Who are the Friends of Five Creeks?

Our new interpretive signs make the Cerrito Creek trail from Adams Street to Creekside Park even more attractive. Join our March 29 & April 26 work parties as we continue to make the creek less flood prone and more welcoming to wildlife and people.

Friends of Five Creeks is a group of volunteers working hands-on for clean water, healthy watersheds, and welcomes for wildlife and people along the creeks and shorelines of North Berkeley, Albany, Kensington, and southern El Cerrito and Richmond. We strive to keep nature a vital part of the urbanized east side of San Francisco Bay. Our grassroots, all-volunteer organization (bylaws), founded in 1996, operates under the fiscal sponsorship of Berkeley Partners for Parks, a 501(c)3 nonprofit corporation.

The "five creeks" in our name are Codornices, Village, Marin, Middle (Blackberry), and Cerrito Creeks and their tributaries. We also have projects on Schoolhouse and Strawberry Creeks and on the Bay shore. See some of our recent and current projects.

Read our newsletter on achievements in 2007 and plans for 2008.

What do we do?

We work to:

• Improve water quality and lessen erosion and flooding
• Provide green corridors, trails, and interpretive signs along creeks
• Restore diverse native vegetation and remove invasives
• Enhance wildlife habitat and populations
• Educate and involve the public 
  

Our activities include:

• Monthly work parties open to all, and many more work parties scheduled for youth groups, schools, churches, businesses, etc.
• Planting, removing invasive species, controlling erosion, installing amenities such as signs and litter cans, removing litter, etc. 
• Weekday "weed warriors," propagating native plants, water-quality monitoring, and a frog survey.
• Every-other-month public talks, guided walks, writing and distributing information, working with school groups, and appearances at fairs and festivals. Here are some ideas on how you can help creeks.
• Advocating on creek and watershed activities, participating in creek-related planning and other political processes, and partnering with public agencies in restoration projects. Where can we restore creeks?

How to contact us, join, or donate:

We can use your help at work parties and with propagating native plants, carpentry, wildlife observation and research, working with children, writing, design, history, hydrology, law, advocacy -- and more. Please join us! We meet at 7 pm on first Mondays  (second Monday if the first is a holiday) at Albany Community Center, 1249 Marin.

For information or to get regular updates on creek-related volunteering and events, email F5Creeks@aol.com or call (510) 848-9358.

Click here to donate or join!