Carol Witham, Jim Steinert, Esther Kerster, C.J. weekdays by prearrangement. Guests are asked Addington, Dan and Mika Tolson, and SLTs land to contribute one dollar per person ($5 per steward, Ken Poerner. person for special tours), with the proceeds Docents at the prairie number 45 to 50 going directly to an endowment that maintains each year, and many, like Mawdsley, have been and enhances the preserve. involved for more than a decade. Training takes place in early February, and tours coincide with For more information about tours or to sign-up for docent the blooming prairie from mid-March to around training contact Solano Land Trust (707) 432-0150 ext 202 or Mothers Day.
kirsti@solanolandtrust.org.

Purchase of McConeghy Farm Initiates Dixon-Davis Greenbelt

In late October, Solano Land Trust purchased the McConeghy Farm from landowner Jean (Eggert) McConeghy and her two children, John McConeghy and Jo Ellen McConeghy Geissler. The acquisition, worth $3.625 million, places a conservation easement on the property, one on the north side of I-80 at Kidwell Rd. and one on the south.

Wendy Low, Land Transaction Specialist

Annual Giving
Support Land Trust Efforts! Please consider a minimum gift of $30 to Solano Land Trust to ensure you receive our quarterly newsletter Vistas and to support our work to preserve and enhance Jepson Prairie, Rush Ranch, Lynch Canyon and our other properties. A more generous donation will be very much appreciated! Your contribution can be earmarked for our Rush Ranch NERR project or you can be a Friend of the Solano Land Trust. A general contribution will help us operate and maintain our properties and easements, support our volunteer groups and educational programs, and pursue new opportunities to preserve open space and farmland.

Jean (Eggert) McConeghy with her father Ed Eggert, 1931. Courtesy of Jean McConeghy.

Jean McConeghy, now 81,and living in New Mexico, recently flew to California to celebrate the preservation of this key piece of farmland. She spoke eloquently of her farm heritage and her pleasure in seeing conser vation easements placed on the property to an assembled crowd of State and Federal funders, City and SLT representatives and State Senator M i ke M a c h a d o a n d Assemblywoman Lois Wolk.

Im delighted how the land will be used, she says. Its great to keep open the land between the two cities. Jeans father, Edmund W. Eggert, acquired the land from his own father, Claus Eggert, in 1911. Edmund raised wheat and barley and leased the neighboring Kidwell property. In recent years, Denny Kidwell has in turn leased her property. Mrs. McConeghy grew up on the farm before the highway came through. She remembers when everyone knew one another and farmers brought their grain to a large warehouse where the TSI fertilizer plant now stands. She describes a fortunate childhood, running everywhere on the fields and riding the harvester for fun. It was a wonderful, wonderful life, she says. Solano Land Trust relies on farm families like the McConeghys to carry out our mission of preserving farmland and our agricultural economy for future generations. We are also indebted to our funding partners, who have worked hard over the last several years, to make this purchase a reality. They include the California Farmland Conservancy Program ($2,237,500), the Farm and Ranch Lands Protection Program ($720,000), the City of Davis ($507,500), the City of Dixon ($150,000), and UC Davis ($77,500). Dixon and Davis are the holders of the Conservation Easement. When SLT resells this property to a farming enterprise, SLT will become a co-holder and take on primary monitoring responsibilities. This 300-acre farm is the first piece of an agricultural greenbelt between Dixon and Davis. The project was years in the making, beginning in 1999 with a joint resolution passed by the Cities expressing shared interest in creating a greenbelt. Interest became reality when UC Davis, which had option to purchase the property, assigned their option to Solano Land Trust in May 2005. SLT hopes to continue to work with Davis and Dixon on future projects in the area.

Rush Ranch Poetry and Art Gallery

On a warm autumn day, Robert Chapla and Sherry Sheehan taught an outdoor workshop for poets and painters en plein air. This workshop was one in a series sponsored by Rush Ranch Educational Council, Solano Land Trust, and the San Francisco Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve as a way to bring arts and nature together at Rush Ranch.

Twice Mediated
His brushstrokes form a windowed fence that leads you in. You watch the scene arrive on canvas, cleared, condensed, meiotic essence rendered lean. He mediates this nub of nature, pulls polarities from space, shapes a room he gives full measure. What he sees you wont erase. Piggyback through paint past painter. Become branch. Explode in bloom. Prune your words, translating nature, awed, its second mediator after art. Poet, illume.
Sherry Sheehan, Crockett, on Robert Chapla, Rush Ranch

Strength
Leaf garnished trail of muddled browns lies atop sleeping souls, inhales, exhales, awakens my slumbering spirit. Hands of eucalyptus reach to infinite air, display the strength of the Patwin life, hold the brilliance of their ways. Today is about the light, their light, mirrors to my core reflections of wisdom ignoring ears have failed to greet. Open silence to noises of the past. Listen, Breathe, Trust, Live. To embrace their lessons as a gift, learn from naked bark time sheds layered wounds, like the stripped lone tree, I too can weather, and still stand.
Suzanne Bruce, Fairfield, on Janet Manalos Patwins Grove
Patwins Grove, Janet Manalo, Fairfield

Rush Ranch, Robert Chapla, Pleasant Hill

Lynch Canyon Open Space

BOard memBers
Sean Quinn,

Currently Lynch Canyon is open to the public during staff- or docent-led activities only.

