Round two from Michele 

I made this poster months ago before the first planned, Oct. 13, 2011 (didn’t happen) LOCAC meeting, concerning the Morro Coast Audubon Society’s plan to replace 10 Blue Gum Eucalyptus trees per year in the East (8 acres) Sweet Springs with native habitat.

This morning, I sent this picture and a (short/mean) “letter to the editor” of New Times, after reading their Feb. 2, 2012 paper, opinion section. Then, I read the letter my sister-in-law wrote to them. It is a very cool letter, and met the criteria of good communication: true, necessary, and kind. I’ll admit, my letter wasn’t kind.

That’s why, I hope, my poster helped to convey the necessary truth, about the “globulus E.” The Blue Gum Eucalyptus produces toxins that prevent indigenous plants & animals from thriving. It is an ill advised ... invasive species.

The California Red Legged Frog (endangered), the Western Pond Turtle, the oldest creature (practically a dinosaur) that lives at Sweet Springs, and the Monarch Butterfly “the milkweed” butterfly, have been migrating through here since before the Pleistocene Era.

We live in California, one of the few bio-diverse “hot spots” on our planet, our mother earth. The rain forest, in the Amazon, is one of the others. Bio-diversity is defined by three measures: #1 is RICHNESS  #2 is RARITY and #3 is ENDEMISM. Endemism means that the plants or animals live, only, in that part of the world, only, in that place. A place like Sweet Springs Nature Preserve. Do we understand the significance?