Anodyne

February Bird Banding

2010-02-26T21:29:00.000-08:00

It was wet and muddy.
Lincoln's Sparrow

Female Ruby-crowned Kinglet
The gophers were out.

Fox Sparrow, thinking.

The secret orange feathers on the crown of a Cassin's Kingbird.

Late January Banding 2010

2010-01-31T15:34:00.000-08:00

It was cold on Saturday - at least for Southern California. We've had a lot of rain lately, so the canyon is getting green.
And the wildflowers are starting to bloom.

Bad focus on the lupine, but it is such a lovely flower I wanted to include it.

Lots of Anna's hummingbirds and Hermit Thrushes, but these two were the highlights for me:

Ruby-crowned Kinglet

And the always saucy Spotted Towhee

January 2010 Banding

2010-01-03T21:01:00.001-08:00

It was one of those kind of winter days in Southern California, when it is so patently obvious why one would chose to live here.

We only netted 20 birds; the Audubon's Warbler was the majority of them.
I was so happy to be back banding - walking the trails, being outside, listening to the birds - that I forgot to take photos. It had been a long absence due to work and the holidays. More in a few weeks, barring unforeseen circumstances.

Early October Bird Banding

2009-10-03T16:17:00.000-07:00

It was clear and hot this morning in Zuma Canyon. We caught some uncommon birds and then we caught a new species, which had never been netted at the station before. This was along with the normal slew of Bewick's Wrens, Wrentits and Bushtits.

First the uncommon ones. A Western Wood-Pewee. It snapped its bill at me as I got it out of the net, a common characteristic of all the flycatchers I have banded.
A Purple Finch, which bit me as I untangled it. Nice bird.
An Ash-Throated Flycatcher. Again, she was a bill-snapper. I managed to avoid getting any skin caught, though.

Cassin's Kingbird - a new species for the banding station.

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 07

2009-08-17T21:37:00.000-07:00

Cooney
So, we slept peacefully at Cold Springs Campground in Mineral King, Sequoia National Park. Next morning we got up when we wanted and proceeded at a leisurely pace to get ourselves together for our hike to the Cooney Fire. This was my only backcountry fire of the season. I tried to pack light and so did Bob, but there is only so much you can do when you have all the work gear (clipboard, Cruiser’s Crutch, Fox Pro digital caller, GPS unit, compass, binoculars, lots of paperwork) and have to carry a bear canister. It isn’t light backpacking. Bob opted to leave his car near the ranger station, where there was potentially less of a marmot risk. He dropped me off at the trailhead with the packs and I waited for his return.

What the marmots make people do. The rodents chew on car parts.
This is the view of where we are going from the trailhead. We are climbing over the top of that snowy saddle - Farewell Gap - in the distance. It's almost dead center in the frame.
We hauled ourselves upward for 6 miles, over Farewell Gap and into the Golden Trout Wilderness.

Almost to the Gap ...
Looking back northeast towards the Great Western Divide
Finally there. That's a signpost on the left.

The other side looking roughly southeast - Golden Trout Wilderness.
We decided to camp at Bullion Flat in a copse of Foxtail Pines, two miles short of the Cooney Fire. We did this for two reasons: 1) I recalled from last year’s trip that it’s steep around the fire and there aren’t any good spots to camp 2) Bob and I were tired of humping the packs. We preferred to get up much earlier and hike the rest of the way with only our daypacks. I told Bob I would do the farther reaches of the Cooney Fire so it was going to be a lot of hiking for me.

As we whiled away the afternoon at about 9200 ft., I ended up wearing all the clothes I had because it was so windy. Bob asked if I heard a helicopter and I said yes. A bit later, I looked up from my book and realized that there was a plume of smoke in the distance, right near where Cooney was. Now we had an explanation for the helicopter; most likely, it was dumping water or flame retardant. To our dismay, it looked like the new fire might affect our survey plans. We decided the only thing we could do was get up at 4:15 a.m. as planned, hike closer and assess the situation then.

Smoke from a new fire. I knew Cooney was back in that valley, too.
There were a lot of marmots around, so we had to hook our backpacks up on trees. Marmots gnaw on sweat-soaked straps to get the delicious salt. I realized that I would have to break down my tent before we left in the morning, or I would risk a marmot gnawing it. (Last year at the Cold Springs Campground I had surprised a deer industriously licking the very same tent, so didn’t want to take any chances.). Bob had left his tent behind because he didn’t want to carry it. Sans tent, he said there were rodents running over him all night. When he said that I remembered that at sunset, I had seen a mysterious creature climbing up the side of my tent. I can’t remember what it looked like now, but it seemed to be the size of a mouse. Glad I had my tent, even though it meant I had to get up even earlier.

At 4:30 a.m. I found myself faced with the beginning of a tiring day. To start, there was a stream crossing; we had camped across it and now it was time to go back over it to get to the trail. I was frazzled from a sleepless night and almost lost it at the stream (incidentally, a source of the Kern River). I didn’t like Bob’s choice of crossing point so wandered to find my own and discovered I was completely incapable of assessing the situation and making a decision. So, I went back to Bob’s crossing and did the requisite contortions to make it across. I almost fell in, though.

In the first light of morning we could see the smoke had settled into a flat ceiling over our destination.
After we had hiked about 35 minutes, we saw flames. Bright orange-red, glowing flames. Based on the maps we had and my knowledge from last year’s survey, we placed the new fire at the southern edge of the Cooney Fire. Neither of us were comfortable with this (most especially me – my part of the survey was at that edge), so we headed back to pack up camp and leave. Defeated by Mother Nature! We had lugged all our stuff in for no reason.

On the way back up ... I was cold and couldn't wait to hit the sun.
All the uphill was in the first hour, after that it was a slow, steady downhill. We were out by 9.30 a.m. and got back to Bob’s in Lotus by 4:00 p.m. This is when Bob told me that we had driven 1300 miles. And we still had four more days to go!

When we talked to Rodney he had found out from the Forest Service that the fire had been started by a lightning strike and was where Shotgun Creek hits the Little Kern – exactly where we thought. Apparently it was a very small fire (which made me feel wimpy) called Shotgun. But, fire is one thing that terrifies me (what a terrible way to go!), so I had no regrets about walking away.

Angora & Gondola
Next, we were off to Lake Tahoe to survey two fires, Angora and Gondola. The weather was opposite of the last time we were there. It was sunny and 85 degrees – unusually hot. We stayed with Abbie again. She very kindly let us stay with her and Dylan, her dog. Dylan is the most adorable dog I have ever met. I entertained thoughts of dognapping. He is so devoted to Abbie, though, he would probably never get over it.
Abbie works for the Forest Service in the Tahoe Basin, so was helpful at telling us the easiest access to our fires. Angora was the first. It’s a recent fire, was huge and actually burned down some houses. It was crawling with Black-backed Woodpeckers. Never have I surveyed a fire in which you pretty much detected woodpeckers all morning - at points, in between points, and again walking back from the survey. I had a rough morning – mentally foggy, problems with equipment (which almost killed the whole morning’s survey) – so it was great to get so many detections. I was also rewarded with a pair of Great Horned Owls. It got very hot, too, which added to the stress of the morning. Sweat was pouring down my back.

Beautiful wildflowers bloom for years after fires.
The next day we did Gondola. I had only one woodpecker at Gondola, but Bob had some at all points but one. I think my digital caller was acting up; it didn’t seem to be loud enough, even though I had put fresh batteries in it the day before. The fire was on a ski slope high above Lake Tahoe.

Sunrise looking east over the Carson Valley (towards Nevada).
The fire was a pain to get to and survey (straight uphill, super-steep terrain covered with brush and downed logs) but had gorgeous views. Those steep slopes gave me one blister of a big toe.

Precipitous. I had to remind myself not to slip.

Lake Tahoe from Gondola Fire

Fall
We returned to Lotus to a searing 100 degrees and decided to stay at Bob’s and wait out the heat. We arrived just before sunset to our last fire, the Fall Fire. It was another, like Freds, that turned out to be full of private property holdings. In fact, most of it was private property, and it had signs of active logging. Once we figured out the small area we could survey we pulled off the road, ate dinner, drank a beer, set up camp and crashed. This was the best night’s sleep I have ever gotten in the woods. Perhaps because it was my last night and I knew I would be going home to Mark? Perhaps because I went to bed later (9:45 p.m.) than usual? The survey the next morning was uninspiring. I could hear the logging going on and the noise was coming from where Bob was. He said it was hard to hear during his survey. Fall was a sour note to end on (no birds, the forest was clear cut in areas), but I mostly forget about it and remember the last days at Tahoe, where I had woodpeckers galore.

Flying home and seeing the Carrizo Plain/Soda Lake. The San Andreas Fault is down there, too.

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 06

2009-07-30T15:33:00.000-07:00

Back to looking for woodpeckers. Bob arrived early at the Fresno airport Monday morning June 22nd, and so did I, a shared trait that makes our work together agreeable.

This is what all my stuff looked like while waiting in the Hertz parking lot.
He warned me that the day – actually the week – would involve a lot of driving. Well, I had already driven over a thousand miles, so what were more?

