By Corny Foster

If you are walking the north end of Crissy Field beach in the Presidio, you can easily mistake a Western Snowy Plover for one more ripple of sand. Camouflage helps the plovers evade predators. It is also the reason that few people know the birds are there until they almost step on them!

Luckily, there are some people who are highly aware of the plovers – Golden Gate Bird Alliance and National Park Service volunteers who spend one morning each month grooming the Crissy Field beach to maintain suitable habitat for the birds.

We recently reached the one-year anniversary of the Crissy Field volunteer program. Over the past year, volunteers put in 105 hours removing invasive weeds and collecting 36 buckets of trash – all aimed at ensuring a hospitable home for the sparrow-sized plovers.

The Western Snowy Plover — the Pacific Coast sub-species of the Snowy Plover — inhabits coastal areas from Washington State to Baja California. There are well-publicized programs to protect the plovers’ nesting beaches, such as those at Point Reyes and the Monterey Peninsula.

But the Bay Area’s wide sandy beaches are also important to the plovers as an overwintering site, where between July and May they build up energy reserves for migration and breeding.

Western Snowy Plovers resting in the dunes at Crissy Field / Photo by Matthew Zlatunich

The first person to identify these small birds was Lt. William P. Trowbridge, who supervised the construction of the San Francisco Tide Gauge near the Golden Gate in 1854. Trowbridge was a West Point graduate and an accomplished naturalist who collected biological specimens and sent them east to be examined and included in museum collections.

Of the many species he collected, some proved to be new to the body of scientific knowledge.  One such species was the Snowy Plover (Charadrius nivosus), which Trowbridge collected on May 8, 1854 from the shoreline dunes of the Presidio.

Habitat loss and degradation due to development, beach recreation, and non-native vegetation have contributed to a decline in the Western Snowy Plover population, which in March 1993 was listed as “threatened” under the Endangered Species Act.  Up to 100 of the estimated 2,300 birds remaining on the Pacific Coast overwinter in San Francisco on Ocean and Crissy Field beaches in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area (GGNRA).

Do you see the Snowy Plover in the foreground of the tide gauge station?…

By Ilana DeBare

It’s been one full year since we started this Golden Gate Birder blog!

In that time, our busy and talented members have written posts about grebe courtship at Clear Lake; Bald Eagle nest monitoring at Lake Chabot; falcon nesting drama in downtown San Francisco; birding in the style of a native Miwok tribes person; the difference between “birders” and “birdwatchers”; and many more.

One of our first posts was on the spread of nesting bluebirds in Berkeley, thanks in part to the nest boxes installed and monitored by GGBA field trip leader and birding class instructor Rusty Scalf.

Since we have now come a full cycle and it is spring again, let’s celebrate a year of birds and a year of this blog with some new photos of bluebirds in Berkeley. These shots of a pair of Western Bluebirds at their nest box on San Pablo Avenue were taken by Allen Hirsch. You can see his entire album of Berkeley bluebird photos at http://allenh.zenfolio.com/p818641381.

Meanwhile, do you have birds nesting in your yard or neighborhood? Which ones are they? 

Western Bluebird by Allen Hirsch

 

Male and female Western Bluebirds by Allen Hirsch

 

Female Western Bluebird brings caterpillar to nest box / Photo by Allen Hirsch

 

Female bringing caterpillar to male on nest / Photo by Allen Hirsch

 

Caterpillar exchange! Photo by Allen Hirsch

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Last call to sign up for our Birdathon dinner! Join us on Sunday May 19th for an afternoon of good food, boutique wines and great birding stories, all in a beautiful private location in the Oakland Hills with birding opportunities before, during and after the event. Deadline for sign-up is Wednesday May 8th — click here to sign up or email Ilana at id*****@********************ce.org.

We also need volunteers to help by baking cookies or other desserts, and to help set up on the day of the event! If you can help, please email Ilana. …

San Francisco photographer Sharon Beals will be a guest exhibitor at our Birdathon Awards Dinner on Sunday May 19th. Sharon is the author of Nests: Fifty Nests and the Birds that Built Them, published by Chronicle Books. For the nests in her book, she turned to the collections of the California Academy of Sciences, the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, and the Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology. Join us at the Birdathon dinner to meet Sharon and see some more of her work! (Note: Registration deadline for the dinner is Tuesday May 7th.)

The following is an excerpt of an interview with Sharon Beals by Chuck Hagner, from BirdWatchingDaily.com.

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BirdWatching: Where did the idea for the book come from? 

Beals: The idea evolved over a 10-year trajectory that began after reading Scott Weidensaul’s amazing book Living on the Wind: Across the Hemisphere with Migratory Birds. Besides explaining how birds manage to find their way — navigating by stars, magnetic fields, polarized light, or even what might be some inherited instinct — he also talks about what they encounter along the way, and at either end of these journeys.

