Photo: Laura Mallonee/Grist
The Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge is one of the last remnants of the Tamaulipan thorn forest, which once covered more than 1 million acres on both sides of the Rio Grande. Jon Dale was 15 when he began planting native seedlings near his family home in Harlingen, Texas, at the convergence of the Central and Mississippi flyways, to create a 2-acre thorn forest. Two decades later, he’s a director at American Forests, which also leads the Thornforest Conservation Partnership and hopes to restore at least 81,444 acres to help the ocelot population rebound. Dale, now 45, believes urban thorn forests, which can mature in 10 years, provide climate benefits for decades: providing shade, preserving water, reducing erosion, and soaking up stormwater. American Forests is launching its first “community forest” in the flood-prone neighborhood of San Carlos, and has created a playbook of “climate-informed” planting.
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