We drove through the flat farmland of the Central Valley to Cedar Grove in Kings Canyon National Park. We were going to Cedar Grove to pick up Alan, a Park Flight intern from Mexico, who was going to observe Bob do the Breeding Bird Surveys (BBS). I was also along to help Bob with this. There were parts of Sequoia/Kings Canyon National Parks (SEKI) I had never been to in the summer and I relished the chance to spend time there. Once we got to Cedar Grove it took two hours to find Alan. When we found him we had to rush off to get the BBS paperwork, then figure out the route by driving it. To do this, we drove almost the whole way up to Mineral King and then back out to check the stopping points. The road to Mineral King is a twisting, sometimes disintegrating piece of asphalt that that climbs 3000 feet; you travel from dry scrub up through Sierra Mixed Conifer and Sequoia habitat. It’s 25 miles in 1 ½ hours. Once we drove the BBS route, we went almost the whole way back up the 25 miles to camp at Atwell Mills. It was dark by then. Alan slept on top of a sequoia stump. No sleeping bag, no tent. I was impressed. I slept at the base of one. I had forgotten how majestic sequoias are. You definitely feel you are in the presence of something great.

Giant Sequoia

The well-traveled route for Monday-Tuesday. A is the Fresno Airport, B is Cedar Grove. C is Mineral King (Atwell Mills is about 5 miles short of Mineral King). We went back and forth between B & C.

View Larger Map

Breeding Bird Survey
Tuesday morning we were up at 5 a.m. to start the BBS route. We were out of the car every half mile. I would take a GPS reading and notes on relevant geographical features that would help next year’s surveyor identify the point. For five minutes, Bob documented all the birds he heard or saw. Alan was there to see how it was all done, and to get practice identifying birds by ear. We did 50 points - 25 miles - which took us to 10:15 a.m. Highlights were hearing a Spotted Owl and a Rufous-crowned Sparrow. Then we had some lunch and returned to Cedar Grove, a 3 ½ hour drive. On the way, we scouted out the next day’s BBS route. That night we stayed in Alan’s National Park housing, with a roof over our heads. We all slept in the same room, with Bob and I on the floor. Alan chivalrously offered up his bed to me, but I declined. I didn’t want to put the man out of his own bed.

Next day we repeated the BBS routine. Though, we had to get up at 4 a.m. (instead of the 5 a.m. of the previous day) because we could not sleep close to our start point. The road we traveled steeply declined into Kings Canyon towards Cedar Grove (our stopping point).

Bob looking over Kings Canyon into the wilderness.

Often there was no shoulder - the road plunged down into the canyon on one side, and there was a rock wall on the other.

Hello, rock wall.
We had carefully noted where all the turnouts were when we scouted it the previous day. So, we shot for every half mile unless there was really no place to pull the truck over. I think this only happened twice; there were that many turnouts along the 25-mile route. Once we got close to the Kings River we often couldn’t hear any birds; the river was that loud.

Kings River

After a chilly morning, the sun finally almost getting to us.

Dead bat along the route.

Once we finished, Bob and I had to get back to Mineral King to camp because we were to leave the following morning on a backcountry trip to a fire. We left Cedar Grove at 10:30 a.m. and got to the Cold Springs Campground in Mineral King at 3:30. We stopped for lunch and at a grocery store, but the rest was all driving. I took a small nature hike and a bath in the Kaweah.

Sawtooth Peak when nature hiking.
We ended up with a sweet campsite, that had Red-breasted Sapsuckers, Wilson’s Warblers and Fox Sparrows singing in it.

View from campsite.
Bob slept on top of this rock on the right.

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 05

2009-07-30T12:01:00.001-07:00

I left you at the Golden Gate Bridge.

Pinnacles National Monument
My plan for the day was to continue south to Pinnacles National Monument. I got there around 1:00 p.m. and it, too, was crowded because of Father’s Day weekend. I wanted to get away from the hoi polloi, so picked a hike I thought might be less populated. It was incredibly hot (the opposite of Point Reyes’ windy cool), so I planned a short one. There were plenty of people at the start, but they thinned out as I kept going and going and going. I had meant to keep it short, but I was enthralled. Pinnacles was an amazing place. The reddish rocks were beautiful and jutted out in incredible volcanic formations.

The Pinnacles.

This volcanic breccia matches rocks from near Lancaster, CA, 195 miles to the south, and geologists were stumped until the theory of plate tectonics was developed. Pinnacles is sliding north on the Pacific Plate along the San Andreas Fault. My one-hour hike turned into four, but was worth it. I saw some beautiful landscapes, as well as a Prairie Falcon. And, the last few hours I barely saw anyone. Probably because it was infernally hot and no one was stupid enough to be out! I managed to stay comfortable by drinking a lot of water; it was easy to refill at the rangers stations and I had an extra bottle for safety. Another great thing about Pinnacles was its manageable size; it was a place a human could wrap her head around. I bet you could hike the entire park in a day. Also, there were “caves” to hike through, which were refreshingly cool.

Entrance to Balconies Cave.

People in front of me at Balconies Cave.

They aren't really caves. They are enclosures made by talus.

View up a canyon.

Can you say Poison Oak? It was everywhere.
The steep section of my climb. I was glad for the steps and rails.

Sometimes it was a narrow squeeze.
When I left at 6 p.m. my mission was to find a place to stay for the night. I wanted to get to a motel near the Fresno airport, where I had to meet Bob at 8 a.m. Monday. I had budgeted for a room because I wanted to have a decent night of rest before I went out in the field again.

Heading East
I took a quiet county road towards Fresno. There was a place called Mercey Hot Springs on my map, and, if I wasn’t too tired, I was going to stop and see what it was like. I was getting tired, though, so doubted I’d stay. I made the left turn to the springs; it was in the middle of a desolate nowhere, and I almost missed it. The guy at registration barely looked me in the eye as I peppered him with questions. This was kind of creepy. He spoke with an Eastern European accent. It didn’t seem like there were a lot of people around either, all of which led me to play out every horror movie scenario I had ever seen. There was some noise from a house on the property – obviously where the family who owned the place lived. The clerk showed me around as the day sweltered to an end; I wanted to have a look before I committed myself to my fate. It was quaintly shabby, yet all the bathing areas looked spotless. I could get a cute, stand-alone cabin (bed!) for a price I was willing to pay. And, there was a pool and individual tubs and a sauna. My aching body was up for that. Plus, it was getting late and sunset was coming. I was tired, and the dark county road drive and airport hotel waiting at the end of it became increasingly unappealing. Perhaps the house was full of a slew of blood-sucking Transylvanian relatives that would soon be out (the sun was setting!), but I tamped down my overactive imagination and handed over my credit card.

It was all great, though. I repacked. I had sprawled all over the car, so this took a while. I ate. The sun set, the heat dissipated and it became gentle and still, the encroaching dark enticing many animals to stir. I filled up one of the tubs – I had the whole area to myself –and laid back to enjoy the dusk and the brightening stars. A Great Horned Owl flew over and I saw lots of hopping rabbits. (Their death by owl talons perhaps the only blood-letting that happened that evening.) At first the water seemed too cool, but then I realized it was the perfect temperature; I did not feel hot or cold, but was in a lovely equilibrium, floating in a haze of liquid warmth.

Registration and warnings.

The cabin.

The tubs.

Mineral water makes my wedding band turn gold. It's almost like the real thing.

The next morning I drove the 1 ½ hours to Fresno to meet Bob. He was early, so was I. Ten more days to go!

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 04

2009-07-28T17:57:00.001-07:00

I wake up Saturday north of San Francisco and I have two days to myself, two days to wander before I had to meet Bob in Fresno for the next (and last) leg of my field work. I had decided that I was going to wing this whole portion of my journey. No reservations, no solid plans. I wanted to throw myself out there and see what happened. If you know me well, you realize this is completely out of character. I was trying to push myself out of my comfort zone and I have to say I did accomplish that.

Point Reyes National Seashore
I felt incredibly independent with my own wheels to point in any direction I wanted. Northwest it was. I drove my red rental car out to the Point Reyes National Seashore, which I had wanted to see since my move to California eleven years ago. I checked at the Visitor’s Center and there was only one campsite left for $20, which involved a five-mile hike in. I was not in the mood for that, so declined. (This turned out to be a wise, yet fateful decision because the wind was going at 45 m.p.h.+ at the ocean, where all the campsites seemed to be). The ranger told me she had just sold the last easy hike in campsite; I had missed by fifteen minutes. Housing I would have to worry about later. I went to Abbott’s Lagoon and hiked out to the shore based on Rodney’s birding recommendations.

I saw this Red-shouldered Hawk on the drive to Abbott's.
California Quail at Abbott's Lagoon.

Red-winged Blackbird.
Lupine at Abbott's Lagoon.
I hiked out past the lagoon and to the shore.
Here I came in contact with the wind, and some kitesurfers who were using it to their advantage.
I then went to the lighthouse, which was closed because of the high winds.

This is how windy it was. My breath was being snatched out of me!

You could see the lighthouse, but could not descend the stairs on account of the wind.
I was amazed at all the cattle/dairy farms on the peninsula. I lost count, but there were easily ten. These all got grandfathered in when the park was created. When I went to an elephant seal viewing area, the wind was strongly blowing offshore and all I could smell was cattle manure.

