By Steve and Carol Lombardi
In April, we joined five other Golden Gate Bird Alliance members on a nine-day birding adventure to the South Texas coast and the lower Rio Grande Valley. Eddie Bartley and Noreen Weeden of NatureTrip, both longtime GGBA members, were our excellent, well-organized guides.
The South Texas coast is a top birding destination in the spring because of the migrant “fall-out” – tens of thousands of birds descending for rest and food after their long flight north over the waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
Highlights of the trip included

• 222 species on our list. Lots of warblers and other neotropical migrants, helped in part by the migrant fall-out at South Padre Island: One of those “Over here! Over there! And over there!” mornings.
• Thirty different spots visited, including state parks, roadside rests, beach towns, and wildlife refuges. We traversed the southeast corner of the state, starting in Corpus Christie, going south to the South Padre Island/Brownsville area, up the Rio Grande Valley as far as McAllen, and back to Corpus.
• Nine days of good accommodations, including five very nice 3-star hotels and a bunch of very, very good meals—yes, even vegetarian!
• Good weather (for the humans). The area can be uncomfortably hot this time of year. Instead, we had cold fronts, which kept the daytime weather temperate and cloudy and contributed to the fall-outs we witnessed.

The gulf coast is definitely a tourist destination, as is apparent from the architecture. But they also take their birding seriously. Local conservation groups have purchased woodlots and marshes in the middle of neighborhoods to protect them from development and provide habitat. Result: Great birding with on-street parking.
This spiffy natural habitat—created
within the residential area—also wins the Most Adjectives In A Plaque Award.
We spent our first day of the trip in and around Port Aransas, across the bay from Corpus Christie on Mustang Island. We were treated to great close-up views of migrating shorebirds on the beaches and neotropical migrants in the nearby woodlots. As Californians, we were pretty well bundled up against the expected bugs. So we were bemused (well, shocked, really) to see many of the local folks out birding in shorts, t-shirts, and flip-flops. We hit half a dozen well-known spots in this area and—among other lessons—grasped the difference between Laughing and Franklin’s Gulls.
After a rain delay that forced us to kill some time in a German bakery (oh, woe is us), we headed south toward Brownsville and South Padre Island, where we spent three nights.…

By Maureen Lahiff and Linda Carloni

Migration is always a natural wonder, whether of songbirds or Monarch butterflies or herds of caribou, but shorebird migration, following patterns from the Pleistocene, is truly an event to be noticed and treasured.

Now there’s even a special day to celebrate it – World Shorebirds Day, September 6, with global shorebird counts on the weekend of September 5-6!

First observed in 2014, World Shorebirds Day aims to raise global awareness of shorebirds and the challenges they face from loss of wetlands. It was founded by György Szimuly, also known as Szimi. He’s Hungarian, so he’s travelled to pursue his passion; he now lives in England. For more information, and some great photos and art, go to the website worldshorebirdsday.wordpress.com/.

San Francisco Bay is crucial for shorebirds

Even though more than 90 percent of San Francisco Bay’s original wetlands have been lost or seriously degraded by urban development, over 1 million shorebirds visit the Bay each year.

Dunlins in flight / Photo by Doug Mosher

The Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network has designated San Francisco Bay as a Site of Hemispheric Importance – the network’s highest ranking of importance. According to the Southern Pacific Shorebird Conservation Plan (2003), the Bay Area holds higher proportions of the total wintering and migrating shorebirds on the U.S. Pacific coast than any other wetland.   For 11 species, over half of the individual shorebirds counted on the Pacific Coast in a given season are found here. (That season is most often winter or fall, sometimes both.)

According to the conservation plan, there are 13 species for which the Bay shoreline is critical: Black-bellied Plover, Snowy Plover, Semipalmated Plover, Black Oystercatcher, American Avocet, Willet, Long-billed Curlew, Marbled Godwit, Black Turnstone, Western Sandpiper, Dunlin, Short-billed Dowitcher, and Red-necked Phalarope..

What is a shorebird, anyway?

Not all birds we see on the shore are classified as shorebirds for conservation and monitoring purposes. Gulls, for instance, are not considered shorebirds. One good description of a shorebird is a bird that feeds in wetlands by probing with its bill or picking up food from the surface. Many shorebirds such as curlews nest inland. Some sandpipers like Mountain Plovers are grassland birds — “grasspipers,” as Kevin McGowan of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology calls them. Not all shorebirds are limited to winter visits: Small numbers of Black-necked Stilts, American Avocets, Black Oystercatchers and threatened Western Snowy Plovers are here year round, though they can be difficult to find.…

