If you have been following the story of the OVLC Nursery and Rewild Ojai, no doubt you have heard the phrases “seed collecting season” or “watershed local genetics”. If you have read plant newsletters, there is not a mention of a plant without referencing the seed bank, or the implications of future seeded generations. And if you are my friend, I am sure you have heard me trail off while unlacing a boot, thinking about a species of native plant I have dived into that particular week, drifting off into the world of ancient phenologies.

A vast, complex system of water cuts through the Ojai Valley like a kingsnake through a bunchgrass meadow. Meandering and weaving through the hillsides, its channels are both shaped and guided by the land. Sediment grains, too small and irrelevant to notice, drift through the system, their individual destinies adding to the personality of the watershed. This dance between water and sediment embodies the river’s character, almost artful in its innumerable expressions. What does it mean for a small granule to rely on the drifts of such incomprehensible power as moving water? What is it like to witness the cyclical, meandering nature of a river from inside the river itself? It isn’t a linear answer, but a kaleidoscope of possibilities in which energies are converging. To envision the watershed as a vivid quilt sown with patchworks of textured grains, that are individually brilliant and yet cohesively lush, is to understand life as a tessellation with layers of beauty. 

A fire, a pandemic, a flood: combined, these three disasters started, and stalled, a nearly seven-year-long campaign to build three new bridges on OVLC’s preserves. As of July, that effort finally finished with the construction of the Broida Bridge at the Ojai Meadows Preserve (OMP)! These bridges didn’t just take time to be built, they also cost a combined total of around $800,000. But the time, cost, and energy that went into the three bridges were worth it because bridges offer connection in a multitude of ways.