In Muir Woods National Monument, Redwood Creek meanders past giant redwood trees — its banks carefully manicured of twigs and logs giving it a tidy, pristine look.

Todd Steiner and his salmon advocacy group SPAWN want to reverse that.

Steiner’s group, along with the National Park Service just completed a project creating small thickets of logs, branches and debris at spots along the waterway, with the aim of giving endangered coho salmon places to hide from predators and ride-out storms.

“It’s a really simple method, low-tech,” Steiner said on a recent rainy day in the park. “We literally collect woody debris and it’s all woven together so it’ll stay together.”

Steiner said over the years, the thinking by park managers was to clean the creek of debris creating an uncluttered setting. B

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