Walking "new" dunes on the Monterey Peninsula - California

Walking "new" dunes on the Monterey Peninsula

Building a sand dune takes thousands of years if the wind alone has to do the work. Rebuilding one may take just five years when you have bulldozers and scientists on your side--and you can see the results of such a project at Asilomar State Beach, on the Monterey Peninsula just north of Carmel. At the 50 acres of rolling, 20-foot-tall dunes behind Asilomar State Beach and Asilomar Conference Center, years of uncontrolled foot traffic had wiped out native vegetation, exposing large patches of unstable, open dune. Without plant cover, dunes dropped 10 feet in height, and sand regularly drifted across adjacent Sunset Drive. As dunes disappeared, so did plant and animal communities that had sprung up behind them. Non-native plants--including the familiar workhorse, ice plant--had been introduced earlier but failed to stabilize shifting sands. Even worse, these exotics proved inhospitable to most native insect and bird life.

A quarter-million natives brought in

Five years ago, in one of the most comprehensive dune restorations ever mounted in the state, workers began removing non-native plants, bulldozing dunes back into shape, seeding and planting 250,000 plants of 28 native species. Today, life has returned. Look for warblers and sparrows in the cover, red-shouldered hawks soaring overhead. About 1/2 mile of boardwalk lets you explore the mounds of fine-grained white sand (mostly quartz from offshore rocks), without harming plants. Along the ridges, wildflowers bloom; this month, look for yellow sand verbena, beach poppy, dune primrose, and the rare Menzies' wallflower. Dune sedge, coyote brush, and mock heather grow in the swales. The boardwalk extends from Asilomar conference grounds and continues on the beach side of Sunset Drive; by summer, a path will extend the length of Asilomar State Beach north 1 1/2 miles to Point Pinos. Pacific Grove--Asilomar Operating Corporation is paying for the entire $300,000 project. From State 1, take State 68 northwest 4 1/2 miles (changes to Sunset Drive) to Asilomar State Beach; park here. The dunes are inland from the road.

PHOTO : Snaking through the dunes, handsome new wooden boardwalk keeps strollers on the path, off

PHOTO : the plants

PHOTO : Menzies' wallflower, an endangered plant, should display its tiny yellow blossoms across

PHOTO : the sands this month into May

PHOTO : Interpretive sign at one end of the boardwalk tells which plants were removed, which

PHOTO : natives were planted

COPYRIGHT 1990 Sunset Publishing Corp.
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group