Who are we
The Big Bear Greenthumbs are a group of volunteers (all ages and
walks of life) who work together monthly assisting the Big Bear
Ranger Station’s Native Plant Nursery and Restoration Program.
Projects include seed collecting, germination, plant
propagation, weed removal, site preparation (sometimes trash
removal), and planting native vegetation on the forest. Open to all interested
public. Over the past 15 years this group has restored hundreds
of acres on the San Bernardino National Forest with native
plants grown from our commercial sized greenhouse.
Our History
The San Bernardino National Forest has been successfully
conducting ecological restoration for over a decade and has a
fully functional, but small native plant nursery with a
greenhouse located on the Mountaintop District. With this
nursery, the Mountaintop District has been able to restore
hundreds of acres of disturbed sites on the Forest all utilizing
locally collected and grown native seeds and plants. It has been
the intent of the Forest to replicate this program, which is
solely funded by grants and managed by volunteer partnerships.
Hundreds of volunteers now
participate in our program every year.
Our Greenhouse Program
The Big Bear Nursery is currently growing hundreds of native
plants for various disturbed areas across the Mountaintop
District. Although we can grow rare species, we prefer to plant
and seed with common species such as native grasses, buckwheat,
rabbit brush, and sage while allowing the rare species to come
back on their own.
Our Planting Program
 Disturbances
can be created by fire, fire suppression, any vehicle (including
mountain bikes) leaving designated roads or trails, fuel salvage
sales, and sometimes even foot traffic. Anytime a Forest visitor
leaves a designated road or trail especially with mechanized
equipment to explore, the visitor can really do some damage to
the countless rare species we have on the San Bernardino
National Forest. It is important that we try to remedy some of
this damage by seeding, planting, or mulching sites to assist
the sites in healing. In a perfect world, time would allow the
land to heal on its own, however, with over 20 million people
within a two hour drive of our Forest, we cannot always afford
the time to let the land heal naturally.
Our approach to restoring the land varies from site to site. We
don’t have the facilities to plant the entire Forest, so we
focus on areas of high potential human interface.
For more information on the Greenthumbs Volunteer Program
Contact:
Julianna Goss
42300 North Shore Drive
P.O. Box 290
Fawnskin, CA 92333
(909) 382-2824
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