Restoration

Restoring 2500 Acres of Forested Parklands by 2025

Did you know?
Seattle is fortunate to have over 3,000 acres of forests. These areas offer residents a unique opportunity to experience actual forests without even leaving the city limits.

Our forests are in trouble.
These gems in the midst of our built-up city are in a critical state of decline and are at risk of becoming ecological dead zones. A 2001 study by The Seattle Urban Nature Project concluded that 80 percent of our forests are host to non-native invasive plants like English ivy and blackberry. These invasives cover the ground, are choking out the next generation of trees and the understory plants, and grow into the canopy, thereby weakening the trees.

What are we doing about it?
The City and volunteers have been working hard to address this challenge for quite some time. But years of passive management and the pressures of the adjacent urban areas have created a significant challenge that requires extraordinary measures. The Green Seattle Partnership was formed between the City of Seattle, the Cascade Land Conservancy and the residents of Seattle to restore 2500 acres of forested parkland by 2025.

You can help save our forests by volunteering!
In 2008, volunteers working in every neighborhood spent 78,000 hours removing invasives and planting native trees and understory plants. Their efforts helped the Partnership bring another 122 acres into the program. The goal for 2009 is to begin work on an additional 90 acres with the help of 87,000 volunteer hours. Make some of those hours yours!