Aquatic organisms are particularly sensitive to climate change because changes in temperature and precipitation alter both the amount and quality of aquatic habitat. On Stanford’s open space, the Stanford Conservation Program has created a network of 15 ephemeral to perennial ponds to increase the number of suitable habitat patches that support California tiger salamanders and California red-legged frogs. From 1997-2025, we completed robust monitoring of California tiger salamanders and California red-legged frogs to track patch occupancy and population size. Over nearly four decades of monitoring, we have documented the role of non-native predators, pond creation, and disease in the persistence of two small populations of pond-breeding amphibians. Overall, we have found that increasing the number of available habitat patches can increase the stability of populations of pond breeding amphibians in the long term. We also have documented wide-ranging benefits to non-target species.  Pond creation can be a formidable challenge, performance can be mixed, and maintenance a long term commitment, but we see pond creation as an essential component of the strategy to conserve pond associated species in the long term.