THE LOS CERRITOS WETLANDS
Our coastal wetlands have all but vanished. They have been polluted, diked, drained, filled in, paved over, fragmented and developed. Oil companies have covered our once vibrant marshes with toxic drilling muds and oily process sludge. Long Beach has lost a staggering 98.3% of its wetlands, compared to 70% nationally and 95% in California.
Yet one precious remnant remains - The Los Cerritos Wetlands - still the largest salt marsh and only restorable estuary in Los Angeles County, with 776 acres remaining available for restoration. The most valuable of all wetlands are those at estuaries (river mouths). They link diverse and interdependent ecosystems between fresh and salt waters, between watershed and ocean and between river and marine habitats supporting species that can survive nowhere else. This is why there are so many different habitats coexisting in our wetlands - 13 in all. They just do not exist elsewhere any longer!
Although the web of life in this estuary is threadbare, with many species endangered, it is still functioning. And, right now, we have a unique opportunity to purchase and link this rare coastal chain of life with far-reaching benefits to all of Southern California.
The importance of a restored Los Cerritos Wetlands cannot be overstated. Healthier wetlands are active bio-filters protecting water quality, scrubbing out toxic contaminants from transported sediments, removing suspended and dissolve solids and trapping out floating refuse or debris before it reaches our harbor, beaches and ocean.
[© 2007 Ki Sun]