Palo Corona - Gateway to Big Sur

Small_pcr_wildflowers

In 2002 The Big Sur Land Trust joined forces with The Nature Conservancy, Monterey Peninsula Regional Park District (MPRPD), The State of California Wildlife Conservation Board, California Department of Fish and Game, California Department of Parks and Recreation and California State Coastal Conservancy to purchase Palo Corona Ranch. It was a dramatic moment in the history of land preservation on the Central Coast. Palo Corona—10 miles long, nearly 10,000 acres of open-space habitat, and adjacent to 13 other protected properties—provided the crucial missing link for a wildlife corridor that now extends from the Carmel River all the way south to San Luis Obispo County. By virtue of its scale, the preservation of Palo Corona—the gateway to Big Sur and the largest land conservation project in Monterey County history—has created an ongoing opportunity to protect wildlife and habitat on an ecosystem-wide basis.

Following its purchase, the 9,898-acre ranch was divided between the California Department of Fish & Game and MPRPD, to be protected as public conservation and parkland in perpetuity. The Palo Corona Regional Park was created with the northern 4,300 acres of the former ranch. Today, the partnership that led to the purchase of Palo Corona is in a new phase: a collaborative management and stewardship effort to tackle the long-term ecological conservation issues that are particularly challenging with a large property and limited funds. The Big Sur Land Trust, The Nature Conservancy and MPRPD are working together to implement a Grassland Management Plan to conserve biodiversity within the grassland, ponds and springs, and riparian areas of the Palo Corona Regional Park. The plan includes a groundbreaking study on the habitat and population of the Smith’s blue butterfly, the only endangered butterfly species on the Central Coast. The plan also includes steps to protect key amphibian and riparian habitats within the park, home to the endangered California red-legged frog, the threatened California tiger salamander, and the threatened steelhead trout.

Small_pcr_oaks_road

Palo Corona Regional Park is made up of several habitats, the most rare and unique being the coastal terrace prairie found on the northern end of the ranch. This extraordinary habitat is thought to have the most plant diversity of any grassland in North America and is home to at least 30 species of important, and in some cases endangered, wildlife. This habitat is ideal for cattle grazing, which has taken place on the ranch for generations and has helped control exotic grasses, thereby protecting its diverse flora and dazzling wildflowers. Grazing also helps reduce fire hazard by lowering fuel load—something that is particularly important in conservation lands that border urban areas. With the help of a certified rangeland specialist, an adaptive management tool is being developed that will include recommendations for using cattle grazing to manage the coastal terrace prairie and grassland/coastal sage scrub habitats while reducing invasive weeds without damaging streams, ponds and other sensitive habitat.

Palo Corona Regional Park is currently open to the public on a limited, permit-only basis. Visit the MPRPD web site for more information.

For more information on the collaborative management and stewardship effort at Palo Corona, please contact Cameron Chabre, BSLT Conservation Project Manager at cchabre@bigsurlandtrust.org

You can help conserve Palo Corona Ranch.