It is a windy, wet day in mid-April when Friends of Alameda Wildlife Refuge’s last volunteer work party of the season passes through the gates to the former airfields at the Alameda Naval Air Station. Across the bay San Francisco is a foggy mirage and the site is flat, barren, and closed to the public…perfect for the endangered California Least Terns that like to nest on sparsely vegetated gravel near water. Soon the birds will arrive from southern latitudes and prepare to nest. It will be September when next the work party visits here. Today, they prepare a grid to help Fish and Wildlife monitor the colony during nesting season, set up hundreds of shelters for Least Tern chicks, and scatter oyster shells across the fenced-in 9.6 acre site. 

Volunteers lay out the grid with San Francisco in the background. (Photo: Susan Galleymore, April 11, 2010.)

The Fish and Wildlife naturalist explains, “The oyster shells shelter chicks when an airborne predator passes overhead; they also also confuse predators that may not easily distinguish a white chick from a white oyster shell.”

She points to one of the many short pyramids of shells within the fenced colony and adds, “Be sure to leave some shells as Western Fence Lizards hide under them; spiders do too, including Black Widows so wear your gloves!”

Volunteers consult the grid map then fan out with wheelbarrows to deliver grid markers across the site or strew shells from large buckets. The storm intensifies yet volunteers appear to barely notice the rain. With the exception of one or two newcomers, the group has volunteered here every year for years through all kinds of weather. 

Leora has been a member of Friends of Alameda Wildlife Refuge (FAWR), a committee of Golden Gate Audubon, since 1994 when the National Wildlife Refuge began at Alameda Point. She says, “I think all Californians would be impressed if they were acquainted with what this site offers as views and visual relief, wildlife resources, and a source of inner city natural experiences.”

Remarkably, this portion of the city jutting into San Francisco Bay is landfill. When Congress authorized Franklin Delano Roosevelt to purchase it for $1.00 in 1936, all but 300 acres of high ground was marsh… and habitat to more than 138 avian species, including Peregrine Falcons, the Least Tern, and California Brown Pelicans. The man-made island has been home to hunter gatherers, landed gentry, and military personnel as well as the terminus of the first transcontinental railroad and site of assorted industries: a Standard Oil refinery – precursor to Chevron; the Pacific Borax Works; even Pan Am’s luxury Clipper Service to China. 

FAWR member Pat Gannon prepares to scatter oyster shells over the flat, gravelly nesting area. (Photo: Susan Galleymore, April 11, 2010.)

At it’s peak in 1945, NAS, Alameda had a military/civilian work force of over 18,000, approximately 60 military tenant commands, 1,513 units of family and barracks-type housing, berthing space at two piers for aircraft carriers, and a Seaplane Lagoon. Today, the Least Tern refuge crisscrosses one of two 8,000 foot long runways.

In July 1992 the area fell under the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, or CERCLA, also known as Superfund. In 1997, when the base closed as part of the US Congress Base Close and Realignment Act, there were twenty-five locations contamined with an assortment of toxic chemicals and approximately 1,636 acres identified for remediation. For wildlife lovers this is a mixed blessing.  While it became easier to access the site for wildlife restoration after the base closed, the north portion of the site remains closed to the public while the Department of the Navy continues remediation and restoration. This means wildlife remains relatively undisturbed and has time to rebuild populations. On the other hand, the longer it takes the more real estate and other developers jockey for a piece of the spectacular site and dream of fortunes to make in the future. 

The competition for hegemony is fierce between those who want to develop and those who want to conserve. Scientists, public agencies, nonprofit organizations, and citizens’ groups share an ambitious restoration plan for the Pacific Coast: reestablish native habitat. In 1965 the California legislature created the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission, the first body in the world established specifically to protect coastal waters, including wetlands. Sam Schuchat is executive officer with the Coastal Conservancy, a state agency charged with protecting and improving public access to the California coastline. He says that the Bay Area is “the biggest, most important tidal estuary on the West Coast. As degraded as it is, we still get millions of birds. If we do this right, we’ll get millions more.” 

If the size of the Least Tern colony on Alameda’s landfill is anything to go by, the restoration plan is working. A few years ago the fenced-in colony was four acres.  As it grew and became more densely packed the birds exhibited stress – agitation and pecking at neighbors – and volunteers extended the fence. Now it is 9.6 acres. 

Today, volunteers struggle in the rain and wind because they agree with Coastal Conservancy’s Schuchat: “When you undo the damage, nature comes back. It’s astonishing how quickly ecosystems recover, given a little nudge.” 

Naval Air Station, Alameda under construction in 1940. At it’s peak in 1945, NAS Alameda had a military/civilian work force of over 18,000, approximately 60 military tenant commands, 1,513 units of family and barracks-type housing, berthing space at two piers for aircraft carriers, and a Seaplane Lagoon. The Naval Air Rework Facility (NARF) was the largest industry in the East Bay with over 9,500 civilians practicing 237 trades serving a foundry, a pattern shop, a plating shop, a parachute loft, clean rooms and machine shops for painting and paint stripping, as well as facilities for testing weapons. In 1994 it was declared a Superfund site. Remediation and restoration continues.