On my way back towards the entrance to the peninsula, I made a turn to the Drakes Bay Oyster Farm and had a half dozen delicious oysters. I didn’t realize I could shuck them myself, so needlessly spend $9 cash (when I could have spent $5.40).
This proved to be not the smartest thing I have ever done. I then stopped at a few motels to see if I could find a deal, but they were all much more than I wanted to spend. My plan had always been to camp Saturday night anyway; I wanted to save the luxury of a room for Sunday night, my last night before going back in the field. I finally returned to a campground in Olema, which I had driven by earlier in the morning. The price was $39 (!) for a campsite, which she told me I could go look at and then come back and let her know if I wanted it. This is when I looked at the sign behind her (CASH ONLY), opened my wallet and realized I not only had merely $31, but I had not brought my debit card. I considered using a charge card for a cash advance, but I had a new card and I had no idea what the PIN was (I’m sure a blessing in disguise. Interest on that would have been ridiculous). I opted to throw myself on the cashier’s mercy. She very kindly gave me what she thought was a crappy site and charged me $25. I had been prepared to give her my whole $31. Her kindness left me with $6, which turned out to be one of the most fortuitous things that happened to me all weekend. In addition, the crappy campsite was much quieter and away from the madness that was Father’s Day Weekend. I had a shower/bathroom near me which no one else seemed to use. I didn’t have a stove, so I had onion potato chips and beer for dinner.

My site on the 100 Meadow.
The relatively empty 100 Meadow.
The madness of Father's Day.

Driving South
Sunday I woke up early, broke camp and left before almost anyone stirred. The last two sites next to me had been taken; the people must have arrived after dark and set up. I drove down to Bolinas and had a coffee while avoiding crazy homeless and drunk people. Then I went out to Point Reyes Bird Observatory, which I had heard about for years in birding circles. They have been banding on the peninsula for a long time. I hung out with the two banders for a bit. They netted a Pacific-slope Flycatcher and a Swainson’s Thrush. Then I was on my way.

I headed south to San Francisco on the 101 and crossed my fingers. I hoped I would have enough money to take the Golden Gate Bridge. (I’m not sure when this dawned on me, that I would have to pay to cross a bridge. Once it did I was … concerned.) I had no idea how much it was and I didn’t really have a sound back-up plan if I didn’t have enough. I was hoping the cashier might be able to take a charge card or at least tell me if there was a way to get over the bay without paying a bridge toll or the ol’ throw-myself-on-her-mercy thing again. The adrenalin was building as I drove over the bay, and as I approached the booth I saw the toll …. $6. Wow. I had exact change.

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 03

2009-07-28T17:48:00.000-07:00

I left us at the lovely Lee Vining Canyon Campground. The next two days we would have the pleasure of staying there because we had two fires to survey in the area; we did not have to break down camp every day. What a relief.

Azusa
Azusa was exclusively a Pinyon Pine fire, but it proved to be an interesting morning for me. Here's the pre-dawn light at Azusa, looking towards the Sierra Nevada.
And, in the opposite direction, towards Mono Lake.I witnessed a Green-tailed Towhee singing with a stick in his mouth (what a multi-tasker, I thought), and a Steller’s Jay raiding a Western Wood Peewee nest. I lost my impartiality, though. I ran straight up the hill and yelled at the jay. I don’t know if I hurt or helped the situation, but I saw the peewee return to her nest. Around point three, I heard some strange breathing. It sounded close. I looked around, and staring down a small hill right at me was an intensely curious coyote. It stayed the whole time (about seven minutes) and then followed me to my next point. It started to howl. This made it difficult to work. You can hear me rustling papers in this clip, because I was trying to carry on with my point count in spite of all the racket he was making. That’s also why I put the camera down; I needed both hands.
Then, Rodney radioed me and we decided to rendezvous. The fire was small, so we each only had about four points. When I returned to the road that would lead to the car I looked up the hill and saw the coyote. It had followed me down the arroyo to the road and continued to follow me the whole way back to the car. I think it hung around about 45 minutes. It had a strong presence, with intelligent eyes and a beautiful coat with a whitish patch towards its hindquarters. I was intrigued by our interaction.

Devils Postpile + Hot Creek
That afternoon we got to be tourists again because our next fire – Crater - was one we did last year. No need to scout. Rodney had never been to Devils Postpile National Monument, so we did that, as well as hiked to Rainbow Falls.

Minarets from the road to DPNM.

Devils Postpile.

Rainbow Falls.

We were discussing going to Hot Creek to perhaps have a dip (although we were taking our chances because last time I had been there it was closed to swimming), when Rodney looked at our Devil’s Postpile map, and pointed to a label at the Reds Meadow Campground - “Showers.” Hmmm … we were walking in that direction to a bus stop so why not check it out? As we approached the campground, I was mentally calculating how much I would pay for a shower. Much to our delight, we read this:

And, so, we helped ourselves to these:

It was stunning. The water was perfect. I could barely tear myself away. But we eventually did leave the showers. We caught the bus back to Mammoth, which was crowded with smelly Pacific Crest Trail hikers. Over the past several days, I had wondered, looking up at the cloud-covered Sierra Nevada, how the PCT hikers were faring. The whole bus ride back over to the Eastside I heard tales of fog and getting lost. We then went to Hot Creek (which is still closed because of increased seismic activity) and it started to cloud up and eventually rain.

Hot Creek.
We treated ourselves to the gas station/Whoa Nellie Deli for dinner. There was a lot of steak on my salad, but I was hungry so I pretty much ate it all. This proved to be a major tactical error, which would continue to haunt me for the next few days.

Crater
Next day dawned the first normal Sierra Nevada Day. It started off cool and got hot by the end of the survey. We did the Crater Fire, which Rodney and I had surveyed last year.

Crater Fire with Mono Lake in the background.
It’s a lovely site that still had plenty of BBWO. Rodney also found a nest in this snag.

Listen to the nestlings. At about five seconds you can hear one of the parents drum on a nearby Jeffrey Pine.

Me in Crater.

Hetch Hetchy
We decided to stop by Hetch Hetchy on our way out to our last fire, Kibbie, which we also had surveyed last year. I had never been to one part of Hetch Hetchy, and we had just enough time to squeeze the hike in. This was another long drive, though. We had to go over Tioga Pass and then through Yosemite, out Big Oak Flat and then in to Hetch Hetchy. We hiked over O'Shaughnessy Dam and out to Wapama Falls, which were running heavy because of all the recent rain.

The dam.

The reservoir.

Wapama Falls.

Kibbie
We came back out and then drove to Kibbie. We got to the trailhead parking lot in time to eat and throw our tents down. The mosquitoes were bad, which was an ominous foreshadowing for the next day.

We got up and hiked about a half hour before we started our surveys. My route only overlapped last year’s by one point. And, I actually surveyed more than the usual ten points to make that happen. I had completed the ten and was almost out of time. We usually stop 3 ½ hours after sunrise, which works out to be around 9:15 a.m. I knew I was near my first point from last year, though, and that’s where I had a woodpecker. So I forged ahead and was rewarded with a pair. The mosquitoes were incredibly annoying all morning.

Here's a meadow that was full or mosquitoes, and birds, though not a Black-backed Woodpecker.
Because of a bad night’s sleep, I was exhausted that morning. On top if that all, I had a meat hangover. Good thing it was the last survey before another break. When we finished up, we drove back to Rodney’s house in the Bay area. He very generously offered to let me stay the night, so I did. The next morning I was dropped off at the rental car place and was off on my own adventure for two days, until I was to meet up with Bob at the Fresno airport to begin my last tour.

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 02

2009-07-21T19:55:00.001-07:00

Cut to the lovely Lee Vining Creek campground a week later. Rodney, the Executive Director of IBP, and I finally had a pleasant, sunny evening. I had flown to Oakland two days before and we embarked on a long drive to the Eastern Sierra Nevada. I realized after we got to our destination – French Camp in the Inyo National Forest - that I probably could have driven there in less time than it took me to fly + drive. Oh, well. We needed to only have one car, and, as things turned out, leaving one on the Eastside would not have worked out. Field work involves a lot of changing your plans based on what you find on the ground. And, we had lots of changed plans.

My tent at French Camp.

Birch
First off was the Birch Fire.
The fire habitat was all burned Pinyon Pine. Normally we have Jeffrey or Ponderosa or Sugar or Lodgepole Pine. Also Incense-Cedar and White or Red Fir. Pinyons are small, scrappy trees that grow in the arid Eastside climate. All the trees you see here are Pinyon in the Birch Fire.Different bird species prefer the arid Eastside’s sagebrush/desert, so lots of new birds came into play. Confusing at first until I sorted it all out.

There are also great flowers, like this Desert Evening-Primrose. My field guide says each white flower blooms only one night and then withers in the light of the next day (the pink things). It says they smell amazing. I forgot to smell. I didn't realize what a special flower I had.
I ended up walking cross country back to the campsite (my points were relatively close) right as it was starting to warm up. Rodney and I completed our data forms and then broke camp and jumped in the car to drive to Nevada.

Sagehen
Our next fire – Sagehen – was in the Toiyabe National Forest across the stateline. Again, this was a very long drive. Storm clouds continually built over and around the White Mountains as we made our way toward the state line.
Approaching the White Mountains, it just got worse.
Once through Benton Hot Springs and into Nevada we had to drive up a state highway and find a dirt road to drive, about 12k until the fire. Rodney was worried about the condition of said dirt road; he does NOT have a four-wheel drive nor high clearance. He was right to be worried. We got close and then were stopped by large rocks in the road. They don't look like much here, but they were undercarriage-scrapers.
We were close enough that we could see the beginning of the habitat, and decided to discard the fire as a survey site. It looked even more sparse than the Pinyon Pine we had surveyed at Birch and we hadn’t had any luck there. In addition, no one is sure that BBWO even use Pinyon Pine as habitat. On top of that, this was coming for us.

