FRIENDS OF EDGEWOOD NATURAL PRESERVE
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FRIENDS OF EDGEWOOD NATURAL PRESERVE
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FOCUS ON...SUSAN SOMMERS By Laverne Rabinowitz Susan Sommers has spent much of her life as an environmental activist. Her convictions regarding preservation of habitats in their natural, original state are deep-seated and guide her ongoing work on behalf of Edgewood. As the botanist who has done the most extensive fieldwork on the Park, she serves as chair of the Revegetation Committee of Friends of Edgewood)d and as a key member of the Master Plan Committee. It's also her painstaking efforts beginning in l969 that brought the potential development of Edgewood to public consciousness and, eventually, the defeat of the golf course proposal and declaration as a Natural Preserve. Susan's hope for Edgewood is that people will assume the obligation to restore the Preserve to as natural a state as possible and that we don't love it so much that it is overused (as with Yosemite). "We want to keep this historical window on California's vegetative heritage, and people need to be prepared to do what is necessary to insure that." Susan (pronounced "Suzann") has spent most of her life in the vicinity of Edgewood Park, though she didn't discover the Park itself until 1969. She says her love of nature "just came with my blue genes." Her family home in Lindenwood near Flood Park and a neighbor's land in the Santa Cruz Mountains provided many happy experiences in the natural settings of our area. Never considering botany as a career, she studied writing in college, designed posters, worked for a print studio in Berkeley and for SRI as a publications coordinator, and has been office manager for Indoor Design Plant Service in Palo Alto since 1987. It wasn't until the late '60s and her discovery of Edgewood where she visited with her godmother Dorothea frequently, that she began to teach herself plant taxonomy. A treasured gift from Dorothea was the Jepson book on the flora of middle California, and when she later discovered the J. H. Thomas guide on the flora of the Santa Cruz Mountains, it "became an appendage" as she pursued her learning in the park over the next 7 years. Susan realized that what she was exploring in Edgewood was a "true California native prairie"-- something few Californians have seen since the disappearance of the great prairies and the introduction of exotic flora with the settlement of the state. Her battle began in 1969, when she became upset with the intrusion of off-road vehicles and motorcycles and turned to state officials about barring access from them. She joined the Save the Serpentine League, formed to prevent development of the Farm Hill site across from Canada College, and learned about due process and environmental review. She studied the recently legislated CEQA (the California Environmental Quality Act), learning the rules and regulations, and started talking to "anybody and everybody I could" until finally certain conservation groups wanted to hear what she had to say and invited her to speak. She continued working on her botanical list and teaching herself taxonomy and field identification. The list, plus 5 years of aerial photos of the serpentine’s floral pattern taken by Susan as she hung out the door of a 2-seater Decathlon plane, gave the State Fish & Game officials the documentation they needed to confirm Edgewood's vegetative mosaic and diversity. In l976 she discovered the San Mateo thornmint, which grows only in Edgewood and is now officially listed as endangered. When the California Native Plant Society published its list of rare and endangered species, Susan compared her botanical list with the publication and found 3 or 4 of Edgewood's plants listed as rare, endangered or threatened. By the time a golf course was proposed Susan's efforts had brought awareness to many groups. When the County published its EIR for the new plans Susan studied it carefully and found, despite the fact that she had provided her lists of flora and fauna for use in making the biological assessment, that there were gross "inconsistencies, inadequacies and inaccuracies." She prepared a lengthy criticism of the document, relating each error to a violation of CEQA statute. With this (and other) input, the CNPS filed a lawsuit against the County, which was eventually settled out of court. The battle continued for several more years, and Susan continued to work tirelessly on behalf of the Park. The action making it a Natural Preserve in 1993 was "a real gift, a really special bonus." With the 24 years of advocacy behind her, Susan has enough future involvement to keep her very busy. She chairs the Revegetation Project, which will over the long term restore the native plant community to all areas of the Preserve damaged by vehicles, mismanagement and weeds. The Project will give back to Edgewood the biological integrity to support native wildlife and keep down the intrusion of weeds. Meanwhile she continues to collect and send specimens to the UC Arboretum Jepson Herbivorium that will constitute the basis also for her planned book on the flora of Edgewood. Stanford Prof. J. H. Thomas (author of The Flora of the Santa Cruz Mountains of California) is encouraging her to give priority to an Edgewood flora book and has offered her access to his own collection of several hundred specimens. Her botanical list formed the core of the Santa Clara Valley Chapter of CNPS’s "Flora of Edgewood Park," revised in April 1993 (and available through FOE). Susan also plans to return to San Jose State as soon as she can to complete her work on a degree in botany, which she began several years ago but had to interrupt for family reasons. Despite the full-time job, ongoing outreach on behalf of Edgewood and now the Friends, and frequent visits to Edgewood to continue work on her botanicals, Susan finds time to create beautiful pieces of Persian embroidery. She also finds side adventure each fall at the Renaissance Faire, where she has worked for the last 14 years with her friends, The Bindu Jewelers. Edgewood profits from Susan's expertise in another area: she is an extremely talented professional photographer. In fact, she dedicated her life savings in the '70s to mounting a splendid photographic exhibition in the San Mateo County Hall of Justice and Records depicting the richness of Edgewood's open space. She has made some of her prints available for purchase through FOE in support of the Friends’ efforts. As we already mentioned her skill includes aerial photography from small planes! Someone so intimate with the Park finds it hard to list "one favorite spot." Susan loves the view from the ridge, overlooking the south hill, especially in spring, and recalls one day watching a red fox loping along and two golden eagles gliding low over the hill. She loves the north hill and the old grove of oaks on the east end, the waterfall grotto on Sylvan Trail and many places in the woods. "Every time I walk out there I still see something new. That's one of the wonderful things about Edgewood--the discovery!" Edgewood Natural Preserve owes a huge debt of gratitude for its existence to Susan Sommers and her relentless efforts to protect it and bring it to the attention of the public. It's only "natural" that she should be featured in the Explorer. Thanks, Susan! |
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