Protecting the wetlands and their inhabitants along the northern edge of San Pablo Bay has been Myrna Hayes’ driving passion for the past three decades.
It's an unlikely calling, considering her previous experience with wetlands – or lack thereof.

"I knew nothing about wetlands. I don't know that I knew the word,” said Hayes, who grew up hundreds of miles away in the Butte County town of Paradise.
But in the early 1990s, Hayes was living in Vallejo and was drafted by her neighbors into the effort to fight a proposed development. Once Hayes understood the value of what she was working to preserve, there was no turning back.
“The wetlands definitely do not wow you like Yosemite,” Hayes said. “They seep through your skin into your bloodstream and you really have to just be there.”
In the interest of getting others to just “be there,” Hayes has organized for the past 28 years the San Francisco Bay Flyway Festival on Mare Island. Primarily a gathering for birders to watch just some of the millions of birds that migrate to the Bay Area each year, Hayes hopes that non-birders find their way there as well.

She is convinced that if she gets someone to spend even a small amount of time on the shores of San Pablo Bay, she will have won a convert to her cause.
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“My psychology professor said way back in college, 'You don't love who you don't know.' So proximity causes you to fall in love,” said Hayes.
Over the years, Hayes has had both success and failure when it comes to her preservation efforts. In one case, it happened with the very same plot of land.

In 2009, Hayes led a group that opened more than 100 acres of the former Naval Station on Mare Island to the public. For a decade, Hayes and her group, the Mare Island Heritage Trust, were stewards of the property, but then the city removed them from oversight of the land and restricted public access. Hayes has been eager to get it back.
“Our Change.org petition has over 10,000 signatures, requesting our return as managers and hosts," she said.
Hayes says her mission is fueled by the knowledge that once gone, wilderness can never be returned.
“That is my drive. That is what wakes me up in the middle of the night, keeps me awake long periods of time,” she said.