When I founded WILDCOAST in 2000 with Wallace J. Nichols, never in my wildest dreams could I have imagined the incredible journey we would embark on over the next 25 years.
What started as two friends and ocean advocates with a vision, transformed into a 28-person, boots-on-the-ground team of conservationists that have had a big impact in California and Mexico. Today, WILDCOAST has helped to protect millions of acres of coastlines and ocean habitat including gray whale breeding lagoons, sea turtle nesting beaches, wetlands, wildlands, tropical rainforest, islands, coral reefs, and mangrove forests.
As we watch our world in the throes of destruction from climate change, our team is fighting these threats with innovative natural solutions. WILDCOAST is dedicated to rewilding blue and green spaces. We stand at the forefront of restoring and regenerating blue carbon ecosystems like wetlands, marshes and mangrove forests that sequester damaging atmospheric carbon.
At WILDCOAST we work with local and indigenous communities to help protect their natural resources and livelihoods, whether we are establishing or safeguarding marine protected areas and coastal reserves, monitoring coral reefs, establishing ecotourism opportunities, or creating blue and green jobs.
I am most proud of WILDCOAST’s successful effort to protect the last true coastal wildlands of the Baja California peninsula. Together with our partners we have safeguarded hundreds of miles of pristine coastlines, gray whale lagoons, migratory bird habitat and some of the largest remaining coastal lagoons left in North America.
This is some of the incredible conservation work our team is leading in Mexico and California:
California Marine Protected Areas
WILDCOAST helped establish California’s 545,280-acre marine protected area network and leads innovative compliance initiatives to safeguard the network’s iconic marine species.
Coastal Wetlands
In Southern California, WILDCOAST has helped restore, manage, and monitor 70.5 acres of coastal wetlands, removing invasive species and planting native flora.
Wildlands
WILDCOAST owns 39.5 miles of coastline and 51,939 acres of remote desert on the Baja California Peninsula, home to spectacular flora, fauna, and epic surf breaks and safeguards against critical habitat from development
Mangroves
WILDCOAST works with women’s collectives and indigenous communities, creating jobs in remote communities, to monitor and restore mangrove forests that capture carbon better than any other terrestrial ecosystem, even rainforests.
Whales
WILDCOAST is supporting the protection of a gray whale sanctuary at Baja’s San Ignacio Lagoon, where federal land concessions permanently conserved 484 miles of the lagoon shoreline and ecotourism thrives.
Sea Turtles
Once on the brink of extinction, thanks to WILDCOAST’s efforts the olive ridley sea turtle population has rebounded and 132 million hatchlings have been born on the 22-miles coastline we help protect in coastal Oaxaca, Mexico.
Trash Boom
Our innovative trash booms at the US-Mexico border have helped stop 250,000 pounds of plastic and solid waste since 2021, addressing the tsunami of trash that plagues our coast and threatens the health of both humans and wildlife.
www.wildcoast.org