Natural Yard Care Class

TPCHD — Keep your landscape and environment healthy. We promote low impact landscape design and maintenance. Natural yard care emphasizes: • Healthy soil conditions.• Proper plant care and lawn management.• Wise water and fertilizer use.• Proper plant placement. Attend our 2025 natural yard care webinars. The regenerative garden: Small scale permaculture for the home garden, with…

Why We Care about Spanaway Marsh

by Claudia Finseth HAPPINESS, FOR ONE THING Last week the annual list of the happiest countries in the world came out. For the eighth time in a row that designation went to Finland. The United States of America came in way down the line. We are not, generally, a happy people. One of the main…

The latest on the Spanaway Marsh

By Claudia Finseth It’s March 25, 2025. Those of us fighting against the destruction of the Spanaway Marsh have been at it for over two years now and spent $140,000 dollars. So let’s take stock. In December of 2024 the Tacoma Rescue Mission brought in massive equipment, and on the high point in the midst…

Flett Property Habitat Stewardship Feb 15 

The habitat stewardship event on CPTC’s Flett Property this Saturday, February 15th from 9:00 AM to noon.  I have attached the flyer with pertinent details and all of the 2025 dates for our remaining habitat stewardship events.  For this event, we will focus on removal of invasive plant species (focus on scotch broom regrowth), planting donated Garry oak saplings (Thanks…

Why is the cost of environmental justice so high?

by Kirk Kirkland and Claudia Finseth Two neighborhood groups in unincorporated Pierce County have recently paid very high prices to attempt to protect their communities because the county is not doing it. Both were to try to stop two different kinds of large projects from dramatically changing their valued open space. Both proposed projects were…

Our Watershed, “WRIA 12” January 15

It is called a Water Resource Inventory Area (WRIA) by the Department of Ecology. The Chambers Clover Watershed includes Parkland, Spanaway, Midland, Collins, Frederickson, part of South Hill and NW Graham as well as Lakewood, McChord Field, Fircrest, Steilacoom, Dupont, and University Place, Below is a map of the WRIA’s in Washington State. Look for 12….

Spanaway Lake, now it’s the beavers

Over the past several years Spanaway Lake has been having issues. For us swimming as children, it was the “duck itch” caused by a parasite getting under our skin if we didn’t dry off well with a towel after swimming. Over time, the swimming beaches became less popular, the diving docks were removed, and the…

Watching a dry creek getting some rain

By Marianne Lincoln On November 29, 2024, I took a drive out to a few locations on Clover Creek to see where there was water and where it ended. I started near Canyon Road and ended near Pacific Avenue. The water in the South Fork disappeared just after Golden Given, where there are a number…

Cantwell & Murray Announce $18.5M For Fish & Wildlife Conservation Projects

Lummi, Skokomish, Colville & Lower Elwha Klallam Tribes — as well WA Dept. of Fish & Wildlife and Chelan County – receive federal funding Grants will help restore salmon & wildlife habitat; improve health, biodiversity of WA public lands WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), a senior member of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs…

Puyallup Watershed Symposium, Dec 5

The Puyallup River Watershed Council is presenting the Puyallup Watershed Symposium on December 5, 2024, from 1:00 – 6:00 pm at the Pioneer Park Pavilion (330 S Meridian, Puyallup, WA 98317). The presenters’ abstracts can be accessed using the QR code on the poster or using this link. To register, you can do so by…

Salmon Saturdays, Dec. 7 & 14

Metro Parks Tacoma’s Salmon Saturdays, which will be held at Swan Creek Park (2820 Pioneer Way E. , Tacoma, WA 98404) on December 7th and 14th, 2024, celebrates the return of salmon to Swan Creek and surrounding areas! Visit Swan Creek Park to welcome home the spawning salmon on Dec 7 or Dec 14 from 12-2…