Dexter
After a 3+ hour drive we turned around and headed back the way we had just come. We had passed a turn for another of our fires – Dexter - on the way out to Sagehen, so we went back to the Dexter turnoff. This was a much kinder dirt road. We drove through lots of interesting habitats on the way out. There was one whole hillside that was covered in Aspen. On the map we saw there were several springs in the area, so that’s what was watering them in the middle of the arid landscape. After that we went through a stand of Lodgepole Pine and then we got to a stand of Jeffrey Pine, some of which was burned. This was Dexter. We scouted the fire as the clouds increasingly threatened rain. As we finished eating dinner it started, so we dove in our tents at 6:00 p.m. Here's my tent at Dexter.
It rained off and on all night long. We were at 8200 feet, so it was chilly and damp. At 4:30 a.m. the rain was still going and Rodney and I had a cross-tent chat about what to do. We decided to hold off getting up until it stopped raining. (Most birds stay hunkered down during such weather, so surveying would have been fruitless.) At 5:00 a.m. it stopped and we got up to start our day. I volunteered to do the cross country portion of the fire. This involved heading down a hill into a valley with a spring and then climbing back up the other side.
When I hit the top of the opposite ridge it looked like it was going to pour again, so Rodney and I talked on our walkie-talkies and decided to call it a day. We both had found birds, so felt we had accomplished what we set out to do. When I returned to camp, I discovered my tent was still wet, so packing up was messy.

Mono Lake
We then drove to Mono Lake to do some sightseeing. At Rush Creek I actually got a great look at a Willow Flycatcher (WIFL), which was very gratifying. Many of you may remember I worked on a field crew looking for WIFL several years ago. There is an outlier population near Mono Lake, which live in wild rose bushes (as opposed to the usual willows).
Rodney and I then took a long leisurely birding stroll down Rush Creek towards Mono Lake. We saw one Yellow-headed Blackbird amidst all the Red-winged ones. The sky was moody, the birds plentiful.

Sierra Nevada from Rush Creek
We were able to be tourists for an afternoon because the fire the next day – Azusa – was just off Highway 120 near the gas station. It was steep yet easy to scout because it was small. This is when we set up at Lee Vining Creek Campground and were able to stay there for two nights. This is Lee Vining Creek - the view from our picnic table.
What a relief to not have to break down camp every day!

The next fire - Azusa - provided a great wildlife encounter. More on that soon.

Black-backed Woodpecker Surveys 2009. Part 01

2009-07-03T15:37:00.000-07:00

It’s hard to believe, but my birding field season is already over. I looked for Black-backed Woodpeckers in fire areas for the Institute for Bird Populations again. It seemed like a rough season with the variable weather, the long drives and, perhaps, my aging body. I am so happy to be home!

I flew up to Sacramento in the beginning of June and Bob picked me up to start our week of work. Peavine was the name of our first fire, and it was a difficult find. After lots of driving on dirt roads and turning around and checking the GPS, we finally found a reasonably close access point. We picked an overgrown dirt “road” we were going to hike up in the a.m. to actually get to the fire. To be clear - this used to be a road, but was no longer anywhere near passable what with all the seedlings growing on it. We made camp late, so we just plopped down, ate dinner and went to bed. We awoke before sunrise and hiked briskly up the steep road. We went about 15 minutes, didn’t see a fire and stopped to take a GPS reading. We realized that we were not in the right place. This hastened a speedy plummet back down the hill, a tricky stream crossing and then a hike up another road. We finally saw fire. Good.
My heart was pumping incredibly fast and I was dizzy with the early hour and the 0-to-60-in-2-seconds quality of the morning. And I was only getting started on the survey. The protocol was a bit different this year, so I had to make some decisions that my fuzzy mind felt ill-prepared to make. Combine that with some steep terrain and the number of birds that sing AT THE SAME TIME in the morning, and I was shell-shocked. I’m supposed to write down not only the birds I hear but those I see at every other point I do. This is in addition to doing the playback surveys for the Black-backed Woodpecker (play a recording, see if the bird responds, collect info if it does), and collecting vegetation data (what kind of trees, how big, how many, how many live, how many dead/burned, how much logging, how much slash, etc). It suddenly dawned me that this was hard. I muddled through with no Black-backed Woodpeckers (BBWO) to show for it. Bob didn't have any either, but but - this was a fire from 2008, so he stumbled upon a ton of Morel mushrooms, which are associated with recent forest fires.
Once we finished we completed our data sheets, ate and packed up to go scout the Government Fire. This was a massive fire along the American River last year that prevented us from getting to sites we needed to survey. A year later it was a survey site. Scouting this fire (and a lot of them) involved driving down perilous dirt roads. Bob has a four-wheel drive, so we’ve never gotten into too much trouble. This one road we went down for Government, though, abruptly became impassable, and there was nowhere to turn around. Bob did some impressive reverse driving while I clutched my water bottle in a death grip - out the passenger side was a steep drop down the mountainside. That ended our scouting for the afternoon. We settled on a few logging roads, plus, for me, the abandoned Iowa Ditch – an old canal - to follow.

Here is me with the Iowa Ditch trailing off in the distance.
And, no, that is not a weird outdoor fashion trend. My hat was pulled down low over my forehead to keep the mosquitoes off me. They were annoying that morning.

The ditch had steep sides from the time when it used to hold water.
Here's my surveying gear. The item with the handle is the Fox Pro playback device. It plays the BBWO call ... and they tend to come if they are in hearing distance.I had no BBWO, but Bob had one at the very last point. I did find some Juncos, though. They nest on the ground and I had set up my flagging/point right next to their home. I knew there was a Junco scolding me, but didn't realize how close I was until I went to collect my flagging.Again, back to camp to wrap up paperwork and eat a bite, then we are off in the car to scout the Power Fire. It was a long drive and the weather was unsettled the whole time.
A light-colored yearling bear ran across the road. This was the only bear I saw all summer. We scouted and decided to follow a few easy roads. We camped next to Cole Creek, underneath a bunch of Sugar Pines.
That night there was a thunderstorm and a little rain. It never really got to us; at one point it sounded very close and then it faded into the distance with a few sprinkles. We did have some precipitation in the morning when I was surveying the fire.
Lupine.
Evidence of some logging - a slash pile and cleanly cut logs.
Bob ended up with a BBWO here, also, and I did not. I saw a mule deer, which was my big excitement for the morning. After we packed up we drove to the Showers Fire, which was near Lake Tahoe. Bob knows someone who lives in Meyers, right outside of Tahoe, so we knew we had shelter for the night. (This ended up being a good thing as when we were driving out to the fire at 4:45 the next morning, the temperature was 36 degrees. It would have been a cold night camping).

Showers turned out to be a prophetic name for the fire. It was cool with rain and some hail. When we got to our trailhead in the morning, we had to hike in 35 minutes and then go off-trail. I had to go straight up a steep ridge that was littered with logs and mountain whitethorn. It was a small fire (I only did 5 points; I usually do 10), but I finally found some BBWO. I stayed with one pair for a bit to enjoy their company. They are such quirky, fun birds. Though the hiking was rough on this one, I really enjoyed being off-trail.

I had to go straight up.

Bob went down thataway.

The sun tried for a bit.
We quit Lake Tahoe and drove down Highway 50 to survey our last two fires. We decided to do a marathon day of surveying so that the following days would be relatively easy. These last two fires - Plum and Freds - had a lot of private property inholdings. As a result, what we thought looked like a feasible survey route would turn out not to be because we would run into a private property sign. We'd take a second look at our topographic maps and realize the private property lines had gotten lost in all the overlays. On top of this issue, when we drove up to Freds it was completely socked in with fog. We couldn't see farther than 50 feet off the dirt road we traveled.We still managed to come up with a survey game plan, and drove back to the comfort of Bob's house, where we would stay for the next two nights to avoid the wet, cold weather. The trade-off was we had to get up at 4:40 a.m. to get to the fire in time for sunrise.

It was windy and rainy again, with a bit of thunder during the survey of the Plum fire the next morning.

No BBWO (there were none last year when I surveyed it, either). It had some nice wildflowers, though.

We got back to Bob’s by 11.30 a.m. and had the rest of the day to ourselves. Only Freds fire to go before I could return home for a 1-week break.

Oaks at Bob's house.

Feral cat at Bob's.
And, look how the next day dawned for Freds fire ...
Blue sky! Unfortunately, I was in that shadow you see for most of the morning, so I was cold. My first bit of sun was near these lupine.

Here are some partially burned snags at the beginning of the Freds fire.
I did not find any BBWO at Freds, and I don't think Bob did either.

And that was it for my first session. Back to Los Angeles with me for a week-long break, and then I was going back out for two weeks.

Late May Bird Banding

2009-05-24T14:12:00.000-07:00

We started late yesterday. Walt was out of town and forgot to leave the gate key with Jim, who was our leader for the day. We waited a few hours for an NPS Ranger to show up and unlock the gate.

I had two guests this time, Mark and his coworker Kaori. And it was a good thing for me. There were three of us banders, so we ran only 9 nets. That meant I had 3 nets to myself on every run. Mark and Kaoari were great support holding the nets back, handing me sticks I could use as tools, and, most importantly, running the hummers back to the station to be processed ASAP. Hummers tend to be fragile creatures and it was hot in the canyon starting around 10 a.m.. Best to take care of them quickly.

The highlight for me was this Costa's Hummingbird; I had never seen one before. This is me getting him out of the net. Notice how his iridescent feathers look black from this angle.

