When I tell new acquaintances that I write a column about nature on Capitol Hill, I sometimes get a bit of a side eye. Though there’s much credit due to how we define nature and where we see it existing, many people still wonder why I would want to spend my time pondering one of the most densely populated neighborhoods in Seattle. Why not dream over far off wild places instead of a place many might find lacking wildness? One of many answers can be found in the Capitol Hill Connections project.
The goal of this project, collaboratively spearheaded by Seattle’s Urban Bird Treaty City partners is to promote healthy urban habitats along a corridor on 11th Ave between Volunteer Park and Seattle University. This means making the pockets of greenspace in between, as connected as possible, which requires multimodal efforts to engage the public and private landowners in creating, connecting, and stewarding spaces for birds and nature. And often what’s good for them is of course good for people.
Capitol Hill Connections project area in green
Old school, as well as still prominent, conservation efforts across the globe have often left people out of the conversation, and entirely out of the picture. While a vast space with few people might feel more appropriate for this approach (though often this flies in the face of traditional lifeways of Indigenous people in such places), it would be absurd to not focus on people when trying to enhance and steward such a densely populated urban village. We need nature, for our physical and mental health, and a connected greenspace along 11th ave would offer more of this. During the pandemic, it’s become increasingly clear that public greenspaces are vital, with the inequities of who has access to nature, and open, safe public spaces laid ever more bare under health guidelines.
Bird Lists for Project Area
| Volunteer Park | Cal Anderson Park | Seattle University | 11th Ave Corridor |
|---|---|---|---|
| American Crow
American Goldfinch American Robin American Wigeon Anna’s Hummingbird Bald Eagle Band-tailed Pigeon Barn Owl Barn Swallow Barred Owl Bewick’s Wren Black Swift Black-capped Chickadee Brewer’s Blackbird Brown Creeper Bufflehead Bushtit California Scrub-Jay Canada Goose Cedar Waxwing Chestnut-backed Chickadee Chipping Sparrow Cliff Swallow Common Goldeneye Common Merganser Common Raven Cooper’s Hawk Dark-eyed Junco Double-crested Cormorant Downy Woodpecker European Starling Fox Sparrow Gadwall Glaucous-winged Gull Golden-crowned Kinglet Golden-crowned Sparrow Great Blue Heron Hairy Woodpecker Hammond’s Flycatcher Hermit Thrush Herring Gull Horned Grebe House Finch House Sparrow Hutton’s Vireo Killdeer Mallard Marsh Wren Merlin Mourning Dove Nashville Warbler Northern Flicker Northern Rough-winged Swallow Orange-crowned Warbler Osprey Pacific Wren Pacific-slope Flycatcher Painted Bunting Peregrine Falcon Pied-billed Grebe Pine Siskin Purple Finch Red Crossbill Red-breasted Nuthatch Red-breasted Sapsucker Red-tailed Hawk Red-winged Blackbird Ring-necked Duck Rock Pigeon Ruby-crowned Kinglet Rufous Hummingbird Savannah Sparrow Sharp-shinned Hawk Snowy Owl Song Sparrow Spotted Sandpiper Spotted Towhee Steller’s Jay Swainson’s Thrush Townsend’s Solitaire Townsend’s Warbler Tree Swallow Turkey Vulture Varied Thrush Vaux’s Swift Violet-green Swallow Warbling Vireo Western Tanager Western Wood-Pewee White-crowned Sparrow Wilson’s Warbler Wood Duck Yellow Warbler Yellow-rumped Warbler |
American Crow
American Goldfinch American Robin Anna’s Hummingbird Bald Eagle Bewick’s Wren Black-capped Chickadee Brown-headed Cowbird Bushtit California Gull Caspian Tern Cedar Waxwing Cooper’s Hawk Dark-eyed Junco European Starling Gadwall Glaucous-winged Gull Golden-crowned Kinglet House Finch House Sparrow Mallard Northern Flicker Orange-crowned Warbler Peregrine Falcon Red-tailed Hawk Rock Pigeon Ruby-crowned Kinglet Snow Goose Song Sparrow Tree/Violet-green Swallow Yellow-rumped Warbler |
American Crow
American Goldfinch American Robin Anna’s Hummingbird Bald Eagle Bewick’s Wren Black-capped Chickadee Black-throated Gray Warbler Brown Creeper Brown-headed Cowbird Bushtit California Gull California Scrub-Jay Cedar Waxwing Common Redpoll Cooper’s Hawk Dark-eyed Junco Double-crested Cormorant Downy Woodpecker European Starling Fox Sparrow Glaucous-winged Gull Golden-crowned Kinglet Golden-crowned Sparrow Great Blue Heron Green-winged Teal House Finch House Sparrow Lincoln’s Sparrow Mallard Merlin Northern Flicker Orange-crowned Warbler Osprey Pacific Wren Peregrine Falcon Pine Siskin Red Crossbill Red-breasted Nuthatch Red-breasted Sapsucker Red-tailed Hawk Ring-billed Gull Rock Pigeon Ruby-crowned Kinglet Rufous Hummingbird Savannah Sparrow Sharp-shinned Hawk Snow Goose Song Sparrow Spotted Towhee Steller’s Jay Swainson’s Thrush Townsend’s Warbler Trumpeter Swan Varied Thrush Violet-green Swallow Warbling Vireo Western Tanager White-crowned Sparrow Wilson’s Snipe Wilson’s Warbler Yellow Warbler Yellow-rumped Warbler |
