San Francisco - Parks & Nature

Discover the remarkable return of the wolverine to California, an animal not seen in the state for 100 years! Enjoy video of this rare creature spotted in Yosemite and the Sierras in May 2021.

Witness the rare sighting of 24 orcas off the Farallon Islands, believed to be preying on seal and baby whale pups.

A plan to reintroduce sea otters to the Bay Area is gaining momentum, with hopes of restoring crucial links in the San Francisco Bay's food chain and rebuilding kelp forests along the coast.

The two-baseball diamond Jackson Park in Potrero Hill has just been approved for a $40 million facelift, with added park and playground space, sidewalk gardens, and bathrooms being modernized into a more deluxe “clubhouse.”

The plan to make the former Pacific Rod and Gun Club into an 11-acre Lake Merced public park was shot down in 2016, but the plans for the park are back on, promising boat decks, a skate park, and a ropes course.

Following last year’s untimely death of her mate Blue Boy, 28-year-old mute swan Blanche has gone on to the great lagoon in the sky, as the swan who lived nearly her whole life at the Palace of Fine Arts died last Thursday.

The long, arching Aquatic Park Municipal Pier at the western end of San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf could be shut down for good following an earthquake last month.

A fenced-off patch of land began its transformation Wednesday into the 10-acre, $140 million India Basin Waterfront Park, a crown jewel that will give Bayview a waterfront park, and build a bike and walking trail between the Embarcadero and Candlestick Point.

Foster City officials are facing severe backlash after approving a plan to kill geese that have overrun the city's parks and lagoon.

The ribbon-cutting for the long-awaited Presidio Tunnel Tops park is Saturday, then Sunday’s Grand Opening features a food truck rally plus DJs, live music, and ranger walks.

The $140 million India Basin Park project in Bayview just got a little bigger, as the Board of Supervisors handed more land to Rec and Parks to renovate.

Car-free JFK Drive may not be car-free much longer, as a pushback campaign is taking the issue to voters. But the pro-car campaign called “Access for All” is funded by just one person.

Community members gathered Thursday to dedicate Telegraph Hill Neighborhood Center's newly renovated Tina Keker Playground, a.k.a. the former TEL HI Playground.

A 93-foot roller skating-themed mural is being painted on the surface of the park’s famed Skatin’ Place area, and a slew of new pictures and videos show its progress.

Announced on Earth Day last week, SF Parks Alliance — San Francisco’s only citywide nonprofit dedicated to the municipality’s parks — relaunched its Heart Your Parks campaign that first debuted in 2020 to celebrate and show appreciation for SF’s 220 parks and open spaces.

The saga of the falcons that live on top of the Campanile on the campus of UC Berkeley is about to add a new chapter.

The Giants’ ballpark area will soon have a statue to the first woman who played for the SF Sea Lions in the Negro Baseball Leagues, plus four other new “street room” installations at the Mission Rock development.

Brickyard Cove became the newest public space inside the 1,833-acre McLaughlin Eastshore State Park over the weekend, adding a list of amenities — picnic tables, walking paths, bike racks, and more — to the area, as well as easier access to the SF Bay Trail.

After a $10 million upgrade four years ago, the Helen Diller Civic Center Playgrounds are now apparently crawling with rats.

A new baseball diamond and bleachers, exercise equipment, and 29 new trees are the centerpieces of the new and improved K.C. Jones Playground on Third Street in the Bayview.

A makeshift, community-built park in the Sunset is set to be bulldozed in May, but at least will be replaced with 135 units of affordable teacher housing.

The SF Planning Commission approved a plan Thursday to beautify Chinatown’s Portsmouth Square, and the most popular part of the plan is getting rid of that ugly pedestrian bridge above Kearny Street.

In a theatrical performance at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting, Supervisor Connie Chan made hay over her car-free JFK Drive proposal, and the mayor called Chan’s comments ”not a responsible way” to decide the matter.

Something called the Ocean Beach Climate Change Adaptation Project could render nearly a mile of the Great Highway car-free, regardless of what happens in the broader car-free Great Highway debate.

The China Beach bathhouse may not be an inviting destination now, but this summer it's getting its first-ever renovation since opening in 1957.