This Week on the Central Coast…
Annual events are coming back, Salinas hosted a Biological Summit for farming, and a rodent species thought to be exclusive to Santa Cruz was found in a local county.
Monterey
Rana Creek Ranch to be turned into a nature preserve
The Wildlands Conservancy, a nonprofit organization who aims to preserve land for public recreation projects, announced its purchase of Rana Creek Ranch in Carmel Valley. The ranch is the home to the Esselen tribe and the Conservancy said it welcomes “a growing partnership with the tribe to help steward the land, restore its fish and wildlife and host the visiting public.”
The acquisition is being funded by a number of supporters, both public and private, and the conservancy expects to complete the takeover by August. Then, over the next year, the nonprofit will fundraise for improvements to the infrastructure of the land to allow public access.
“The acquisition protects a key wildlife corridor between the Salinas Valley and Los Padres National Forest and will provide free educational and recreational opportunities for underserved communities”. The conservancy believes the creeks within the ranch will be able to help restore the steelhead trout population.
Carmel Plaza is bringing back its live music series, starting at the end of June and continuing through July. The events will feature free musical performances and offer food and wine packages for $25, with 10% of the purchase going to a selected charity each week. The food and drink offerings will vary each night.
“The scheduled performers are:
June 30: The Money Band
July 7: Wild at Heart
(The following performances will feature an intermission by various dance groups:)
July 14: Drive!
July 21: Red Beans and Rice
July 28: Chicano All Stars”
Pebble Beach Food & Wine festival announces its return
The Pebble Beach Company announced that its popular food and wine event will make a return April 4-7, 2024. It will be the first time since the pandemic that the event will be held, and the first time the company will be hosting it itself.
“Pebble Beach Food & Wine was the brainchild of once-dynamic duo David Bernahl and Rob Weakley, who together ran the event through their Monterey-based company Coastal Luxury Management.” However, the partners split up, which allowed Pebble Beach to take the event in their own hands and partner with a new marketing agency.
“I think a lot of the hallmarks of the event that existed will be there but we’ll also be taking a fresh look at everything to make it as good as it can possibly be and a one-of-a-kind festival in the culinary event space for 2024,” said the Chief Strategic Officer for Pebble Beach. He hopes that the event has previous attendees excites, but also attracts a new era of guests.
You can sign up for updates about the event at its website.
Salinas
Salinas hosted its first Biological Summit for farmers
Farmers, entrepreneurs, and agricultural experts from around the world met in Salinas for its first Biological Summit. The event focused on updates to the farming industry, particularly in biological ways of protecting crops. “The goal is to head toward safer methods, including biological and technological solutions. Both protect plants and soil by using living organisms, or even drones that spray bugs on crops.”
One attendee, who came from New Zealand to attend the event, was particularly interested in the advancement of robotics in the industry, including laser weeders and robotic knife weeders.
The goal of the event is to move farmers away from synthetic means of crop control, such as pesticides, and into something more biological to minimize the effect of chemicals on the surrounding environment and people.
Salinas begins its Public Arts Master Plan
Local leaders believe art is a key part of Salinas’ identity. Unfortunately, funding for it has been scarce, but now, that will change. Jose Arreola is the city’s Community Safety administrator and leads the committee for the Public Arts Commission, and under his leadership, public arts has been granted ten times more funding than it did in previous years.
Now, Arreola “wants to make the application process smoother to encourage more local artists to apply for future projects.” The city has started to do so by offering workshops to artists that teaches them how to apply for the grants.
Many artists have already started work on their murals. The article shows a few of the projects on East Alisal Street, featuring visages of farm land and Aztec culture. Arreola hopes more artists will make use of the funding that’s available to them.
Santa Cruz
The rare Santa Cruz kangaroo rat was rediscovered in a neighboring county
The Santa Cruz kangaroo rat was thought to only exist in the Henry Cowell Redwoods State Park, but that expectation was proven wrong when one of the rodents was discovered in Sierra Azul Open Space.
“It's small like a rat, shaped like a kangaroo, and is listed in California's critically imperiled subspecies. Known scientifically as Dipodomys venustus venustus, the furry creatures are more closely related to gophers and chipmunks than rats”.
As evidenced by the discovery, the rodents seem to be benefiting from habitat conservation. The kangaroo rat is key in helping maintain the balance of the local ecosystem.
Scientists hope to see more progress so they can eventually list the species under the California Endangered Species Act.