• Lights out for spring migration

    By Ilana DeBare

    Spring migration doesn’t exactly work like an Olympic running race, with millions of birds lined up and ready to fly at the exact minute the pistol goes off.

    But here at Golden Gate Bird Alliance, we consider February 15 the official start of spring migration season — and the start of our spring Lights Out for Birds campaign.

    From February 15 through May 30, we  ask people to turn off or dim the lights at night in tall buildings like the ones in downtown San Francisco and Oakland.

    More than 250 species of birds migrate through the Bay Area each year. Many of them fly at night, and can be disoriented and drawn off track by bright urban lights. Sometimes they crash into buildings; other times they circle lighted buildings until exhausted and easy prey for predators.

    Our message:

    • Building owners and managers should turn off all unnecessary lights at night, including exterior architectural lights and interior overhead lights.
    • Owners and managers can get rebates from PG&E to install motion sensors and timers, to assist in turning off lights at night.
    • Individual employees who need to work late should draw the blinds, or use desk lights rather than overhead lights.

    Turning out lights at night is good for people and the planet as well as for birds. By reducing energy usage, it saves money, reduces pollution, and can help moderate climate change. One municipal building in Toronto reported cost savings of more than $200,000 from taking part in a Lights Out initiative there!

    Golden Gate Bird Alliance has been running Lights Out for Birds educational campaigns each spring and fall for about four years. We have some really supportive partners in the San Francisco Department of the Environment and at PG&E who are helping us spread the word.

    This season we also have a gorgeous new logo, donated by Oakland artist Leslie Laurien, as well as new Fact Sheets and Posters designed by SF DoE.

    Now all we need is… you!  SF DoE and PG&E are helping us reach out to building owners and managers on an organizational level. But there’s no substitute for grassroots word-of-mouth.

    If you work in a large office building, can you help us spread the word? Talk to your co-workers about drawing blinds or using desk lighting if they need to work late. Talk to your building manager about installing timers or motion sensors.…

  • The condor recovery debate, 30 years later

    By Burr Heneman

    Rich Stallcup was the giant of birding in Northern California and beyond. There is so much to miss about him now that he’s no longer with us in person. To be with him in the field and glimpse the “feathered nation” — or snakes or salamanders or butterflies — was to fall in love with them for life. Rich could also write beautifully, and from the heart. He wrote most of all about birding, but there were occasional thoughtful and thought-provoking pieces on hard issues that he couldn’t remain silent about.

    Rich wrote “Farewell Skymaster” (below) in 1981 for a special 20-page Point Reyes Bird Observatory Newsletter devoted entirely to the California Condor. Today, with more than 400 condors in the skies over California, Arizona, and northern Baja, it’s hard to imagine the controversy and deep divisions within the ornithological and birding communities caused by the condor recovery program 30 years ago.

    The condor population was falling steadily and had dwindled to 22 birds in the wild. The question that engendered fierce debate was whether, as a last resort, to bring all of those birds into captivity for a captive breeding program in spite of a failed attempt in the 1950s. The National Audubon Society, co-founder with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service of the Condor Research Center, supported the plan. Golden Gate Bird Alliance, the largest NAS chapter, vigorously opposed it.

    California Condor / Photo by Phil Armitage

    Some of the field biologists most familiar with condors believed the experiment would be doomed to failure — the birds were just too fragile. Moreover, if they could be induced to breed in captivity, their every-other-year breeding cycle would not produce enough offspring to make a difference. Dave Desante summarized that view in a closely reasoned article in the Newsletter.

    Meanwhile, experts in breeding birds in captivity at the San Diego Zoo and Los Angeles Zoo believed they could succeed and wanted the chance to prove it. In any case, it was the only chance to save the species. S. Dillon Ripley, then head of the Smithsonian and a respected ornithologist, represented that perspective in an interview I did with him for the Newsletter in which he urged the decision-makers to “take the ultimate risk.”

    PRBO board member Frank Pitelka of UC Berkeley, another leading ornithologist and conservation biologist, argued in the Newsletter that the millions of dollars needed for a risky condor recovery program would be better invested in less expensive efforts to save many other endangered species.…

  • Number-One Killer of Birds is Outdoor Cats

    The following is an Opinion piece published in the San Francisco Chronicle on Tuesday February 5, by Golden Gate Bird Alliance Executive Director Mike Lynes.

    By Mike Lynes

    Everyone knows that cats are hunters. But even wildlife experts were stunned by a new report last week that as many as 3.7 billion birds are killed by outdoor cats in the contiguous United States each year. That’s far more than the 1 billion that previously had been estimated, and more than are killed by any other single source such as collisions or oil spills.

    This peer-reviewed study – by the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service – must serve as a wake-up call to people who care both about cats and about wildlife.

    Domestic cat with a dead AmericanCoot / Photo by Debi Shearwater

    The implication for domestic cats is clear: Owners need to keep them inside.

    This protects not just birds and other wildlife but the cats themselves, keeping them safe from hazards such as traffic, dogs and poison.

    The implication for unowned or feral cats is more complicated. Last week’s study indicated that unowned cats are responsible for the vast majority of bird deaths – 70 percent. Yet policies in cities like San Francisco do little to address the gruesome toll of feral cats on wildlife.