Pine Siskin nest / Photo by Sharon Beals

And as most of your readers may already know, migratory hazards and habitat loss are affecting so many birds around the world. I had already been interested in native plants and habitat restoration, but this book was the inspiration to learn as much as I could about what birds need to survive and about what I do in my own life that affects the welfare of birds, even at a distance.

BirdWatching: What made you ask, in 2007, to see the collection of nests and eggs at the California Academy of Sciences?

Beals: I wanted to share what I was learning, and to reach a larger audience than the already-converted choir of birders and native-plant aficionados. How to do that with my skill and artistry eluded me. It was only after photo-ing some of a friend’s innocently but, as it turned out, illegally collected nests (now either returned to the wild or donated to the Academy for use in nature education) that I felt that I had found a subject matter that would engage a wider public and, hopefully, engender their interest in birds.

California Towhee nest / Photo by Sharon Beals

BirdWatching: Are nests more of scientific or artistic interest to you?…

 By Ilana DeBare

For the past two years, we’ve been fighting plans by the city of San Francisco to create artificial-turf soccer fields with stadium-style lighting in western Golden Gate Park, an area that was intended in city plans to remain more natural and less developed.

We lost a round in this battle last summer before the city’s planning and parks commissions.

But next week, the issue goes before a different body — the California Coastal Commission.

And there are (fingers crossed!) some signs of hope.

The Coastal Commission staff report, which was released last Friday, concludes that the Beach Chalet soccer field project may conflict with the city’s Local Coastal Plan.

The “project will modify the Beach Chalet fields in a way that will alter its naturalistic character, including through the introduction of elements that would significantly change its spatial organization and setting (e.g. artificial turf, field lights, seating areas, fencing,  concrete paths, etc.),” the commission staff wrote.

The report recommends modifying the project along the lines suggested by GGBA and our allies —  improving the grass fields, rather than replacing them with artificial turf, and eliminating or reducing the proposed 60-foot-tall lighting towers.

The staff report noted that:

Such a project would be a significant improvement to the Beach Chalet fields area that would both enhance its pastoral naturalistic character and its utility for recreation consistent with the LCP [Local Coastal Plan].

So that’s good news! But the commission is by no means required to follow the recommendation of staff. And the same powerful interests that pushed the city for an artificial turf “solution” will also be trying to influence the Coastal Commission.

Together with our allies in S.F. Ocean’s Edge, we’re asking people to come to the hearing on May 9th, to support an alternative that would meet the needs of both recreation and wildlife.

Beach Chalet now, with natural grass fields What Beach Chalet would look like with lights

If you can’t attend the hearing, you can send the commission a letter. But it would need to be a postal letter (no email!), and they would need to receive it by May 3rd. Click here for information on what to say and where to send a letter.

Email us at gg**@********************ce.orgif you can attend the hearing. If enough people are coming, we can try to arrange carpools. The hearing will be at the Marin Board of Supervisors chamber, 3501 Civic Center Drive in San Rafael. …

By Bob Lewis

Eleven friends of Golden Gate Bird Alliance did a Birdathon trip near Monterey on April 15 aboard the Elkhorn Slough Safari boat, finding about 43 species in two hours, and photographing many.  Although the weather report promised high winds and cold temperatures, the elements held off and the morning was pleasant.  Captain Yohn is expert at maneuvering close to animals without spooking them, and we got great looks at quite a few.

It was a grand time to see birds in their alternate (breeding) plumage, and we found all three cormorants – Brandt’s on nests with their bright blue gular pouches, Pelagic with bright red faces, and Double-crested sporting bright yellow pouches.

Brandt's Cormorants nesting / Photo by Bob Lewis Pelagic Cormorant / Photo by Bob Lewis Double-crested Cormorant / Photo by Bob Lewis

American White Pelicans flew by showing off their “nuptial knobs,” strange protuberances on their bill that are only present during breeding time.

White Pelicans with breeding "bump" on bill / Photo by Bob Lewis

The most interesting bird was a Red-throated Loon in alternate plumage.  It’s a plumage seldom seen south of the arctic nesting grounds, so exciting to find.  Some of the Common Loons were also in striking black and white breeding plumage, Eared Grebes showed off golden ear tufts, Black-bellied Plovers had black bellies, Greater Yellowlegs were strikingly speckled, and a Pigeon Guillemot showed off his bright red feet.

Red-throated Loon / Photo by Bob Lewis

Best mammal award was a tie between the always adorable Sea Otters and the Harbor Seals with their newborn pups.  Sea Lions will probably dispute the judging – they had a lot to say as we cruised by their overcrowded dock.

Newborn harbor seal and mother / Photo by Bob Lewis

Many thanks to all the participants and others who contributed to our Birdathon efforts.

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Even if you didn’t go on a Birdathon field trip, please join us at the Birdathon Awards Dinner on Sunday afternoon May 19th! There will be good food, good friends, boutique wines, and birding opportunities at a beautiful private hillside home next to Redwood Regional Park. Info and registration at https://goldengatebirdalliance.org/donate/birdathon-2013/birdathon-2013-dinner/.

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