Hawk Hill Gypsy

One of my favorite 'reset' buttons is getting up to Hawk Hill in Marin County every couple weeks as a volunteer for Golden Gate Raptor Observatory. A 360-degree view of the Bay Area will put nearly everything back in perspective (plus helping track the Golden Gate Raptor migration not only restores my wonder but allows me to utilize some of my college-accredited field & ornithological skills). After a very full, long, fun weekend of music at FAR-West, I was back on the Hawk Hill Monday. Yesterday, our hours of counting were capped off by the release of a Red-Tail Hawk dubbed 'Gypsy' who will be tracked via Telemetry for clues on just how hawk spend their time. Hawk migration season runs into early December. Get up on the hill if you can! And find out more about GGRO at http://www.parksconservancy.org/programs/ggro/

A photo posted by Deborah Crooks (@deborahrcrooks) on Oct 19, 2015 at 4:31pm PDT

Then today I heard a great broadcast on NPR, with Terry Gross talking to wildlife photographer Gerrit Vyn and essayist Scott Weidensaul about some of the remarkable abilities of birds. Vyn and Weidensaul contributed to a new book about North American birds. Flights Of Fancy: Exploring The Songs And Pathways Of 'The Living Bird' http://n.pr/1KkI1HW

The Living Bird: 100 Years of Listening to Nature, by Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Gerrit Vyn, Barbara Kingsolver, Scott Weidensaul and Lyanda Lynn Haupt

 

California Coastal Clean-Up Day

Scouts on duty

Our stretch of the Bay to clean up

We got up this morning and drove out to Ballena Isle to join the local efforts of the statewide Coastal Clean-Up Day. Our local contingent was bolstered by several troops of Boy Scouts, as well as yacht club members and sailors and local Alameda residents such as ourselves. Armed with buckets, bags and gloves we trolled our designated areas of the island for trash (aka anything man-made). You'd be surprised at how many bottles, fishing line, foam, cigarette butts, clothing, balloons, random bags and food containers were wedged into those rocks to the left. Or maybe you wouldn't! In any case, two of us picked up 21 lbs in an hour and a half. Hundreds more pounds of human-generated debris were collected by the rest of the crew. Frightening, especially when you consider this is regarded as a pretty clean area. In any case, it felt good to help out. It will feel better to keep see more folks keeping their trash both to a minimum and out of the water. Kudos to the California Coast Commission for organizing the event, and to everyone who got up early on a Saturday to participate. Coastal Clean-Up Day is the state's largest volunteer event!

On the Bay

I'm not a sailor — I prefer floating and tranquil kayak paddles to heavy wind and wave — but I live with one. So very slowly I've been acclimating to sailing. As a result I am gaining a new found appreciation of the San Francisco Bay despite having lived near it much of my life. Yesterday, was a gorgeous and calm day: surf scoters and pelicans, terns and at least one sea lion were coasting over or in the water, and I got more sun than I bargained for despite the SPF 50 sunscreen. It was a great cap to a busy weekend of shows.
When the Bay is looking this good, it's easy to forget how many people have fought to save the bay from pollution, over-development and general decline.  Prompted to do some research on SF Bay whose currently helping the Bay, I found a great list on Bay Nature of local advocacy and conservation groups to support or with whom to volunteer. Check it out!