CA Audubon Coastal Leadership Program - Ballona Wetlands

2026 Coastal Leadership Cohort and Patrick Tyrrell - Director of Habitat Restoration for Friends of Ballona Wetlands

For my first blog post, I am proud to announce my participation in CA Audobon's Coastal Leadership Program as one of ten members in the 2026 cohort! This program seeks out early-career individuals with an interest in coastal restoration and the work of conservation nonprofits, helping participants to "acquire the skills needed to address the impacts of climate change on coastal habitats" through guest speakers, visits to restoration areas, and collaborative discussion (Audobon.org). We meet twice a month at the Audubon Center at Debs park, and occasionally on Saturdays for fieldtrips along the Los Angeles coastline. 

As of now, we have had our first two weekly meetings, as well as our first habitat visit to the Ballona Wetlands near Marina del Mar. The Friends of Ballona Wetlands led us on a tour of their current restoration area, and gave a demonstration on how they track the changes in native and invasive plant growth within the wetlands. While there, we had the pleasure of observing great blue herons, great & snowy egrets, killdeer, black phoebes, and even a barn owl, all enjoying the protected wetlands and all the hard work that the Friends of Ballona have put into restoring the habitat so far. 

Tyrrell explains how to use quadrats to track plant growth in a habitat

My favorite part of the trip ended up being a bit of a surprise. Our visit leader introduced us to "pickleweed": a type of succulent that grows like a wildfire across the marshes. From afar it looks like a bush, but its "leaves" are hard and branch off like coral, changing from green to bright pink as the branches mature. But even stranger is what it tastes like! Usually plants suffer in soil with a high-salt content, but plants like pickleweed and saltgrass soak up the salty water from the coastal wetlands and either store it or excrete it instead of shriveling up. Pickleweed is completely edible and even considered a delicacy in some countries as "sea asparagus", so naturally we all had to take a bite. (Spoiler alert: it was VERY salty) Usually spotting birds is my favorite part of outdoor excursions but I was pleasantly surprised that pickleweed ended up being the highlight of the trip!

Pickleweed in the Ballona Wetlands marshes

We have another field trip coming up very quickly to the Malibu Lagoons, which is another coastal site I’ve never visited before. I’m curious to learn about how the wildfires last year affected the habitat, and to see what kinds of animals call this particular spot home.

So far it has been an incredible pleasure to connect with similar-minded environmentalists, artists, and birders through this program, and to already have learned so much from the CA Audubon and our visiting speakers. In the final months of this program I will need to complete a capstone project, and I am already feeling so inspired by what we have seen to conduct my own coastal conservation project. I think it will take a few more sessions for me to decide on what kind of project I want to pursue… but one idea that struck me while visiting the Ballona Wetlands was “birding kits”.

While chatting with my cohort, I was surprised to learn that many of the members were completely new to birding. As someone who has been fascinated by birds since I was a kid, this conversation really opened my eyes as to the different hurdles that may keep people (especially kids) from connecting with nature, even when proximity isn’t an issue! My idea was to build birding kits— backpacks with binoculars, info cards about local birds, and examples of how to journal discoveries— and leave them with local schools, libraries, or even at local coffee shops for kids to borrow. Though there are a few kinks to iron out, I though this would be a great way to encourage kids to explore nature with intention and break down some of the access issues that accompany birding.

Stay tuned as to how this project develops! One thing I know for sure is I can’t wait to incorporate pickleweed into my next embroidery piece!