Batiquitos Lagoon Wetland Restoration Project

The Batiquitos Lagoon Wetland Restoration Project will restore habitat over a sixty-acre project area of degraded wetland habitat surrounding Batiquitos Lagoon State Marine Conservation Area (SMCA), that makes up 326.4 acres of wetland ecosystems. This project will restore the integrity of this natural wetland ecosystem, improve the wetland’s capacity to respond to climate change and maintain healthy functions, enhance the lagoon’s resilience to anthropogenic disturbances over time, enhance critical habitat for a number of endemic, threatened, and endangered wildlife species, and engage a diverse audience as conservation stewards. The project will accomplish this by restoring California coastal sage scrub, riparian, and wetland habitats through eradication of invasive trees and plants and accumulated biomass, revegetation with native trees and plants, and trail maintenance.

The project’s outreach and educational aspects will provide on-site interpretation through signage, educational materials, and stewardship opportunities for students from indigenous and park poor communities. Volunteers will remove small weedy non-natives and plant native species such as cottonwoods, sycamores, California buckwheat, coast live oak, white sage, and black sage, as well as maintain trails. The project will also include the annual Batiquitos Lagoon Kayak Cleanup Days, a stewardship event that allows volunteers access to the lagoon via kayak and includes kayak-based survivorship studies and maintenance of previously restored sites. A major focus of the event is the participation of students from underserved communities in south San Diego County, El Cajon, and Valley Center.