May 6, 2022
8:30 to 11:00
After an hour and a half drive to Bolinas, at the southern end of the Point Reyes National Seashore, my Vertebrate Biology students and I arrived at the Palomarin Field Station at 8:30 a.m., where folks from Point Blue Conservation Science had graciously agreed to show us the ropes of mist netting and bird banding. Up on the mountain, it was foggy and just a little bit drizzly, but not too cold – not great weather for seeing birds (or for catching birds in the mist nets).
My class is too large for us to all watch the bird banding demonstration at the same time (due to COVID protocols), so while half of the class was watching the demo, the other half was free to wander the nature trail to make wildlife observations. Total distance walked: 1 km between 8:30 and 11:00 a.m.
I started out the morning on the natural trail, where I mostly wandered around by myself. Occasionally one of my students would come up and ask for help identifying something they’d seen or heard, but at this point the semester, I’m encouraging them to ID things for themselves, so I told them to take a look at a field guide. One of my first birds was an American Robin singing majestically for most of the time we were at the station. I never managed to spot one, but I did get some excellent audio recordings. Wilson’s Warbler were also singing in the woods, but the stars of the show for this part of my day were several Pacific Wren. I started hearing them singing right after heading down the nature trail, but I wasn’t able to get a look at one. The precipitation wasn’t helping. In this kind of habitat, I’m mostly able to spot things by watching for movement. Today, there was just enough rain that fat drops would form and fall onto leaves below, causing movement that triggers the same part of my brain that is triggered when I see a bird in motion. Finally, though, when I’d gone about as far as I intended to go along the path, I did spot a bird flitting around in the bushes. A few minutes later, the bird began to sing. I knew it was close – very close – but for the life of me, I couldn’t spot it. When a couple of my students wandered over and caused the bird to flush, I realized that it had been perched on a branch RIGHT in front of me (not 10 feet away), in plain sight, but I’d been looking for it further away. *sigh* A few minutes later, this bird (or maybe another individual) popped up on some trees right over the path and once again began to sing. In clear, beautiful view. Of course, I couldn’t get my camera to focus on the bird, so I have a single super blurry photo. I did get some fantastic audio recordings of both the song and the call, though:
When I was heading back to the station for the 2nd bird banding demo, some students pointed out a bird perched at the top of a tree. Ah! This explains a haunting vocalization I’d heard a few minutes earlier: a Band-tailed Pigeon, a bird I’d seen here last time I’d visited the field station. Later, I saw a few of them flying overhead. Other birds heard, but not seen, on my nature trail hike included Golden-crowned Kinglet, an Orange-crowned Warbler, and Pacific-slope Flycatcher.
Back at the field station, I was able to get some nice photos of a pair of Anna’s Hummingbird when they came to the feeder next to the deck where we had gathered for the banding demonstration. There was also a lovely Western Giant Puffball growing in the meadow nearby.
The first group watching the bird banding demonstration had seen any birds, and given the weather, we weren’t too hopeful that anyone would be caught in the mist nets for the second group, either. Even so, Mark gave us a great overview of the project, and then took us out to check the nets. I only hiked about half of the route with them before returning to the main building. Again, I didn’t see many birds, but I heard a whole lot of them, including some news ones for the day: Chestnut-backed Chickadee, Bewick’s Wren, Song Sparrow, and Swainson’s Thrush.
Well, no one had been caught in the mist nets on this second demonstration either, and it looked like the bird banding was going to be a bust. As we were wrapping up the question and answer period, though, Mark got a call on the walking talkie that a bird had flown into one of the nets. OH YEAH! I asked Mark to not say the species ID, and instead allow the students to identify it themselves. When Naomi arrived with the bird, it turned out to be a tiny, delicate yellow bird with a dapper black cap. Students had some guesses (the best being lesser goldfinch), but eventually (after an offer of extra credit to the first folks to shout out the name), a couple of students came up with the right ID: Wilson’s Warbler. (Afterwards, I realized that literally all of them should have been able to ID this bird, as it was on our last exam. Hmmnh).
It was wonderful to see this gorgeous bird up close. Naomi walked through the steps of processing the bird: taking measurements, determining sex and an estimate of age, and putting a band on the bird’s leg. Then, everyone was able to take a good, close-up look. It doesn’t get better than this.
After the demonstration, we headed back to the vans for the drive back to campus. A few students asked if we could stop at another site in Point Reyes to look for mushrooms, and I was game. Most of the class opted to just head home, though. We did have one more notable sighting, however, as we were trying to leave the field station. As I was driving out of the parking lot (with two vans behind me), four California Quail wandered into the middle of the road in front of us. As I drove up behind them, going extremely slowly, two males and two females (all adults) were foraging on the dirt road, completely unconcerned that we were trying to get past them. It took us literally 5 minutes to get safely past them, but they are so adorable, no one was bothered by the delay.
I’ll write about our further adventures at Bear Valley in a separate entry.
Species List
Birds observed: Western bluebird (Sialia mexicana occidentalis), American robin* (Turdus migratorius propinquus), Wilson’s Warbler (Cardellina pusilla chryseola), Red-shouldered hawk* (Buteo lineatus elegans), Canada goose* (Branta canadensis moffitti), Mourning dove (Zenaida macroura marginella), Pacific wren (Troglodytes pacificus), Song sparrow* (Melospiza melodia), American crow (Corvus brachyrhynchos hesperis), Spotted towhee* (Pipilo maculatus), Golden-crowned kinglet* (Regulus satrapa olivaceous), Orange-crowned warbler* (Leiothlypis celata lutescens), Band-tailed pigeon (Patagioenas fasciata fasciata), Anna’s hummingbird (Calypte anna), Chestnut-backed chickadee* (Poecile rufescens neglectus), Pacific-slope flycatcher* (Empidonax difficilis difficilis), Swainson’s thrush* (Catharus ustulatus oedicus), Bewick’s wren* (Thryomanes bewickii marinensis), Dark-eyed junco (Junco hyemalis oreganus), California quail (Callipepla californica brunnescens)
*Heard only
Notable plant and fungal species: Western giant puffball (Calvatia booniana), Pacific poison oak (Toxicodendron diversilobum), Coyote brush (Baccharis pilularis), Hairy brackenfern (Pteridium aquilinum var. pubescens), Ribes sp., Coast live oak (Quercus agrifolia), Bay laurel (Umbellularia californica), Western sword fern (Polystichum munitum), Bowltube iris (Iris macrosiphon), Broadleaf forget-me-not (Myosotis latifolia) Beard lichen (Usnea sp.), Douglas Fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii), Common cowparsnip (Heracleum maximum)
Let me know what you think!