American Crow
American Goldfinch American Robin Anna’s Hummingbird Bald Eagle Bewick’s Wren Black-capped Chickadee California Scrub Jay Canada Goose Cedar Waxwing Cooper’s Hawk Dark-eyed Junco European Starling Glaucous-winged Gull House Finch House Sparrow Mallard Northern Flicker Peregrine Falcon Red-tailed Hawk Rock Pigeon Song Sparrow Steller’s Jay Tree/Violet-green Swallow Western Gull White-crowned Sparrow |
Josh Morris, Conservation Manager at Seattle Audubon, and a leader in the project which was developed when the Capitol EcoDistrict joined the Urban Bird Treaty in 2018, was quick to mention people when we talked about the work (for transparency’s sake I should state that Morris and I are coworkers). People are the first on the list of motivations for the project on Seattle Audubon’s page, and Morris makes the strong point that without people, without the community behind this project, it won’t be possible. After all, while there are about 60 acres between the major greenspaces along the proposed connection, there’s also a lot of private property. The project aims to provide a draft vegetation plan for property owners to help guide participation in habitat enhancements along the corridor as well as build a group of local stewards to focus on Cal Anderson park. Morris was clear: “our success is reliant on the people who live on 11th ave.”
Another major goal is harm reduction: building a playbook of creative solutions to reduce bird window strikes, moving away from pesticide use, even turning off lights in tall buildings during migration. This column recently covered rodenticides and their impacts, particularly with an eye to predatory birds like Cooper’s Hawks. Rodent bait boxes are all across the entirety of 11th avenue, including at Cal Anderson Park. The goal of having Cal Anderson be pesticide free is still in the works, but getting everyone else, from business owners to property managers, to elect rodenticide use restrictions is a bigger hurdle. Morris said “rats pose a serious health threat,” so even Seattle Parks and Recreation is reluctant to stop this form of management despite the obvious impacts on native birds.
At the end of the day, the Capitol Connections Project in its current form will be just a start. With initial goals of restricting pesticide use, creating a team of volunteer stewards at Cal Anderson, and drafting a vegetation plan for habitat enhancements well underway, the hope is that this groundwork will be followed up by a lot of hard work from the community. Morris wants public input (go ahead and reach out via e-mail) and has run community workshops and intends to run more in the future. There should be no doubt that this work is happening in an area of Seattle that is affluent. Finding community members with time, money, and expertise to get involved may not be as challenging, but that doesn’t mean the work shouldn’t happen here as an example for future projects.
So getting back to my initial question, why would a naturalist be driven to think about places with less biological diversity, where people dominate the landscape? Clearly I want people to care about nature, and the nature closest to them. That’s the easy answer. But there’s something deeper in the concept of this project – the idea of connections, both for human and more than human members of our community.
Rejoining connections, filling in spaces between fragments, literal and figurative, is something we all need more of and should be emphasizing in our daily lives despite the obvious barriers of the Pandemic. Connectivity along 11th will facilitate the movement of organisms, and people are organisms after all. So where would you rather live? In a space where birds are safer and people are healthier and more connected? Or in fragments, closed off from our neighbors, with less nature around? The enormity and complexity of even a neighborhood scale project like Capitol Hill Connections is real, but it promises to be very worth the effort.
If you’re interested in receiving updates and information about getting involved in the Capitol Hill Connections project, sign up here.
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These kinds of efforts can also be understood as green-washing to distract from the larger, systematic and City-approved loss of local habitat caused by upzoning and bad design. “Oh look, we’re recognizing the importance of habitat on ten blocks of one street! And throwing in two parks, where it should already be a priority. Aren’t we special!”
Thanks for this article, it’s a great project……