And here he is on Kaori's hand. They often don't fly away right off, so she is providing a platform for his launch, once he decides to get up and go, which he did a few minutes later. You get the full effect of his iridescence from this angle.
Another treat was this Juvenile Western Scrub Jay. Look at the soft downy feathers on this head and the remnants of his gape (the wide usually yellowish mouth that nestlings have).
Another intersting bird - a Song Sparrow with some kind of problem with its head feathers.
Orange-crowned Warbler. You can only see his orange crown in the hand. This picture doesn't demonstrate it, but he had one!
And, the biggest treat of the day for me was the following bird. I saw the male flying around and hoped he would get in the net. Lo and behold, on the last net run I got my wish. Well close enough - I got the female Phainopepla.
She made lots of very unusual sounds when I was trying to take her out of the net. Kaori said she sounded like a car alarm.

Early May Bird Banding

2009-05-12T07:30:00.000-07:00

It was a foggy morning at Zuma Canyon. Start time was 5:57 a.m. and I had brought company with me. Mark decided to check it out, just this once, to see what I do with myself every other Saturday. There were only four of us (not counting Mark), but we ran all nets except for #7, which involves an out-of-the-way walk up a steep hill.

The Pacific-slope Flycatchers were out in full force singing, and we got several in the nets.Look at their lovely almond-shaped eye ring (and please ignore my grip on the bird; it's all wrong).
Mark managed to get a photo of one of the gophers; we see evidence of them all over -their holes - but rarely see them.
We got another Black-chinned Hummingbird and this time I actually got a photo of it. It's gorgeous.

We also got two Warbling Vireos. Another first for me at that station. They are so quietly elegant.

Cool bush. I think it's called Sugar Bush.
And, last but not least, the House Finch. He's a very common bird around our house (he sneaks food from the hummer feeder) and we see him in the canyon all the time. This is the first time I have banded one, though, and I was impressed by his red feathers and his culmen. My neighbor calls them flying lizards.

April Bird Banding

2009-04-26T08:52:00.000-07:00

It was an great morning of banding. We started at 6.11 a.m. and it was pleasantly cool in the canyon.
We got another Red-shafted Flicker. The person who brought it back from the net kindly handed it off to me to process. Perhaps I have made my great affection for Flickers clear?
Look how he uses his tail to brace against Walter's hand. That's what they do on trees, so he's just doing this behavior on a person for stability.
We also saw a pretty large Pacific Gopher Snake

Most birds are in breeding condition. The first bird I got was a Spotted Towhee female, who was about to lay an egg.I could tell because when I looked at her cloaca, I could see an egg-shaped bulge under the skin. As soon as I realized this I finished up with her quickly and let her go so she could make some more Towhees.

Some birds already had nestlings. Walter found these Bewick's Wren babies and showed us them:
We quickly took a peak and he put them back in the nest.

We also had a male and female Black-chinned Hummingbird, and a male and female Black-headed Grosbeak. Click on the links to look at the size of the beak. They use it. I have never been so abused by a bird. They are very good at getting tiny pieces of your finger skin in their beaks and they just clamp down. Ouch!

We also had another treat; this is an unusual bird to get in Zuma Canyon. It is quite beautiful.

Male Lazuli Bunting.

Carrizo Plain National Monument

2009-04-17T22:14:00.000-07:00

Easier to post these here.

Our Very Own Birds

2009-04-07T08:26:00.000-07:00

Two chickens and an (unexpected) quail. The quail chirps rather loudly for such a small creature. The chickens peep.

We're going to have fresh green/blue eggs in a few months!

March Bird Banding

2009-03-15T08:29:00.001-07:00

We had an exciting morning yesterday as we got an unusual bird. Walt has been banding in Zuma Canyon for, I think, 20 years, and he has never caught this bird. It is a rare stray to the Western U.S., and to think it landed in one of our nets!

It's the Rose-breasted Grosbeak. If you look at the range map on the right in the link, you will see it is an eastern bird, but there are records of it straying this far west.

This is a male in his winter plumage. This is his breeding plumage.
Here's Walt getting the band ready for the bird. You have to do that and hold it at the same time, which can be tricky.
Here in the west we have more commonly have the Black-headed Grosbeak.

The canyon also seemed to be suddenly flooded with singing Orange-crowned Warblers. Two weeks ago I didn't hear any, which makes me think they are migrating north right now. Though Walt says there is a resident population, too. I was really excited I heard one on a net run. I tried to find it for a while to get visual confirmation (I had heard its song and was positive, but wanted to be extra-positive about the ID). Well, I couldn't find it, but I got back to the station and said, "Walt, I know I hear an Orange-crowned Warbler." Lo and behold, one had been caught in a net already and was being processed. Old news to everyone already back at the station.
It's hard to see the orange crown in the field with binoculars. You have to have it in your hand and actually move the feathers around on his head to see it.

These plants were in bloom all over the place. It's a ribes. I think the common name is some kind of gooseberry; I'm not sure. I got this info from other people as I'm not so great at plants.

And, I was saving the daintiest for last. We got a few Anna's Hummingbirds. Here is one. I think it was a female.
Oh - and we got a few Bewick's Wrens. I love its eye stripe.

February Bird Banding + Griffith Park

2009-03-09T08:44:00.000-07:00

I'm far behind. These pictures are from our session two weeks ago. It was kind of slow; we only had 28 birds.
One of them is this gorgeous warbler - the Common Yellowthroat. I know I've had pictures of him before, but I never get tired of his Lone Ranger look.
Here is a California Thrasher's tail. Its tail gets very beat up because they spend a lot of time in scrubby bushes.
Here I am with a male Spotted Towhee.
And here is a Hermit Thrush. They have one of the loveliest songs. I hear them when I work in Yosemite. This one is migrating north.
Wildflowers were starting to come out. Lupine.
And, some yellow flowers near Net 08.

I went on a hike in Griffith Park a week ago and wildflowers were out there, too, in the recent fire areas.

January Bird Banding

2009-01-28T11:32:00.001-08:00

It rained the whole way to the coast. I didn't catch a break until somewhere in Malibu, and it didn't seem to want to hold. It was misty at Zuma Canyon, which made for a pretty slow day; we only had 26 birds total. The last two were huge treats, though. I always hear the Red-shafted Flickers calling when I am in the canyon, and this time we actually got one in a net. In fact, we hit the jackpot; we got both a male and a female.

You can see his deep red eye in the following picture (click to enlarge):

The usual Audubon's Warblers.
We caught as many of the Audubon's as we did Wrentits. This is unusual as we normally catch way more Wrentits. Maybe they were hunkered down because of the cool temperatures?

The always impressive California Thrasher, which really likes to kick. That's how they look for food, by kicking the leaf litter and uncovering tidbits to eat. Look at those feet.

Here is what the nets look like.

Redondo Beach Pier

2009-01-04T20:05:00.000-08:00

A little So Cal Christmas day trip to the ocean.

Brown Pelican
Brown Pelican which doesn't like the looks of me

Black-Crowned Night Heron

December Bird Banding

2008-12-23T09:52:00.001-08:00

It was a cloudy, cool day in Zuma Canyon. We were told the ticks were out.
We caught several interesting birds, most of which I have no (or bad) pictures of. Here are the few that are ok.

This is an Anna's Hummingbird. The first picture is blurry, but you can still see the beautiful colors on its gorget.
Clearly visible here are the growths around the hummer's left eye.
He had survived this long with them, so we could only release him and hope for the best. We do not actually band the hummingbirds. It is possible, but you have to have a special permit for it (and some very small tools). We take them back to the station and process them, meaning that we identify them and then age, sex and weigh them. Weighing them is kind of fun as you lay them on the scale on their backs and they don't put up a fight. They docilely stay there. They usually weigh a gram or so. All the other birds we put upside down in pill bottles to weigh (this keeps them from flying off).

Here is a female Nuttall's Woodpecker. She was aged as a hatch year bird (meaning she was born in the summer this year).
Her flight feathers had not molted yet as she was a hatch year bird, and they had been bleached through use/exposure to the sun.
Those feathers were much darker at the tips when she was born.

November Bird Banding

2008-11-23T10:35:00.000-08:00

We had another session this month. It was back to standard time, so I had to get up at 5:00 a.m. to make it out to the coast for our 6:34 a.m. start time. I actually was a little early.
My favorite bird yesterday:
We usually don't catch Western Scrub Jays as they are "too smart" (the Master Bander's words) to fly into a mist net. He said only the young ones are stupid enough to do it, and it only happens once. Alas, I aged this bird as an adult. Perhaps s/he (sex difficult to determine unless it's breeding season) was having an off day.

In spite of its large size and fierce appearance, it was very tame in the hand.
When I let it go, it gave a classic jay squawk and shat. Glad it didn't do that in my hand. Handling bird poop is definitely a side effect of banding, but the mostly small birds we handle make small effluvia. This is ... palatable. The jay is not a small bird.

We had another Oak Titmouse, which, again, endlessly abused the fingers of those who handled it. Wasn't me this time! Walter, the Master Bander, said that this bird's raised crest was the avian equivalent of the primate's raised middle finger.
Here's part of our setup; that's Walter on the left, with the canyon behind him.

A Few Election Observations

2008-11-05T13:06:00.001-08:00

This blog is and has been apolitical, but I feel compelled to speak today.
Yesterday I witnessed a few things I never have seen in Los Angeles:

- I had to wait in line an hour to vote. All very patiently & quietly waited their turn.
- I was out on the street around 8 p.m. PST when the city gave a collective yell. Barack Obama had just been named the winner, and our 44th president.
- I waited in line to get into a club were we could see Obama's speech, and the majority of the cars driving by were honking and there were people literally dancing in the streets.
- Later, on the way home, several corners were full of crowds of people yelling with joy.