By Ilana DeBare
They started out as boring, nondescript, too-often-ignored trash cans.
But now they are bright spots of bird art in downtown Oakland!
A neighborhood group in Old Oakland is in the middle of a campaign to spruce up their street-corner garbage cans with mosaics featuring Bay Area birds.
So far, artist Juan Lopez of New World Mosaics has created images of Great Blue Herons, Western Tanagers, hummingbirds, California Quail, and Great Horned Owls, while neighborhood residents created a Picasso-style peace dove.
The mosaic project was designed partly to give people a bright, hard-to-miss reminder about where to put their trash.
“Those cans have been there since the 1950s,” said Tiffany Eng, a member of Old Oakland Neighbors who helped start the project. “They’re so ugly, so ubiquitous, and people don’t use them. The idea is if people see them, they will use them.”
Great Blue Heron can
Before and after view of California Quail trash can / Photo by Old Oakland Neighbors
An additional goal was to build community and memorialize a corner where, several years ago, there had been a shooting. Old Oakland is the section of the city between downtown and I-880, known for its beautifully restored Victorians.
“There was a pretty violent shooting and we wanted to create a peace dove,” Eng said. “We wanted to do something iconic and came up with using the birds of Oakland and the Bay Area. We liked the idea of transformation since this is a neighborhood in transformation. We’ve got Swan’s Marketplace [a restored food emporium], which is an ugly duckling turned swan.”
Artist Juan Lopez at work / Photo by Old Oakland Neighbors
Western Tanager can / Photo by Old Oakland Neighbors
The group raised several thousand dollars for the initial mosaics from the Alameda County Clean Water Program, the City of Oakland’s graffiti abatement program, and Eng’s employer, Capital Impact Partners. They have enough money so far to do six or eight cans, and hope to complete a total of 17 through individual donations to a crowdfunding campaign.
Which birds are next? Organizers are taking suggestions, but some likely candidates are Black-crowned Night-Herons (the focus of Golden Gate Bird Alliance’s recent educational campaign and art flash mob), Snowy Egrets, and Western Bluebirds.
They’re also seeking suggestions for a suitable bird for a trash can near the Mexicali Rose restaurant. Got any ideas for a colorful bird that loves rose bushes?…

By Richard Neidhardt
The California Condor and support for its recovery at Pinnacles National Park have captured much of my time over the last 5½ years.
This blog tells you a bit about my personal experiences with the condors of the Central California flock, a group of about 70 wild birds that make their home in the mountainous range between Big Sur and the San Joaquin Valley.

About the California Condor

When put into context, the California Condor tale is a success story. Condors have been in North America since pre-history and were first recorded in Monterey in 1604. But by 1982, due to human interference with nature, only 22 California Condors remained in the wild. In 1984, the federal government joined with many private groups in a massive initiative to save the condor from extinction through protective breeding practices.
Today, about 400 California Condors are alive, with over half of them living in the wild in Southern California, Baja Mexico, Central California, and Arizona/Utah.
Condor in flight over Pinnacles National Park /
Photo by Sara Bartels
While this is great news, the California Condor remains a highly endangered species. The stark truth is that without help from mankind to repair past damage, address current threats like the use of lead ammunition, and provide vigilant monitoring and support, this awesome icon – the largest bird in North America – is unlikely to fully recover the strength to become a self-sufficient species.

Life as a Condor Recovery Program Volunteer at Pinnacles NP

This is where I come into the story.
In 2010, as a novice to condors, I began to volunteer with Pinnacles’ Condor Recovery Program. Since then I have been amazed, inspired, and challenged by the unceasing dedication of those working to help the condor sustain success in its wild habitat. As my awareness of the condor’s challenges has grown, I have witnessed challenges to this support program also emerge.
In 2013 Pinnacles National Monument became Pinnacles National Park. This brought national attention to Pinnacles and attracted a massive influx of new park visitors. Seeing the strains and challenges associated with this growth in park attendance, I extended my personal in-park efforts and began to raise funds for the Pinnacles Condor Recovery program. This led to my co-founding the Pinnacles Condor Fund in 2013. Today, this special interest fund is administered by the park’s friend’s group Pinnacles Partnership (PiPa).
Condors are a huge part of my life.…

By Anthony DeCicco
Success! Pure thrilling success. I screamed “Yes!” this spring when I first saw a pair of adult Western Bluebirds entering the nest boxes made by third-grade students at Lake Elementary School in the North Richmond area.
Over the past couple of years, we’ve added a Bird-Friendly Schools component to our award-winning Eco-Education program. As part of that, the Lake Elementary students and I had determined that their grassy field would be an ideal Western Bluebird habitat. (We had help from Golden Gate Bird Alliance bluebird maven Rusty Scalf.)
The Lake third graders built the nest boxes last year, and this spring we attached them to the chain-link fence along the kids’ playing field. At nearby Montalvin Elementary, we did the same with our fourth-grade Eco-Ed classes.
I was a “nest box newbie” and had never thought about the challenges involved in producing a brood of chicks. The day after that thrilling moment of first seeing the pair, reality struck. “Okay, they like the nest box… now what?”
Building nest boxes / Photo by Anthony DeCicco
Eco-ed students with their completed nest box / Photo by Anthony DeCicco
I obsessively consulted various books and websites. It seemed that the more I knew, the more anxiety-ridden I became. I desperately wanted that pair to raise successful chicks so that the kids could marvel over the new life they helped foster. But my goodness, how many factors could ruin that wonderful vision: raccoons, opossums, snakes, cats, starlings, House Sparrows, House Wrens, wasps, ants, black flies, rats – aughhh!!
I had done enough research to know that the 10-foot-long metal pole to which we attached the boxes would eliminate most of the predators. But no resource could advise on how to deal with pesky second-grade boys (not in our Eco-Education program!) opening the boxes, shaking the poles, or throwing rocks in the entry hole. I opted to screw all sides of the nest boxes shut, which forced me to monitor the progress of the nesting pair though observation from a distance with optics rather than quickly lifting a side. But whatever it took was fine. I wanted chicks to hatch and fledge!
The North American Bluebird Society suggests monitoring an active nest box at least once a week. If you don’t see either parent, they recommend observing the site for at least 30 minutes, sometimes one hour. And so I did for the next several weeks amidst groups of curious kids on their recess, who came up to ask what I was doing with the binoculars and scope.…