    San Francisco SPCA operates a trap-neuter-release program that stops some feral cats from reproducing but does nothing to stop them from hunting and devouring birds. The city also countenances feral cat feeding colonies, where well-meaning citizens provide food for large numbers of outdoor cats.

    But this study documents that even well-fed cats are killers. Feeding and maintaining large feral cat populations may seem humane for the cats – but it is a death warrant for birds and other wildlife.

    It’s time for San Franciscans and other animal lovers to expand their definition of “humane animal care” to include the needs of wildlife as well as domestic pets.

    We have many opportunities to do so. First, we can strengthen efforts to educate cat owners about keeping their cats indoors and not abandoning them in parks if they need to give them up.

    Second, trap-neuter-return should be scientifically evaluated as a policy – something that has not been done. If it is not shown in peer-reviewed studies to be effective, then it should be discontinued and replaced with other solutions.

    Trap-neuter-return should also be evaluated from an environmental perspective.

    …

  • Central Valley birding – go for the goose!

    Editor’s note: We are nearing the end of peak winter birding season in the Central Valley. If you haven’t been there, now is the time! Golden Gate Bird Alliance board member David Anderson offers some tips and routes.

    By David Anderson

    The sky filled suddenly with a blizzard of snow geese, lifting in waves near and far — ten thousand or more. A thousand undulated in the distance, winging high; a few thousand rose then settled back close by; several thousand more circled restlessly.

    For a while, the horizon filled with their movements, alternating bright flashes of white as they turned in the sun. Then, the various groups landed or headed away to work (foraging the nearby fields). A cacophony of noise – almost hurting our ears – filled the air with the geese.  Ears ringing, eyes wide, I laughed in pure joy. The host of wildlife filling the bright, blue sky was a wonder to behold, a scene of nature’s glory.

    Our viewing platform was in the midst of the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge, part of a system stretching the length of the Central Valley from Redding to Bakersfield. Thirty refuges provide nearly 400,000 acres of wildlife habitat.  California wildlife management areas add almost half a million acres more. The two systems give protection to tremendous numbers of migratory birds coming here for the winter, as well as numerous other wildlife species. These lands offer incredible viewing, especially the areas between Willows and Los Banos.

    Clouds of geese at Sacramento NWR / Photo by David Anderson

    The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last year reported 48.6 million ducks in the U.S. and Canada, the most recorded in the 57 years of surveys! Clearly the breeding conditions were optimal. The estimate was that 5 million ducks would winter in the wetlands of the Central Valley, along with record numbers of geese.  A mid-winter survey shows about 4 million ducks and one and a quarter million geese. That’s a lot of feathers out there.

    We’re reaping the rewards with incredible viewing opportunities, enhanced by long stretches of clear, sunny weather.  Snow Geese, Ross’s Geese, Canada Geese, and White-fronted Geese all appear in big numbers.  Northern Pintails, American Wigeons, Northern Shovelers, and Green-winged Teal are in even larger numbers.

    Colusa NWR

    My favorite birding route from the Bay Area to the Central Valley is I-80 heading east past Vacaville, then I-505 across to I-5 near Dunnigan.  …

  • Good news for birds at the Altamont wind farm

    By Mike Lynes

    Our years of advocacy on behalf of raptors at the Altamont Pass wind farm are paying off — with a dramatic reduction in bird mortality there.

    Deaths of four key raptor species from Altamont wind turbines dropped by an estimated 50 percent between 2005 and 2010, according to the independent scientific review committee charged with monitoring bird mortality there.

    The estimated number of Golden Eagles killed by turbines each year fell from 58 to 33, Burrowing Owls from 543 to 233, American Kestrels from 415 to 268, and Red-tailed Hawks from 196 to 85, according to a report accepted last month by the Scientific Review Committee of the Alameda County Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area (APWRA).

    These figures are rough estimates: It’s exceedingly difficult to track exact numbers of bird deaths on the sprawling Altamont Pass. And while the data indicate a decline in risks to birds, we know bird injuries and deaths are likely to always result from wind turbine operations.

    But the findings are still very good news. They show that with careful siting and design, it’s possible to significantly reduce the risk to birds from wind turbines.

    Golden Eagle / Photo by Davor Desancic, http://www.flickr.com/photos/ddsimages/

    The results also show the positive impact that Audubon activists can have in speaking up and pressuring wind companies to protect birds.

    The roots of this good-news story go back more than a decade, to when we at Golden Gate Bird Alliance joined other Bay Area chapters including Santa Clara Valley, Ohlone, Marin and Mt. Diablo Audubon to advocate for birds and other wildlife at the Altamont Pass. (Other conservation groups such as the Center for Biological Diversity have also stood up for birds at Altamont.)

    The oldest wind farm in the country, Altamont had about 5,000 turbines in the area bordering Alameda and Contra Costa counties. Researchers estimated that thousands of birds – some migrants, some year-round residents – were dying from collisions with wind towers and blades.

    Altamont wind turbines / Photo by Elizabeth Pepin/KQED

    In 2004, we and our partners sued Alameda County for reissuing wind turbine permits in the APWRA without conducting any environmental review. The settlement of our suit required a 50 percent reduction in bird mortality by 2009, removal of certain high-risk turbines, and development of a comprehensive conservation plan.

    In 2010, when it became clear that the 50 percent reduction had not been reached, we pursued further negotiations with NextEra Inc.,…