By Bob Lewis

(Note: Bob will present slides and describe the wildlife of Madagascar on June 21 at our monthly Speaker Series in Berkeley.)

I went to Madagascar in October 2011 with Oryx, a South African photo tour company.  I wanted to photograph some of the endemic families of birds on this fourth-largest island, and experience Madagascar’s other natural wonders.  Madagascar has been separated from other land masses for about 80 million years, and evolution has progressed on the island in a unique way – it has all the world’s lemurs, half the world’s chameleons, and is home to six families of birds found nowhere else.

Lemur ancestors came to Madagascar about 50 million years ago, and flourished since they have little competition or predation on the island.  There are about 70 species, and they exist only on Madagascar.  This Ring-tailed Lemur travels in small groups, and young are carried for several months.  Most lemurs are arboreal.  These were common near our lodge in the spiny forest of the south.

Ring-tailed Lemurs / Photo by Bob Lewis

Chameleons are hard to spot, blending into the green and brown of the forest.  This Parson’s Chameleon is about a foot long, moves slowly, and like the lemurs, lives in the trees.  The exotic pet trade threatens these creatures.

Parson's Chameleon / Photo by Bob Lewis

Vangas are one of the families of birds found only on Madagascar.  Their ancestors probably came from Africa, and over time evolved into over a dozen different species, each adapted to a different habitat.  This Sickle-billed Vanga nests high in large trees, and probes cracks and holes in the trunks for spiders and lizards.  Forests on Madagascar are threatened due to the use of charcoal as fuel, and most of the forested area is found around the edge of the island.  The higher, cooler central plateau has been converted to rice paddies and brick quarries, feeding and housing 22 million people.

Sickle-billed Vangas / Photo by Bob Lewis

Even with so much habitat lost, Madagascar still holds one of the most diverse, unique and fascinating collection of creatures in the world.

For more images and stories of cool critters from this distinct ecosystem, come join us on Thursday June 21st in Berkeley, right after Golden Gate Bird Alliance’s Annual Meeting.

Magical Madagascar presentation:

Date:   Thursday June 21

Time:   6:30 for Annual Meeting & refreshments

            7:30 for Bob’s presentation on Magical Madagascar

Place:  Northbrae Community Church, 941 the Alameda in North Berkeley

             (between Solano & Marin)

Cost:   Free for GGBA members, $5 for non-members

 

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By Janet Byron

Yes! At least three pairs of Western Bluebirds are currently nesting in Berkeley, to the surprise and delight of local bluebird lovers.

Berkeley birder and Golden Gate Bird Alliance birding instructor Rusty Scalf first discovered a pair of Western Bluebirds nesting in San Pablo Park, in West Berkeley, in spring 2008.

“I was stunned,” said Scalf, who in decades of California birding had seen numerous bluebirds in wild meadows and on rural fence posts, but never in urban areas. “The assumption has always been that bluebirds cannot coexist with urban House Sparrows and Starlings, as both compete for next cavities.”

This year, the San Pablo Park pair took up residence on the park’s south side, in a box built by Scalf and placed by the Berkeley Department of Parks in a sycamore tree near Russell Street. The pair had a setback earlier this spring when a House Sparrow destroyed their first clutch, but they moved to a box on San Pablo Park’s north side and are now feeding another clutch of babies.

Bluebird near Milvia & Derby Street nest box / Photo by Elaine Miller Bond

The second pair moved into a box on a Monterey pine at the corner of Derby and Milvia Streets, also built and placed by Scalf with the blessing of the director of the King Child Development Center. Scalf was tipped off to this pair by birder Joe Eaton, who spotted them foraging around the Berkeley Unified School District playing field nearby this past winter. The young fledged on May 30 or 31 but are still spending time near the nest box.

The Derby/Milvia pair has routinely attracted small groups of fans during busy Tuesday farmers’ markets; the birds don’t seem to mind crowds in the slightest.

The third pair is nesting in a box on the Albany/Berkeley border along a restored section of Codornices Creek between 6^th and 8^th streets near U.C.’s Albany Village.  Members of the Codornices Creek Watershed Council built and installed four bluebird boxes at the site in March.

A pair that nested in a woodpecker hole along Parker Street last year did not return this spring, Scalf noted.

“My hope is that Western Bluebirds can take hold and maintain an urban population in Berkeley,” Scalf said.  “What a wonderful addition they are!”

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Janet Byron is managing editor of the University of California’s California Agriculture journal.…

By Ilana DeBare

We’re sadly accustomed to stories of environmental tragedy – dying coral reefs, melting ice caps, rivers with no salmon. Shouldn’t we also highlight stories of conservation success, where species are brought back from the brink of extinction?

That was Robbie Brandwynne’s idea when she decided to organize Celebration, an art exhibit on display through Aug. 31 at the Environmental Education Center in Tilden Park.

The exhibit features works by 60 artists depicting birds, animals and plants that faced extinction but have at least partially recovered.

