The 2010 Napa County Voluntary Oak Woodland Management Plan describes the role of oak woodlands in protecting our water quality and quantity: "Oak woodland canopies capture 20-30% more rainfall than do grasslands, and their contribution to organic matter in the soil improves its water holding capacity... Compared to annual vegetation, oaks can extract water from he soil profile to a greater depth. Consequently, soils under oak woodland canopy are able to absorb and hold greater amounts of rainfall than equivalent soils with only annual grassland cover... Oaks and other vegetation also help reduce soil contamination by absorbing heavy metals, fertilizer nutrients, and pesticides from the soil and intercepting sediments containing these pollutants, thereby preventing these materials from reaching surface waters."
Read the entire document here:
This voluntary plan is great for the people who already want to protect oak woodlands and do the right thing. But it does nothing to protect us from the bad actors that County leaders are too afraid to take on. The bottom line is that since 2010 no onehas applied to use the plan.