A fine moment in U.S. history to be alive.

November Bird Banding

2008-11-01T21:48:00.000-07:00

Cloudy and cool conditions made for the most pleasant bird banding in Zuma yet. For once, it was 10 a.m. and I did not feel like a turkey roasting in an oven.

Bewick's Wren. Such a pretty little bird, and feisty, too. They like to complain at the indignity of being held by a mammal.
And, for all you people out there who appreciate color, I present the
Nuttall's Woodpecker.

Lastly, the Oak Titmouse. Mark and I recently saw a lot of these up in the Central Valley, so it was fun to see one up close. It turns out they are avid and successful biters.

Young Elk Looking for Its Herd

2008-10-31T10:38:00.001-07:00

It sounds a little pathetic, no? We saw it at Gold Bluffs Beach in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park in CA.

Yosemite Vacation

2008-10-07T13:36:00.000-07:00

Mark and I spent a few weeks in July in Yosemite National Park with our friends Amy & Rich and their son Jefrey. We set up base camp at White Wolf, and spent many a day hiking in the High Sierras. Mark and I then spent 3 days+2 nights backpacking in the Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne River. We started at Tuolumne Meadows and ended by walking out to our campsite at White Wolf. The last two nights were spent at a cabin outside the park, It was great to have a shower, cook decadent meals and play some backgammon.
I opted for a photo album, but that's the backstory.

September Bird Banding

2008-09-21T18:56:00.000-07:00

It was a little chilly Saturday morning at 6:30 when I arrived at Zuma Canyon for bird banding. Fall is here. We were expecting many migrants, but only ended up with one, a Wilson's Warbler, on our last net run. Oh, wait. There was a female Black-headed Grosbeak, also.
Both of these bird I see in Yosemite during the summers. They were on their ways south for the winter.

We mostly had Wrentits and California Thrashers, an endemic California songbird - and a cool-looking bird if there ever was one. Look at that bill!

Wrentits are interesting because they are the only American representative of the Old World babbler family. When foreign birders come to the US, they try to see these birds as they are very unique. They skulk in the chaparral, and are more often heard than seen, but they are our most common bird netted. And, I managed to not take any photos of them! Next time .... They are very hard to take out of the net because they usually have a death grip on the net with their feet. You have to convince them to let it go.
I had a hummingbird. This time, I actually took it back to the station and processed it. I discovered it was an adult female Anna's Hummingbird. Her heart beats so fast that she felt like she was purring. Her bill was not flexible either (not like the one described last time), so they must harden up when they hit adulthood. No photos because I was too worried about her health. They tend to "go fast", so I don't dally when I process them.
It was an exhausting day for me. Some of the nets are a good distance, and it gets hot once the sun comes up. And, getting up at 5:15 .m. isn't easy for me, either. I am out of practice.

What My Unemployed Husband Has Been Doing, Pt. 2

2008-09-15T20:12:00.000-07:00

Stalking Great Egrets.

What My Unemployed Husband Has Been Doing, Pt. 1

2008-09-11T10:01:00.000-07:00

Torturing the cat.

LA Bird Banding

2008-08-31T12:14:00.000-07:00

I found a person who does bird banding in Los Angeles. It's in Zuma Canyon, on the coast, so I decided to join them yesterday. I'm a little out of practice at getting up so early, but I managed to drag myself out of bed at 5:00 a.m., and then drive the hour out to Zuma. I was met there by Walter Sakai, the master bander, and 5 other banders, including myself. There also was a Mom in attendance, who was observing. Here are a few highlights:

Common Yellowthroat. I've always found this name counterintuitive as this bird's appearance is anything but common. They are feisty, too.

One time I went to the net and there was a hummingbird caught in it. Any other time I've seen hummingbirds caught in nets, they have come out pretty easily. This one was quite entangled. It took me a little while to get it (her?) out and she was scolding me the whole time. I discovered just how flexible there bills are; when I had to pull the net over her head and bill, it curved nicely and allowed for an easier extraction. When I got her wings free, she would try to fly and I felt like I had a tiny beater in my fingers. I decided to let her go after I extracted her as 1) the first season (2006) I did Yosemite MAPS we released them at the net, 2) they are very small and need to eat constantly, and that net run we had gone out later than we should have so I was afraid she had been in there as long as 30 minutes 3) she was in the sun, which can be added stress for birds, and had been pretty entangled.

When I returned to the banding station Walter told me that they do process them and that I should have brought her back. Then, we would have been able to discern if it was an Allen's or a Rufous Hummingbird. Oh well, I don't regret giving her her immediate freedom. Walter also said that the birds' bills tend to be flexible when they are young, and become less so when they reach adulthood.

Yellow-Breasted Chat, our largest wood warbler. (This and the Common Yellowthroat are both wood warblers). Although, the Cornell site is saying that recent genetic data suggests that this isn't a wood warbler at all. So, the jury is out. Ah, science - changing its mind when faced with concrete evidence that what it has thought all along is incorrect. Crazy!

Last, the Swainson's Thrush. Fall migration has started! This bird breeds in the Northwest US during the spring/summer (among other places) and then heads to either Central or South America for the winter. I have never seen a Swainson's, but I heard their gorgeous, haunting song when I was in Arcata, CA last spring.

There were a lot of Black-hooded Parakeets in the canyon also. Thankfully none of them ended up in the nets (they tend to fly high). I wouldn't want to face one of those formidable bills! I'd be afraid of losing a finger.

Sunset Saturday night at 854 Hyperion Ave.

Lethargy

2008-08-17T15:05:00.000-07:00

I can't get used to working every day at a "real" job that involves sitting at a desk.
I keep thinking about these things.

Sunsets

Meadows

Marmot Noses

The High Sierra

Fast Rivers

Woodpeckering: Part 03

2008-08-03T09:25:00.000-07:00

Mark and I had a great time in Yosemite National Park with our friends Rich & Amy and their son Jefrey. (More on that later.) We were there until July 20th, at which time Mark dropped me off in Modesto at the bus/train station and he took off for Los Angeles. I waited four hours for my bus to Sacramento. It actually was a pleasant day spent reading and eating a delicious sandwich that I had packed for lunch. The bus finally arrived. I sat next to a gal who was chatty/friendly and she would often talk over me to another woman she seemed to know well. As a result, I overheard all of their conversation. It seemed they hadn't been home for awhile and that people were picking them up from the station in Sacramento. I let them borrow my phone to make calls because the bus was running late. There was a nervous energy about the woman I was sitting next to; she seemed excited and yet anxious about the day's events. Over the course of the two-hour ride, I slowly figured out that they had both just been released from prison in Chowchilla. Eventually, the woman next to me clearly spelled it out. She said, "You are sitting in-between two convicts. Well, ex-convicts." The woman next to me was in for seven months for, I think, a parole violation. Her original crime had been something violent. I never was clear on what exactly it was. She said she needs to lay off - then she made a gesture about sniffing something - and she'll be fine. The other woman was in for extortion, and it was her second strike. She had been in jail for many years. She had a stroke in prison, and had to use a walker to get around. She said that she is done, no more. Both of them said that.

Bob, who was picking me up, called me and told me that he had a flat tire, so was running a bit behind. Plus, it would change up our plans a little. We would have to get the tire fixed before we went on any bad dirt roads. As the bus arrived in Sacramento, I saw that Bob was there and I silently wished the women all the luck in the world as we went to our separate fates. Bob drove us to Lotus, where we stayed for the night at a campground. We had a delicious dinner, then went back to camp and had a beer on the banks of the South Fork of the American River. We saw birds, yes, but also two beavers. They were swimming around in the twilight, flopping their tails on the surface as they dove.

The next day we got up and drove to Auburn to have Bob's tire fixed. After that, we took off for our first fire - the Codfish. Bob had tried to check this the previous Thursday, but a road he needed to take was closed ... because there was another fire. Welcome to summer 2008 in California; everything is burning. Bob was expecting this to still be the case, and it was. So we made a left and wound our way through to Truckee and then into the Tahoe National Forest. We traveled some very rough dirt roads to the Rock Creek fire. There were no close campgrounds, and we had to drive back to Stampede Reservoir to pitch our tents for the evening. In spite of some very loud kids playing, I managed to drop off around 8:30. I was up at 4:45 a.m. to make the drive to the site. Rock Creek was all off trail. It started off innocently enough, but I was soon walking (well, stumbling) through bushes that were waist high. The surprise was that underneath all these bushes were a lot of downed trees. As I could not actually see the logs very well, if at all, it was rough going. There were a lot of birds out that morning, and I scored a few Black-backed Woodpeckers, also. We didn't have to do point counts anymore, so that made the whole process move along more quickly. I was glad we didn't have to do them because I couldn't hear too well as there was a loud wood chipper going almost the whole time I surveyed. They were obviously doing some logging in the area.

Check out those bushes; I know they look innocent, but they are several feet tall, and covering lots of logs.

You can hear a Fox Sparrow singing in this clip and see the dastardly shrubs. The microphone did not pick up the Black-backed piking, but I could hear it.

After Rock Creek we drove north 4 hours to the Boulder Complex fire, which was near Antelope Lake. I can't remember quite when, but at some point on the drive north we ran into a lot of smoke. (We later found out this was the Canyon Complex Fire. Fire crews were being staged out of Quincy.) We reconnoitered "our" fire by driving along the road (always nice when a road runs through a fire) that runs around Antelope Lake. We camped at Lone Rock Campground. The fire seemed to have just missed the campgrounds. A lot - rather, most of the area around that lake was scorched. We later figured out that the next fire we had to survey (the Moonlight) was all around the southern and western edge of the lake. The Boulder was on the northern and eastern shores. The next morning I got to survey walking the road.

