By: Kevin Wolf and friends, 530-758-4211
Updated March 2001

1. Find a place, fall in love with it, and commit yourself to help protect and restore it for the rest of your life. Help your friends and family fall in love with it too. Make sure one of the places you fall in love with is in a watershed where you live. Every year spend some time with it and do a little more to help it. Over time, your efforts, and those of the friends and family you brought to it can make a significant difference. But keep in mind a prime directive ñ donít sacrifice other places for yours.
2. Educate yourself and others. Learn all you can about the different linkages of issues and science in your watershed. As you learn, share it. Personal communication is the most effective means of learning and teaching. As you know more, pass it along to others in email, letters to the editor, friends and people anywhere and everywhere, and learn from them at the same time. It is best to gain expertise on some aspect of your watershed and participate in any stakeholder or other decision-making processes. State, federal and local agency public processes are biased towards those who know the most about an issue. Become one of those people yourself.
3. Get involved in the watershed group where you live. Every place is in a watershed. If there isn't already a river or watershed organization, help start one. Find other interested people through Friends of the River, the Sierra Club, Clean Water Action, neighboring watershed organizations, community-based organizations of diverse allies, and friends of friends. Look up these organizations in the phone book or on the web.
4. Get good-on-the-environment candidates elected to office. Step one - register to vote. In this world where campaign contributions seem to drive much of politics, the only way to combat this (besides through campaign finance reform) is to put personal energy into the campaigns of people you support. Help get like-minded people to vote on Election Day. Remember over 50% of eligible voters don't vote. Your efforts on a grassroots level make a difference. And consider running for office yourself some day. There are few better ways to serve your community and country.
5. When you have money, give some of it away to help support organizations that make a difference towards the environment. However, remember that sometimes giving your time is better than giving money. Professional staff make a tremendous difference in being able to keep up with the complex, time consuming aspects of many parts of environmental protection efforts. They are often overworked and if you can volunteer quality time with the organization, you can become a valued asset. And don't forget to give some money to environmental candidates for public office and initiative campaigns. It's almost impossible to win elections without a minimum level of funding.
6. Live lighter on the land and channel land use and population growth where it is environmentally most sound. California is a fast growing state. We have 33 million plus now, and by 2020 we are expected to have over 50 million. By 2030 we may double our population. To save farms and wildlife habitat, people will need to live more closely together. If a high-density infill project is proposed in your town or city, go out and actively support it (even as you help improve it). To lessen resource depletion through mining, oil drilling, overcutting of timber, and other non-renewable activities, we all need to lower our own consumption. And don't forget about our own roles in increasing the population levels. Because they live in a first world country, our children are highly likely to consume large quantities of non-renewable resources in their lifetime.
7. Learn about farming and ranching and become friends with people who make their living off the land. Spend time on a ranch or a farm and learn the real life problems and opportunities they have. We all have to eat and farmers are indispensable. Their land can offer the best opportunities for habitat restoration on a macro and micro scale. Remember that these people are actual or potential allies, and not the enemy.
8. Eat lower on the food chain. The water it takes to irrigate pasture to feed cattle in California ranges from around 2500 -12,500 gallons of water per pound of beef produced. About twice as much water goes into producing food for meat and dairy animals in California than is used by all 33 million in their homes, yards, golf courses, businesses, industries and all urban uses. In addition, the pollution that runs into rivers from meat and dairy production is enormous in comparison to human waste and sewage. And donít forget to support organic farming by buying and eating what they produce.
9. Wherever you live, change your landscaping to hold more water on your land and avoid runoff and erosion. Changes such as mulching, berms, swales, french drains, ponds and other features slows floods, recharges groundwater, helps delay and breakdown pollutants, settles sediment, and can improve habitat for birds, insects and other life. All our actions, big and small, can add up to make huge differences, especially on a watershed level. Check out the proposal at www.treepeople.org/trees/ for Southern California. They show that numerous small changes on private and public property can ultimately reduce the regionís water imports by half. And donít forget to reduce or better yet, eliminate the use of pesticides and fertilizers in your own yard or garden.
10. Change our personal habits and infrastructure. When we form new habits, we donít think about it after awhile. We automatically wash and rinse a load of dishes in a tub of water, brush teeth with a glass or two, shave without running water, wash the car while watering some land, pee in a compost heap, water only once every week or two, train roots to go deep, donít wash our cars with toxins, and more. When we improve our home's plumbing, our guests don't have to form good habits to save water, and we can take longer showers without feeling as guilty. 1.6 gallon flush toilets, low-flow showerheads, faucet aerators, drip irrigation, energy and water efficient appliances and more make long term, no-need-to-think differences. Think about how much water we use and why we are using it. Don't use more than is needed. (And remember, we all need a long hot shower sometimes :-)