The 46th annual Endangered Species Faire was celebrated today with a downtown parade that featured axolotls, giraffes, owls and salmon puppets — and served as a call to action on climate change and species preservation.
“Animals cannot speak up for themselves, so we speak up for them,” a host on the plaza stage told about 250 attendees after the parade. The fair was organized by the Butte Environmental Council (BEC) and began at 10 a.m., with around 20 booths representing a wide range of organizations, including nonprofits, for-profits and government agencies.
A parade participant who identified herself as Amanda — she asked that her last name not be used for personal reasons — joined the event with her daughter. With a few other participants, she carried a puppet that represented the river ecosystem, and her daughter carried a Monarch butterfly puppet they had constructed. Amanda said she was from Santa Cruz, where there used to be many Monarchs, but their numbers have declined significantly.
Erik Lopez represented the Butte Fire Safe Council at a fair booth.
“We want people to use us as a resource in fire resilience, like fire defensible space efforts,” Lopez said. “We provide resources for homeowners and landowners. We do grazing programs as well, where we contract with grazers around Butte County and systematically put goats on the ground to graze the land and mitigate any fuels mitigation.
“Wildfire in any situation is a scary situation. People are, in that scenario, panicked and maybe unprepared,” Lopez added. “I’m glad people are coming up to the booth and willing to learn about what we do and how they can stay safe against wildfires.”
Fair booths provided information on waste reduction, composting, energy and water conservation, disaster preparedness and more.
“We hold this event to let people know we really have to take care of our environment, we really have to be serious about climate change, we really need to take care of our creatures,” said Susan Tchudi, a BEC board member and the fair coordinator. “One of the things that we’re emphasizing is we need to be involved in climate action, in doing things to protect ourselves, to be resilient, to try to do whatever we can to slow the change in the climate.”
Yucheng Tang is a California Local News fellow reporting for ChicoSol.
Thank you for covering the Endangered Species Fair! This is the 46th annual coordinated by the Butte Environmental Council. Now, more than ever we need events like this that are educational, fun and celebrate and help protect the gifts of our wonderful planet.