Stewarding In Place

What you do matters!

We've been blown away by the support of our community over these months of Stewarding In Place. What each of us does in our yard and neighborhood impacts our local creek, river, lake, or ocean, and our soil, plant, and animal communities. We can use that power for good to enhance our watersheds together and develop an intimate partnership with nature.

Don't just take it from us - check out these community-member submitted photos and stories below about how they've taken charge and improved their local neighborhoods for the better. WMG has hosted dispersed and virtual workshops and events covering invasive species pulls, plogging (our new favorite workout - jogging and picking up trash), basin building, rain garden care, and more. Our community has taken this opportunity to do something good for our local environment now and for years to come.

Enjoy these photos of our stewards in action. Click the image to enlarge and gain a little more insight!

Steward In Place: Basins and Rain Gardens

"I figure I am about 25% finished now. Once the winter rains come, I can make necessary adjustments. Then I can plant native plants next spring." - Greg M.

"Thank you so much for the basin building class on Tuesday! I had already started building basins in my yard, and the class taught me so much about what I was doing right and where I could make improvements." - Patty R.

First of three images of the Drummond and Radomsky family's basin!

Second of three images of the Drummond and Radomsky family's basin!

Completed Drummond and Radomsky family's basin! They say "grasses to come."

"I built it in a little corner of the backyard. There were some old and current irrigation lines to work around." - Carol B.

"The shade structure is a new lemon tree. Not visible are lady’s slipper cactus, aloe Vera, shade tree and Arizona milkweed." - Kate K.

"A basin happened today! I was so excited after the Build Your Own Basin workshop that, armed with my WMG design, I went out ahead of schedule to draw my outline and strategize on my very first basin!" - Paula R.

"Thanks to the generosity of some volunteers I met on prior Co-op Workshops, I have a good start to a basin today! Brian and Marty came by to help me strategize, and dig." - Paula R.

"It's not a huge basin, but it was fun to build." - Mike C.

"I bought plants this weekend from the Mission Garden plant sale and from Spadefoot Nursery. Now for the monsoons to come!" - Jan S.

"We're working on digging rainwater basins before the monsoon season starts. Thank you to @watershed_mg for the education and inspiration." - Christina F.

"Planted a fig tree, transplanted an agave to make room, and reshaped passive berms." - David R.

"I dug out a series of channels and small basins to capture rainwater. Then, I repurposed a used pickle jar as a shaker for native wildflower seeds." - Gregory M.

"We made the slope easy so we didn’t need to use any rocks, and put the soil downslope of the basin. We put [the rocks] between mesquite trees hoping to help them [and] native grass seeds in the basin with some mulch to help with moisture!" - Brandon W.

"I created a rain garden in my backyard for native (mostly) plants." - Jan S.

Mike C. rescued this pretty prickly pear from an alley for his rain garden!

"Some backyard monsoon projects - a new basin..." - Peggy M.

"...and future water harvesting tank site." - Peggy M.

"We were in the Rillito on River and La Canada, which is where we do our daily walk with our dogs, where we are always overwhelmed by the amount of trash. It feels like we can never get ahead of it." - Hilary M. & Stephen A.

"We picked up three bags of trash from the Arroyo Chico watershed and the Barrio San Antonio neighborhood until it got too rainy looking to be hanging out in a riverbed. We all had a great time." - Kyle P.

"My son Max has a book called Trashytown. He loves this book. It's the story of a sanitation worker named Mr. Gilly. Every day Mr. Gilly drives around picking up trash. I got Max some toddler-sized gardening gloves. He was super stoked about his gloves. They seem very official to him. We went out and picked up trash three times, "like Mr. Gilly."" - Mike C.

"Here are some pics from walking the washes for trash in neighborhood." - Drummond and Radomsky families

"Thanks for encouraging everyone to keep our community clean and keep garbage out of the waterways." - Heather H.

"Over the past year, I've worked with my city councilman and two establishments in regards to the litter problem. I'm pleased to say that one of them has been incredibly responsive, and now sends staff out daily, if not more often, to clean a wide radius from their front door." - Paula R.

"Sad to see so much trash, but satisfying to pick it up." - Jan S.

"I collected four boxes of trash along Wentworth Road before it could be washed into Tanque Verde Creek!" - Sara B.

"We worked on a wash near our home and collected three bags worth of trash. For what it's worth, we also scoured our neighborhood for buffelgrass for that event but did not find any (a good thing)!" - Jen T.

"I picked up trash around the bus stop and in the swale. While working there, a woman pulled over on the shoulder to thank me for my efforts. Also, upon my return, a man pulled over to inquire about what I was doing and kindly offered to take two of my full trash bags off my hands. I really appreciated his help, and bonus! I connected with a new neighbor! It is so encouraging when total strangers stop to provide encouragement for one's efforts." - Carol B.

"I went out a week early and did 2.5 hours at Gates. I need to go back with bigger bags." - David R.

"The trash was in my back alley and around the neighborhood on the streets, I filled up two small bags and a large one!" - Brandon W,

"By and large a lot of 50ml liquor bottles, cigarette butts, and plastic car parts." - Justin P.

“I did a 20 min neighborhood clean-up and collected one grocery bag full. And saved a few bushes from becoming trash cans.” – Kathy Balman

"My roommate Grace and I cleaned up around our neighborhood this morning! Thank you for organizing this!" - Rachel S.

"We did go out but, unfortunately, well, maybe not unfortunately, didn't find any buffelgrass. But we did pick up trash - three pounds worth." - Kathy B,

"Cleaned up about a 1/4 mile stretch (up and back) along Craycroft Road north of River Road." - Steven A,

Venom’s (Tucson's womxns club ultimate frisbee team) before photo at the Santa Cruz River Downtown.

And after! “Thank you to all you folks at WMG for heading up local efforts like this to better Tucson's community!” – Venom

"We all had a great time, and it felt great to volunteer a few hours to make Tucson's waterways cleaner and healthier!" - Venom

“With our season and practice scheduled cancelled this year, who knew it'd be trash that could make Venom feel like an actual team again!”

"The invasives were in my neighborhood, on the corner of a street." - Brandon W.

"One of numerous piles of buffelgrass from our pull this morning. Also gave us a good overview of what we’re dealing with and to create a plan for the next few weeks." - Charlene W.

"I ended up with two large trash bags full of invasive weeds!" - Gregory M. (Goathead pictured)

"With glee, I overturned one paving stone, another, and another, tearing at the sneaky stolons. "Bermuda grass, you are gone!" was my victory cry. Alas, now so is my patio! - Paula R.

"This morning I cleared the western facing slope of a small peak in Tucson Mountain Park. I worked from 5:45 to 9:30 AM." - David R,

"We started removing arundo from around our favorite pond in Tanque Verde Creek. Today, we removed approximately a dozen small arundo sprouts, and will return to clear what we can by hand." - Sara B.

The Drummond and Radomsky families strike again with their invasive buffelgrass pull!

"It wasn’t as widespread as I thought it would be. Other grasses are more prominent – bermuda grass I think, and another grass that’s taller and more cane like, with little seeds like horseshoes." - Susanna S.