Peregrine and Prairie Falcons. California Clapper Rails. Golden Eagles, Bald Eagles, Belding’s Savannah Sparrows and more…

Prairie Falcon by Barbara Stikker

Some but not all of the works are accompanied  by short explanations of the species’ threat and revival. A note alongside Barbara Stikker’s striking linoleum reduction print of a Prairie Falcon notes that in 1977, when it was listed as a federal species of concern, there were only 300 to 500 pairs left in California.

Today the population has stabilized at more than 5,000 pairs, thanks in part to the use of fallow and flooded rice fields as bird habitat in the Central Valley.

Several of the species in the show owe their survival to a single environmental initiative — the banning of DDT in 1972. The ubiquitous pesticide made Bald Eagle eggs so brittle that they couldn’t withstand the weight of a brooding adult. Listed as endangered in 1967, Bald Eagles were removed from that list in 1995 and then removed from the list of threatened species as well in 2007. Similarly, Brown Pelicans had been listed as threatened in 1970 but, once DDT was banned, they recovered enough to be delisted in 1988.

It was a newspaper photo about the delisting of the Brown Pelican that initially inspired Brandwynne, a retired psychotherapist and medical researcher who currently quilts and paints watercolors.

“That photo meant something to me, and an idea began to grow,” said Brandwynne, an Oakland resident. “People don’t hear enough of the good news in general, and we hear way too little of the good news about conservation. That message — the pelican portrait — means that conservation and restoration really do work when adequately funded and implemented.”

One of the most interesting features of the exhibit is the way multiple artists depict the same species. Some are as detailed and naturalistic as images from a field guide; others are more abstract and stylized.…

By Jack Dumbacher

By now, most of the birds that summer in the Bay Area have settled into their new territories and are well on their way to producing this year’s family of nestlings.  The warblers, orioles, tanagers, and vireos are singing and defending their territories – often the same territories where they nested last year or will nest next year.  Likewise, many of our winter migrants are long gone, and probably already settled in their summer homes.

These long-distance migratory movements have long fascinated ornithologists, with the primary question: How do the birds find their way?

Decades of research have shown that birds use a variety of information including visual landmarks such as coastlines, rivers, stars and sun-angle.  Even odors have been shown to be important for homing pigeons.  But one of the most peculiar and interesting of all migratory aids is magnetic orientation.

Birds appear to have a magnetic sense.

Range map of Dunlins, from The Sibley Guide to Birds of Western North America. The Dunlins that winter in the Bay Area (blue) migrate long distances to summer breeding sites (goldenrod) in Alaska.

Avian magnetic sense was first demonstrated in the 1960s by Friedrich Merkel, Wolfgang Wiltschko and colleagues in Germany using caged birds in altered magnetic fields.  Birds adjusted their orientation when the magnetic field was altered.  This was a stunning and unexpected result – so much so that many other researchers sought to test the effect using magnets strapped to the backs of birds, and even created bird backpacks that induced magnetic fields using coils of wire with electrical currents (called Helmholtz coils).

More and more researchers showed that birds respond to magnetic fields, often in predictable and useful ways.  It’s now clear that birds can use this sense to orient to the earth’s magnetic field during migration.

The earth’s magnetic field contains a great amount of geographic information.  For example, the direction of the field lines identifies the north-south azimuth, and the polarity of the magnetic field lines identifies which direction is north and which is south.  The inclination (whether the field is level, pointed down, or up) can provide information about latitude.  The strength of the magnetic field also provides information about latitude, as the field is stronger near the poles than at the equator.  Local variations in the field could even be used as local magnetic “landmarks” for navigation.

But these are weak and subtle forces – can birds really use all of this information?…

By Janet Byron

Northern Shovelers are common in the Bay Area in winter months. But breeding season is another matter – so it was exciting news when a female Northern Shoveler and babies were recently spotted in Alameda County.

Golden Gate Bird Alliance board member Bob Lewis photographed the Shoveler with two ducklings on May 20 at Coyote Hills Regional Park in Fremont.

“The recently issued Alameda County Breeding Bird Atlas states the only confirmed record for the county was Hayward Marsh,” Lewis noted. “Time has gone on, and there may be others now. These birds were on the north side of the large pond across from the last parking area at Coyote Hills.”

Another birder, Jerry Ting, reported seeing the female Northern Shoveler with seven babies at the same spot in Coyote Hills a week earlier. He guessed that a pair of Northern Harriers nesting nearby may have taken the other ducklings.

The Northern Shoveler is a spoon-billed dabbling duck that breeds in freshwater and brackish ponds. While they are abundant on San Francisco Bay in winter months, especially in Santa Clara County and the South Bay, few have historically remained to breed. The Northern Shoveler’s breeding grounds include Alaska, southeastern Canada and the United States from northeastern California to southern Minnesota.

The only confirmed record in Contra Costa County was at McNabney Marsh in 1995. One was confirmed breeding in Marin County at Las Gallinas sewer pond in 1985, and they are spotted breeding occasionally in Santa Clara County.

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