Heron Habitat Helpers works to help the public enjoy, learn about, and protect great blue herons and their nesting colony at Commodore Park.

Goals

• Create community awareness of great blue heron colonies in the Greater Puget Sound area, especially the Commodore Park Great Blue Heron Colony and previous history at Kiwanis Ravine
• Restore and protect heron habitat invaded by non-native plant and animal species
• Monitor herons during breeding season and provide data to Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife
• Provide educational activities focused on valuing and protecting heron colonies and habitat
• Partner with local organizations to educate the public and protect heron and wildlife habitat
• Advocate for land preservation as natural habitat for birds and wildlife
• Shape real estate development that compromises wildlife and habitat in Kiwanis Ravine and neighboring areas
• Restore and protect Kiwanis Memorial Preserve Park as an urban wildlife sanctuary
• Create a backyard wildlife refuge and monitoring program in neighborhoods adjacent to Kiwanis Ravine
• Daylight Wolfe Creek and restore salmon runs in the creek and its tributaries
• Enhance funding, management and monitoring of Kiwanis Memorial Preserve Park

Collaboration

HHH works with Seattle Parks and Recreation Department (Parks), www.seattle.gov/PARKS, to restore, maintain, and monitor Kiwanis Memorial Preserve Park. We interface and share projects with Parks in the Habitat Advisory Panel (HAP) committee. Also, we are a member of the Green Seattle Partnership (GSP),www.greenseattle.org, a partnership between the City of Seattle and the Cascade Land Conservancy. The City of Seattle is represented by the Department of Parks and Recreation, Seattle Office of Sustainability and Environment, and Seattle Public Utilities. The partnership goal is to restore all of Seattle’s forested park lands by 2025. We are one of the many non-profit organizations supporting this effort.

In addition, HHH is part of the Great Blue Heron Working Group, a consortium of citizens and scientists organized by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife, WDFW. The group has participation from scientists as far north as Protection Island, B.C. (near Nanaimo, B.C.) and as far south as Olympia, WA. One of the scientists from that Heron Working Group is Ann Eissinger, and she has formulated a protocol for studying heron colonies. In that protocol is an in depth study about the life cycle of the great blue heron. See Ann Eissinger’s complete study here. HHH is working to establish a sense of community throughout this region, called the Salish Sea, focused on appreciation and support for the Great Blue Heron.