President
Bob Berman,

Restoration Days

Vice President
Frank Morris,

Jepson Prairie Preserve

Self-guided Tour
Take a self-guided tour in the Docent Triangle any day of the week during daylight hours. Docent-led wildflower tours will resume mid-March. For more information contact SLT (707) 432-0150 ext 202 or kirsti@solanolandtrust.org.

Treasurer
Jane Hicks,

Secretary
Ian Anderson Frank Andrews, Jr. Carl Debevec Jeff Dittmer John Isaacson Russell Lester Karin MacMillan Al Medvitz

Jan. 1, Feb. 11. 9 a.m. - Free Help plant native plants and seeds. No experience necessary. Community service credit is available for teens. Bring gloves and tools. For information call Ken at (707) 580-6277 or SLT at (707) 432-0150.

Volunteer Trail Care Days

Second Saturday of the month: Mar. 11, Apr. 8. 9 a.m. Free (Jan. & Feb. dates see above) Assist Land Steward Ken Poerner with trail care. Snacks are provided. For information call Ken at (707) 580-6277.

Rush Ranch Open Space

Rush Ranch is open to the public Tuesday to Saturday from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The Suisun Hill Trail (across the road from Rush Ranch) is open seven days a week, dawn to dusk. For additional information visit www.rushranch.org.

staFF
Marilyn Farley,

Scenic Hikes
Fourth Saturday of the month: Jan. 28, Feb. 25, Mar. 25. 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. - Free Join Dave Warner for one of his popular Lynch Canyon hikes. For more information contact Ken Poerner at (707) 580-6277.

Executive Director
Terry Chappell,

Field Steward
Wendy Low,

Access Adventures: Horse-Wagon Driving for the Disabled

Michael Muir has begun a horse-wagon driving program for people who are wheelchair-bound or have difficulty hiking the trails. Contact Mike at stonewallmike@hotmail.com for pre-scheduled dates.

Land Transaction Specialist

Kirsti Muskat, Bookkeeper Tina Nixon, Finance Officer Ken Poerner, Land Steward Ben Wallace, Conservation

King and Swett Ranches

The newly acquired King and Swett Ranches are part of the Sky ValleyCordelia Hills Open Space. Currently, the King and Swett Ranches are open to the public during staff- or docent-led activities only.

Volunteer Workdays
First Saturday of the month: Jan. , Feb. , Mar. , Apr. 1. 9 a.m. until finished - Free Get some fresh air while helping with ranch and trail maintenance. No experience or tools necessary. Lunch is provided for participants.

Project Manager
Sue Wickham, Resource

Management Plan Coordinator

Aleta George,

Restoration Day
Jan 21, 200. 9 a.m. Help plant native plants and seeds on King Ranch. No experience necessary. Community service credit is available for teens. Bring gloves and tools. For information call Ken at (707) 580-6277 or SLT at (707) 432-0150.

Editor, SLT Vistas

Blacksmith Shop Demonstrations

Third Saturday of the month: Jan. 21, Feb. 1, Mar. 1, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. - Free Watch or participate in the art of blacksmithing with local blacksmiths.

Scenic Hikes
Feb. , Mar. , Apr. . 9 a.m. Free Explore Solano Countys largest protected open space with docent Kathy Blume. Each hike takes you to a different section of the 3,900 acres with excellent views of marsh, grasslands and the San Francisco Bay. Meet at the Parkand-Ride lot at the Hiddenbrooke Parkway/American Canyon Road exit at I-80. Co-sponsored with the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council. Call Kathy for info at (707) 864-2108.

S AV E T H E D AT E ! Rush Ranch Open House

April 29, 2006. 10 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. Learn about the natural and cultural history of the ranch while having fun. Join us for horse-drawn wagon rides, live music, blacksmithing, square dancing, and working sheepdog demonstrations.

Solano Land Trust 1001 Texas Street, Suite C Fairfield, CA 94533 (707) 432-0150

NonProfit Organization US Postage Paid Fairfield, CA 94533 Permit # 00234

Preserving Farmlands and OPen sPace thrOughOut sOlanO cOunty