Here you can easily see the road and hear many birds singing, among them the Western Wood-Pewee, Oregon Junco and Olive-sided Flycatcher. Not the best quality video (or videography!), but you get an idea of the areas I work in.

A road makes the going easy, plus there isn't a lot of traffic on a Wednesday at 5:30 a.m. I had ten Black-backed Woodpeckers! The sunrise was weird because of all the smoke. It didn't get warm until almost 10 a.m.
When I caught up to Bob, I found out his truck had died. So, we tried to push it and jump start it and that didn't work because we couldn't get it far enough up an incline to get the run we needed. We hung out until the next truck came by and we got a jump start.

We again spent the night at Lone Rock. At sunset, I went out to the lake and watched 3 beavers play around. There were a lot of Canada Geese there, too, eating grass and making some noise. It was very cool to see Violet-green Swallows skimming the surface of the lake to grab a drink of water.

The smoke was a little better on Thursday. My survey area in the Moonlight fire was again along a road, but this time it was the dirt/logging type. The blue lines mean those trees are going to be salvage logged. You can hear a Hairy Woodpecker piking towards then end.

This fire seemed like it must have burned very hot. Everything was incinerated; what soil was left was mineral soil. The Moonlight Fire was massive - there was no way we could survey even 10% of it, let alone the whole thing. So, we settled for doing as much as possible along a few logging roads.
Bob dropped me off and went farther into the fire. I actually ended up with even more birds than the day before - 13. At the time, I felt like the place was crawling with BBWO. I think a lot of them were juveniles, also, but I found it difficult to positively ID them. Both juveniles and males have yellow on their heads, but in different areas. Considering that these are birds that spend their lives on burned trees, and, therefore, tend to get blackened by the soot, it can be difficult to see where exactly the yellow is. The soot can obscure plumage.

The rest is a bit of a blur. We drove to Salmon Creek Campground in some national forest. Sierra Buttes were visible from the road that ran along the Bassett's fire, our next one. The Buttes were visible from the fire area, too. A lot of it was salvage logged.

This fire was off-trail and very steep. I needed to go west to stay in the most severe burn area, and that was straight uphill. Nevertheless, it ended up being one of those lovely mornings, in which the sun comes up and hits just right and the birds are everywhere and in the midst of ashy destruction there are these little bits of life reemerging. Natural magic.

In this movie, you can near a Black-backed Woodpecker piking. It also is making a semi-rattle noise that Bob and I were thinking might be a juvenile vocalization.

Here is where they were replanting trees. It's a nice idea, but leads to stands that are all the same tree and the same age - a monoculture.

I actually fell in the above area (also depicted in the first photo with the Buttes) because it was all downed trees and scrap branches from the logging. It was a mess, and very uneven going. And steep. This led to a resounding thunk as I hit the ground and scraped my arms up. I was almost finished, so persevered, made it to the road and walked to Bassett's Station, thinking about breakfast the whole time. I saw Bob's truck, so knew he must be around somewhere, so I decided to just go into the store/restaurant at the station and have some coffee and breakfast. And there was Bob, just finishing up his breakfast (he said he tried to wait, but couldn't make it) and reading the Bee.

Later that day we packed up and headed towards Auburn. Our last task was to try to check out the Codfish fire - again. It was a blazing hot ride on the 49, so Bob had the brilliant idea of stopping by the Yuba River for a swim. The South Fork of said river is the greatest swimming hole ever. The water level was so low that you could actually swim at the surface through tunnels of boulders. It was crystal clear and had large (at least 6-inch) speckled fish swimming around.

Once we got back to where we started, we found we could make the turn to the Codfish Fire. Then we made a few more turns down increasingly bad dirt roads until we were stopped by a deluge of signs that boasted of large dogs and guns. When we saw
Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be shot again.
we decided that woodpeckers, while very lovely, were not worth our lives. Bob did some amazing reverse driving (the road was so narrow and steep there was no way to turn around) and we departed. My woodpecker adventures ended sooner than anticipated, and we made our way back to the airport in Sacramento.

Woodpeckering: Part 02

2008-07-08T10:00:00.000-07:00

We woke up the next morning knowing it was going to be a driving day. Our goal was to get from the Cold Springs Campground in Mineral King to our next fire - the Vista - in the Sequoia National Forest\Monument. It was quite a long drive (Thank you, Rodney!), which took us, again, through the horrible air of the Central Valley. It was also very hot. We did a quick recon of the area and decided it would be easy enough to drive down a Forest Route to get close to the fire. After that, I would be hoofing it along a road and then going off-road. Rodney had all off-road. We bunked down at Troy Meadow Campground for the night, which seemed to be filled with OHV enthusiasts. Rodney and I went birding at sunset, and I was worried about getting beat up; we looked like geeks with our binoculars, and I am certainly no match for the all the testosterone that filled the campground that night. There was a very large trailer that carried two OHVs that had a stenciled "Weekend Warrior" label on the back.

I should probably give you a brief description of our procedure. We start at sunrise, so that's about 5:40 a.m. this time of year. We survey every 250 meters, which we count off in steps (67 of my steps make 50 meters, so I do the figuring from that). At every point we play the audio of the BBWO, which includes some drumming and some pik-ing and this fantastic snarl/rattle.

They seem to always flare their wings out when they snarl/rattle. We await their arrival for 5 minutes, and document it if they show up. At every other point, we do a passive point count. This means I stand there for 5 minutes and write down a 4-letter code for every bird I hear/see, and estimate its distance from me, in meters. If a lot is going on, this can be incredibly confusing, but it's really fun. We go until we run out of fire or we run out of time. We stop point counting at 9 a.m.; we stop surveying for BBWO at 10 a.m.

The Vista fire was fun to survey. I had a great look at a male Western Tanager, and it was full of woodpeckers. I had both Hairy and Downy Woodpeckers, the Downys being unexpected at the elevation I was surveying (I think 7,500 ft.). I had no Black-Backed Woodpeckers (BBWO), but Rodney had them at 5 of his 6 points. And, he found a nest! He said it was pretty low - about 5 feet off the ground in a snag - and he could hear the babies inside the hole.

On the way back to the campground we decided to stop at the Bald Mountain Fire Lookout, which was on our way. The person who was working up there said you can see 100 miles in all directions. There was a large fire called the Piute that had started down near Lake Isabella, that we could easily see. It's on the right of this panorama.

We also could see an overhead view of the fire we had just surveyed, the Vista.

He told us how they thought it started: there was a raid to bust a marijuana growing operation (a persistent problem in that National Forest) and all the employees fled. They started a campfire to stay warm. They had to run and it was left unattended and started the wildfire.

Then it was back to Troy Meadow Campground, tear down camp and we were off, this time to near Mono Lake. The ride up the 395 was apocalyptic. There was obviously some kind of fire going on to the east, and a lot of smoke was collecting in the valley throughout almost the whole stretch. It didn't clear up until north of Bishop. We breathed a sigh of relief; we were worried we would be working in very smoky conditions at our next fire. We found a great little campsite at Lee Vining Creek, surrounded by Quaking Aspen and the rush of the creek, then made our way off to the Gas Station to stuff ourselves with food and beverage. Delicious Fish Tacos. Delicious.

The Crater Fire was off east 120, right near Mono Lake. It was a magical morning of birding with the gleam of Mono Lake to the north, the austerity of the surrounding blackened snags, the clear acidity of the blue sky, and the crisp temperatures of the early hours. Mountain Bluebirds, Brewer's and Vesper Sparrows and Violet-Green Swallows abounded. I got extremely lucky and also saw a Lewis's Woodpecker - a first for me. I heard a lot of Pinyon Jays, but was never close enough to the live trees bordering the burn area to see them. (Make sure you listen to their calls; they are really loud, like most jays!) The Black-Backed Woodpecker was also present. I kind of fell for the last guy that came to check me out. He flew in tentatively, but then became more and more curious and got very close. At one point, he was up a snag about 2 meters away from me, cocking his head and perusing me as if he couldn't quite figure it all out. He must have wondered how such a large, inelegant creature such as myself could be making his noise. And, from the ground of all places. I sat down and watched him for a while.

Rodney found woodpeckers in his section of the fire, also, so it was a successful day for both of us. We returned to the campground and packed up to go up Tioga Pass. The last two days we helped Dave DeSante, the director of the Institute for Bird Populations, collect data on his plots up near Yosemite. He has been studying these plots in the Hall Natural Area since the 1970s. This was a short drive - a few miles up the hill, and then a small stroll into the campsite at Sawmill Walk-in Campground. There was a stunning view of Mount Conness from the campground. We were immediately confronted with how many mosquitoes there were. If you were walking, it wasn't a problem. But, once you stopped, they descended in droves. We hid in our tents until Dave and Sarah Stock, a Yosemite wildlife biologist who was helping Dave, returned. Over dinner and mosquitoes that evening, we found out that we were doing the B grids of Dave's study site. Our task was to walk the grid (basically making a zigzag pattern as we went) and to find and record the location of every bird that was out there. Any other wildlife observations were also encouraged. Dave knew the area intimately, and had a mental map of where he was. We just had maps he had drawn with the cardinal directions and a compass. There were no GPS points, just landscape features you could look for ("Willow Wonderland", "Pyramid Meadow", "Tarn", etc.) and evenly spaced grid points. I like to know where I am off-trail, so I knew this would be a mental challenge. Most importantly, I wanted to record the birds at the proper grid point, and if I didn't know where I was, that was going to be difficult. Dave sent us off with a "You'll probably be lost a lot of the time", which actually made me feel better. "Good, I thought. He knows I'm confused already."

