Forest Aid: TreePeople and Boeing Launch A New Campaign for Healthy Forests and Fire Resilience

“Trees need people and people need trees,” chanted 50 elementary students from Sylmar and Inglewood, making branch shapes with their arms. The students – on field trips to Coldwater Canyon Park for the kick-off event – joined Cal Fire, LA Conservation Corps, Junior Rangers, Spectrolabs, and Sen. Bob Hertzberg on September 7 to cheer at the announcement of the new initiative in mountain forest restoration. With a $1 million legacy gift from our partners at Boeing, Forest Aid will mobilize communities, businesses, schools, and others to mitigate the effects of years of devastating fires and restore healthy forests.… Read more >>

W is for Safe, Clean Water!

Throughout our 45-year history, water has been maybe our biggest obsession – after trees and people.

And one of the biggest moments in LosAngeles’ water history could come this November: Measure W.

Please join us in creating a safer, healthier, and greener region. Visit the Yes on W site for more information and spread the word!

Los Angeles County’s water systems were born about 100 years ago. In the name of flood control, and to tame more of the land, our predecessors engineered infrastructure to rush water down drains and into the ocean as quickly as possible.… Read more >>

Saving Water is as easy as 1, 2, 3!

Proposition 3, the Water Supply and Water Quality Act of 2018, is a citizen’s initiative water bond that will appear on the November 2018 statewide California ballot.

The bond will invest $8.877 billion dollars in California water infrastructure, including key categories like safe drinking water, Sustainable Groundwater Management (SGMA) implementation, watershed restoration, fish and wildlife habitat conservation, infrastructure repair, and many other important water management programs.

Proposition 3 will benefit individual water users, the environment, and agriculture, and subsequently has received support across the board from conservation, agricultural, environmental justice, water, and civic organizations.… Read more >>

Need That Fall Color Fix?

Contrary to popular belief, LA does, in fact, have seasons. They may not happen when or how you expect them to, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get a fix of fall color in your life this autumn.

Some of our evergreen natives color up in fall when the temperatures drop by getting a reddish or purple tint to their leaves. Others turn yellow or orange before dropping their leaves. To be a leaf peeper, visit our local natural areas in the Santa Monica Mountains, the Angeles National Forest, and the San Bernardino National Forest.… Read more >>

Seasons, Los Angeles Style

If you ask someoneto describe the four seasons (and I’m not talking about Vivaldi’s music or the hotel), you’ll most likely hear that fall is when plants slow down and begin to drop their leaves (if they’re deciduous), winter is when they sleep, spring is all about new growth, and summer is a burst of color. Then they say, “but we don’t really have seasons in L.A.”

Ah, but we do have seasons here. The earth travels around the sun on its tilted axis, giving us seasons.… Read more >>

California Continues to Lead on Climate Action

California has once again proven itself to be a national and world leader on climate, with several important actions taking place in the past few weeks:

On August 27, the State released California’s Fourth Climate Change Assessment, a series of reports and tools that advance actionable science. The assessment represents the latest data on climate impacts and adaptation at the state and local levels. It also highlights areas including climate justice, tribal and indigenous communities, and ocean and coastalareas.… Read more >>

TreePeople’s Most Wanted: Mountain Edition

We’re back with another round of California’s most wanted invasive plants.

This time we are looking to our local mountains in the Angeles National Forests and Santa Monica Mountains to learn about the top five worst invasive species that we tend to find during our mountain restoration events. These plants out-compete our native plants and create huge fire hazards in our already drier than normal hillsides

#1 Ripgut Brome (Bromus diandrus)

This pesky plant quickly spreads and infiltrates its surrounding areas.… Read more >>

Sunburned This Summer? So Are the Trees!

Driving around LA you may have noticed trees and plants all over town with entire areas across their canopy covered with dried, brown leaves. This sunburned effect can be caused by a combination of the angle of the sun and extreme heat, burning some, but not all the leaves.   

This unusual combination occurred when record-breaking temperatures over the course of two days – July 6 and 7 – hit 108° in the downtown area, and rose to 117° in the valley.… Read more >>

Trees, Art, Sam Francis and TreePeople

It’s beautiful to see how nature helps pave the paths of those who inspire our lives.

TreePeople’s Founder and President Andy Lipkis was a forward-thinking youth who began an environmental nonprofit at the age of 17 after being inspired by the dying trees in the Angeles National Forest. Similarly, Sam Francis, one of California’s most influential abstract expressionist painters with art hanging in LA museums like the Broad and the Norton Simon Museum, also drew inspiration from nature in forests, lakes, rivers and the ocean while living around the San Francisco Bay Area.… Read more >>

TreePeople’s Most Wanted: Home Edition

California’s native plants are under attack.

From our mountain habitats all the way down to our very backyard, invasive plant species are taking over. According to the U.S. Government, an invasive species is one that is non-native to the ecosystem and one whose introduction causes or will likely cause economic, environmental or human-health harm.

Invasive plants can often outcompete our natives because they don’t have the checks and balances they would have in their native land. Often this freedom leads them to grow faster and spread faster than the native plants they are replacing.… Read more >>