2 March 08
No Al B. Tross, But...
With a friend visiting from Massachusetts and another one eager to see more California birds, we took a trip out to Point Arena and Bodega Bay yesterday. It’s a long drive: it took four hours just to get to Point Arena from Davis. We left at five.
The Laysan albatross that has been wintering in Point Arena for the past 14 years wasn’t there. We knew it was a long shot, since this is right around the time it has historically departed for (presumably) Hawaii, but we decided to spend a good time there, look for it, see what else we saw, and head down the coast.
Point Arena yielded a flotilla of horned grebes; black oystercatchers, and Hutton’s vireo plus unhoped-for Allen’s hummingbirds; Willow Creek Road, just south of Jenner, turned up wrentit and more Allen’s; Bodega Bay was an orgy of gulls (we had all four cycle Western gulls on adjacent picnic tables for comparisons) plus my first black scoters for many years, Pacific loon, the huge and impressive array of shorebirds, more photographable oystercatchers, pelagic cormorants, pigeon guillemots, and a fierce northwest wind by mid-afternoon.
These long birding days, in the company of enthusiastic and skilled people, are delightful, even if you pay for the early mornings and long drives later. Christopher, I hope you got home safely. We loved having you here. Fernando, cuando quieras, salimos otra vez…
27 February 08
Encyclopedia of Life Opens Its Pages
Today I went to a presentation about the Encyclopedia of Life, a project to provide a set of web pages for every one of the 1.8 million species on Earth. As it turns out, the first incarnation of the site went live yesterday, and proved to be too popular for the site’s own good, their computers quickly crashing under the load — they got about 19 million hits yesterday!
The site has initially been populated with about 30,000 entries, with 25 of these being selected to serve as exemplars showing what the fully fleshed-out content will look like. They hope to have entries for all the named species within a decade.
On the way down to this presentation in San Francisco, I was able to do some public transport bigbying. From the train I saw a ring-necked pheasant, marbled godwits, willets, and a ruddy turnstone. Best of all was seeing a flock of red-masked parakeets, the birds made famous by the story of the wild parrots of Telegraph Hill.
26 February 08
Signing Up for Saving the World
That will be $13 on Paypal, please.
Why not join in? You can surely fill a small 64-page book by August 1!
25 February 08
Rattling Around Upstairs
Yesterday morning I dreamt that I was with my brother and nephew who were wondering if I had been following the Tour de France this time, which had just ended. I hadn’t, but the news in the paper and the highlights on TV were discussing Jelle Nijdam’s victory in the Tour. At which point the cat wakes me up, and I’m wondering where on earth I came up with that name, so I write it down. When I get up in the morning I search on the name and find his Wikipedia entry. It turns out he is a Dutch former professional cyclist who had held the yellow jersey in the Tour for one day in the 1987 Tour, for two days in the 1988 Tour, and won a couple of stages in 1991. I probably haven’t run into his name since!
24 February 08
Duck Days and a Bag of Rice
A postdoc arrived from Spain a fortnight ago. He’s working in Plant Sciences under the direction of a faculty member — Numenius is working on a project concerning climate change and agriculture with her, so he met Fernando.
Fernando’s from Madrid, where I grew up. He’s also a birder; a really, really good birder. But he doesn’t know our birds. There’s something wonderful about having a newcomer enthuse over your robins and white-breasted nuthatches (we all went out on bikes last weekend; today it’s raining hard, time to catch up on laundry).
Apparently in Spain (in Europe? Richard? ) people are now taking bags of rice — large bean bags, in effect — along with them when they’re birding to anchor their spotting scope (and long camera lens) from the car window without having to set up a tripod. Since we got handed bags of sushi rice at the California Duck Days reception on Friday night, I might just cobble this together. Might be useful on the bike, too…
20 February 08
Meeting Around The Moon
I’ve become quite a fan of the Clear Sky Clock. This is a set of weather forecasts for astronomers, telling when the skies will be clear and transparent. Anyway, it correctly predicted we’d have a break from clouds and rain this evening just in time for tonight’s lunar eclipse.
The eclipse had to fit in around Yolo Audubon activities though — tonight was the monthly general meeting, preceded by the dinner for the speaker. I cycled over to the dinner in downtown Davis and while riding eastward saw the moon rising with a bit of shadow nibbled out of it. I got out the binoculars to have a better look, only to discover I had to be standing right in the middle of the road to see the moon. It was a quick look.
The meeting was at 7:30 so I got to see the moon at totality. Not a prolonged look, but at least lunar eclipses are easily seen from the middle of town. After all, we saw the last one while watching quite an historic event.
19 February 08
Before it Rains Again
It’s predicted to start raining this afternoon or evening; I wanted to get one of the vegetable beds lined against gophers and filled before the whole place gets turned to mud again.
There’s always four times as much soil as you think. Then I wanted to incorporate a lot of horse manure into it to let the bed sit a while. That’s a lot of trips across the road (I caught a horse that had escaped and spent some time weeding with Mary on separate trips). Heavy barrow. I have blisters on my hands. I also loosened all the soil in the herb garden, where a gopher is busily working its way through my artichokes (and the latest victim, the yarrow). I’ve ordered more plant cages against the varmints…
This wooden gizmo at right is a fantastic tool for turning newspaper strips into small pots, which can then be planted straight into the ground without disturbing root systems. I may try to get the ones I filled to soak in rainwater this afternoon.
18 February 08
Great Backyard Bird Count
It’s not too late to participate in the Great Backyard Bird Count! This citizen science project has been happening this weekend and ends Monday February 18. Basically you count all the birds you see at a single location over a period of time of at least 15 minutes and report this online. Between the two of us we did three counts today: one from our backyard, one over by Putah Creek, and one in the Arboretum.
16 February 08
First Bigby Flat
Poor Numenius got his first Bigby flat tire today at the Davis Wetlands. We had seen our first cliff swallows of the year; our first Bigby cattle egret; American avocets — and then he felt the tire. I stopped at a pond to scan while he pumped it up and saw a horned grebe there, definitely a nice surprise. We limped home — he stopped to pump it up twice — and ran and got a new tube while I ordered burritos for lunch.
After lunch we met up with a postdoc from Spain who just arrived last week and wanted to go out birding — on his bike. He was excited about every bird, since they’re all new; it’s a great thrill to take someone who isn’t jaded by American robins out into our fields and creek and through West Campus. My memory of Spanish names for birds is definitely rusty but lots came back: “mito,” for instance, is the Spanish name for long-tailed tit, a word I haven’t seen or heard for over 20 years…
The binoculars were hauled out once again this evening so we could see the International Space Station on its way overhead. My but it’s bright. No wonder people report flying saucers.
15 February 08
Signs Of Spring
The first almond blossoms on our tree have opened.