After several frustrating moments and much trial & error, I realized the only way I was going to be able to keep tabs on where I was, was by walking a line in a cardinal direction, counting off every single grid point (every 40 meters) and using the landscape features only as general guides. One person's Pyramid Meadow is another person's Triple Divide Meadow, I discovered. That finally worked. I set off with renewed vigor, only to have all my energy slowly sapped by the relentless yapping and sipping of the m%^&%^f!@#^* mosquitoes. Yes, I had on spray. No, I did not wear my net. I cannot bird with a net on. Mosquitoes are evil, evil creatures. I was a carbon dioxide-exhaling piece of meat out there.

So, after ripping a hole in the ass of my new fieldwork pants (same fate as last year's), getting the blood sucked out of me, and counting some birds, the day was over. I hid in my tent or wore my head net (affectionately known as the camping burqa) for the rest of the day.

My bites. They don't look as bad as I remembered. This was the day after I got home, though.
Rodney and I found out we had completed our duties with that day's surveying. So, we planned to get up the next morning and head into the park to do a short hike (my desire to climb Mt. Conness was met with "That will take all day."). Just inside the Tioga Pass entrance was a quick jaunt to Gaylor Lakes and the ruins of an old mining settlement. The place was crawling with insects - both mosquitoes and some kind of gnat. The gnats were in thick clouds all around Lower Gaylor Lake, and we saw Gray-Crowned Rosy Finches just snatching them out of the air as they stood on rocks. They barely had to move! The corn lilies were covered with the gnats. Our other good bird sighting was an American Pipit on the snow around Upper Gaylor Lake. I also saw some Ptarmigan poop, but no Ptarmigan.

Hike finished and more blood sacrificed on the altar of the Great Mosquito God, we took off for the airport in Oakland and back to LA for me.

Tomorrow Mark and I off are off to Yosemite for 10 days, then I go out for my final Woodpecker stint. I'll be back the end of July.

Happy Summer!

Woodpeckering: Part 01

2008-07-06T08:36:00.000-07:00

Finally. Here I am. I have found that going back and forth between my regular life as a compositor, wife, swimmer and my summer life as a ornithological field worker, solitary person, hiker is difficult. When I come home there is lots to attend to (and work!), so I have not been posting. This is my attempt to break that habit.

First off, I have to confess that my camera doesn't work anymore. Rather, it doesn't work more than it does work, so my words (perhaps linked to others' photos) will have to suffice. I think this is another reason I have not been blogging - the visual images I bring home lead to a story; without those, I flounder.

Thursday the 26th, I flew up to Oakland, where I was picked up by Rodney Siegel, the biologist from IBP who roped me into this adventure. I have known Rodney since 2006, when I did my first birding study - looking for Great Gray Owls. Rodney was the man who trained me, and we have remained email buddies since. Last year when I worked on the WIFL (that stands for Willow Flycatcher) crew for IBP, Rodney joined us for a few weeks and we actually backpacked together for old times' sake. This is the second woodpecker expedition with Rodney; we went out June 03-09 also. We are looking for Black-Backed Woodpeckers (BBWO) in fire areas. These birds move into recent fires to take advantage of the outbreaks of wood-boring beetles that occur. We are doing this in National Forests all around the Sierra Nevada. Rodney took a random sample of relatively recent fires (I think within the past 8 years) for us to survey.
This time out we were making a huge loop. From Oakland we drove to Mineral King, in Sequoia National Park.
I have never seen such terrible air quality in the Central Valley. If you are not aware, there are hundreds of fires burning here in California, and a lot of it gets funneled into the Valley. Unfortunately, this was creeping upslope into SNP. The air quality there was rated "Unhealthful for All" at the rangers' station. And, we were about to backpack twenty-some miles roundtrip, up to elevations of 10,587 ft. Great.

The ride to the Cold Springs campground in SNP took us through from the valley through foothill and into Sierra Mixed Conifer regions. A gray fox ran across the road on our drive up. What a gorgeous creature. We spent the night car camping at the aforementioned Cold Springs. We discovered when we went to the ranger station that yellow-bellied marmots
are a problem in Mineral King. The current thinking, as related by a campground volunteer, is that it seems to be the lactating females who are drawn to nibble at our radiator hoses and other such delicacies under the hoods of cars. They think the animals are either getting some trace minerals from their snacks, or are getting high. Whatever the case, Rodney and I were a bit concerned about leaving the car unattended for a 36-hour stretch while we backpacked in over Farewell Gap to the National Forest outside the National Park. They recommended leaving the hood open; the rangers said that seemed to discourage them. ? OK. When we saw people who had the underneath of their cars wrapped in tarps or chicken wire, we were doubtful, but we didn't have a choice. We had no tarp or chicken wire and there wasn't any available.

We spent a relaxing night at the campground. Here's the river that ran through it:
We took a walk and came back to find a deer nibbling on & licking my tent (what's wrong with the animals in Mineral King anyway?)
One corner was covered in deer slobber. Bad deer.

Next day was up and out over the pass. I still can't figure out how long it was. The signs and maps all seem to say different things. Suffice it to say, it was somewhere between 10-14 miles one way, and it featured a 3000-ft. elevation gain (from 7,500 ft. to 10,587 ft.) and then a 1,500-ft. elevation loss. As it turns out, it is very difficult to carry a 35-lb. pack that far at that elevation with unhealthful air. I was coughing at the top - Farewell Gap - when we took a break for lunch. There was much more snow than in the picture I link to. We had to cross a small snowfield on the other side, as we entered the Golden Trout Wilderness, part of Inyo National Forest. I really dislike crossing snowfields; they seem to be inevitably on steep slopes and I am walking on melting snow and if I, say, slipped, well, it's going to be awhile before I stop. Scary. I don't look down and don't think about it too much. I find that gets me through. And, it was quite windy through the gap, but the wind was nothing compared to on the way back. That adds to the challenge of walking on the snowfield.

So, we made it over and to the survey site. It took about six hours. Exhausting hiking, but stunning scenery. We were above treeline and could see as far as the smoke would let us! This is a little closer to the amount of snow, but there was even more.

Rodney and I had a hard time finding a campsite because it was very steep around the study area. We finally decided to just plonk our tents down on a bare patch in between two creeks. We were desperate to go to sleep - we were both exhausted - but the site was completely exposed to the sun and we would have roasted in our tents. We were sitting and waiting for the sun to go down behind the mountains to the west. Inevitably, it did. When I got in my tent to settle down for the night, I realized I was filthy. I saw rivulets etched in the dirt on my arms. I was too tired to do anything about it.

After all this, there were no BBWO! The nerve. Rodney did see a black bear and a goshawk, though. I flushed a sooty grouse. She really let me know of her displeasure, by constantly clucking as I walked away.

After several kilometers of surveying, it was back to camp to break everything down. We left at 11 a.m., a little ahead of schedule. Rodney and I are good hiking partners, because I am better at the uphill and he is better at the downhill. So, I pull him up the mountain, and he pulls me down the other side. I was going as quickly as possible, because I could feel everything from the knee down hurting from the day before, and I knew that the sooner I finished, the better for us both. When we returned to the 10,587-ft. Gap, the wind was roaring through it. Small pebbles were hitting me as I turned around to check Rodney's progress across the snowfield. I actually had to grab the sign marking the pass because when the wind caught me crossways as I turned, it started to blow me over. I don't know how fast that is, but I would have to guess maybe 50 m.p.h. We made it back to Mineral King by 4 p.m. That was the hardest hike I have ever done, even harder than the Hetch Hetchy last year, mostly because of the elevation. The car was unscathed (Thank you, oh Great Marmot God) and we drove back to Cold Springs and collapsed. End of the first survey on our second trip, and we were wiped out and had no woodpeckers to show for it.

To be continued ...

Lame Excuses

2008-06-13T14:31:00.000-07:00

Between a small vacation, malfunctioning camera, and then heading back to work directly after the first installment of looking for the woodpecker, I have gotten nothing posted.
The great news is, we actually found the Black-Backed Woodpecker. I actually found the Black-Backed Woodpecker. Several times. More this weekend.

Summer Soon

2008-05-09T11:14:00.001-07:00

Field season is about the start again, and I am happy to report that I have another gig. I will be looking for Black-Backed Woodpeckers (BBWO) in the Sierra Nevada, California. It be a week here and there during June and July. We will be gathering pilot data for the Forest Service to develop a Sierra-wide BBWO monitoring project. I am again working with the fine folks at IBP, and we will be covering the Sierras from near the Oregon border down to Lake Isabella. It should be lots of fun and educational.
First things first, though - a week spent in Yosemite, helping IBP set up bird banding nets for MAPS. Stay tuned for reports, starting May 25th or so.

Sea Elephants, Sea Kittens & Vegetables

2007-08-06T08:43:00.001-07:00

Elephant Seals/San Simeon

Otter Eating/Morro Bay
We saw him when we were eating our dinner. He dove down and came up with a huge clam and also a rock on which he slammed it. A gull came by and tried to land on him to take his food. The sea kitten was having none of that.

Farmer's Market/Morro Bay

A Little Math

2007-08-03T14:57:00.001-07:00

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