Erin McDermott

Partner
Principal Vegetation and Restoration Ecologist
Certified Arborist #WE-7318A

Erin McDermott is an environmental professional with over 20 years of experience providing biological expertise for a variety of resource management efforts. Her expertise includes vegetation ecology, invasive weed management, restoration ecology, wetland ecology, and arboriculture. She has prepared environmental documents in support of CEQA and State and federal Endangered Species Acts, and prepared regulatory permit applications, restoration plans, vegetation mapping reports and biological resource management plans. She is a CNPS-certified California Consulting Botanist and an International Society of Arboriculture Certified Arborist. Her restoration expertise, especially relating to sensitive habitat types, is relied upon by numerous private clients, public utilities, local governments, land trusts, and park agencies.

Erin McDermott has a passion for the vegetation diversity, the threats facing these communities from invasive weed species, and planning locally appropriate restoration for a variety of common and specialized habitats. Ms. McDermott started her career in 2002 working for the federal government conducting vegetation surveys at Lake Tahoe for the U.S. Forest Service and invasive plant management in the Bay Area for the National Park Service. This foundation, along with her vast experience working as a professional in the Bay Area since then, has made her a leader in the fields of vegetation science, weed management, and restoration.

Ms. McDermott is experienced in restoration planning, implementation, maintenance, monitoring, and reporting. Ms. McDermott has developed Restoration Plans and Mitigation and Monitoring Plans, for both small and large projects for approval by regulatory agencies. Her horticultural and botanical background allow her to design and implement restoration projects that are ecologically and regionally appropriate, use species that do well in a restoration setting, and are successful. She has overseen annual monitoring for numerous projects and has observed restoration projects develop over time, which allows her to make appropriate recommendations for any needed adaptive management measures. This results in restoration projects staying on track to meet performance standards.

Ms. McDermott is an expert in current vegetation sampling and mapping methodology and uses. Between 2006 and 2011 she provided her expertise to the East Bay Chapter of CNPS as the Chair of the Vegetation Committee, and since 2008 she has served on the statewide California Native Plant Society Vegetation Committee. As part of this committee, she provided input to develop the Online Edition of the Manual of California Vegetation, to provide a useful online tool to land managers that could be updated more frequently than a print book. Ms. McDermott has attended over 50 presentations on vegetation sampling, mapping, and research at annual botanist meetings, symposia, and conferences. Ms. McDermott has led and completed several large vegetation sampling and mapping projects.

Ms. McDermott has extensive experience conducting inventories, mapping, and managing invasive weeds and has prepared weed management plans that include an inventory of invasive weed species, prioritization for control based on threats to biological resources, treatment prescriptions, and monitoring programs. She has managed large and small-scale baseline mapping efforts targeting specific invasive plant species and has prepared invasive weed management plans for a number of clients, including the watersheds of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission and the Monterey Peninsula Regional Park District.