January 21, 2002

Catherine Caufield, Executive Director
Environmental Action Committee of West Marin (EAC
PO Box 609, Point Reyes Station, CA 94956
 

Dear Catherine:

The Sierra Club - Marin Group and its 7,000 Marin County member wish to convey our support for EAC's nomination of Tomales Bay as a "Wetland of International Importance" under the Convention of Wetlands (commonly known as the Ramsar Convention).  We strongly believe that Tomales Bay fulfills all the criteria identified by the Ramsar Convention for designation of Wetlands of International Importance in that it:

Contains natural wetland types representative of the biogeographic region;

Supports vulnerable species and threatened ecological communities;

Supports plant and animal populations important to maintaining the biological diversity of the region;

Supports species at critical stages of their life cycle;

Supports 20,000 or more waterbirds;

Supports 1% of the individuals in a population of one subspecies of waterbird (black brant, bufflehead, etc);

Supports a significant proportion of indigenous fish (herring, coho, etc);

And is important spawning ground, nursery, or migration path for one or more fish species, including the federally listed coho salmon and steelhead trout.

As stated in the nomination, the nominated area covers the land and waters to the mean high tide mark, under the overlapping jurisdiction of the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary and Point Reyes National seashore, both of whom support the nomination.  The Sierra Club - Marin Group and its 7,000 local members look forward to Tomales Bay's designation as a "Wetland of International Importance."
 

Sincerely,

Gordon Bennett, Conservation Committee Co-Chair