Whooping Crane; sketch by Alison Kent
The basis for acceptance of reports of unusual birds has changed over the years, and continues to evolve. From the beginning of bird study in America to well into the 1950’s, reports of rare birds were seldom taken seriously by the authorities, namely, professional ornithologists, except over the barrel of a shotgun. You had to […]
Swainson's Hawk; © Ann Brice
The Yolo Habitat Conservancy is an arm of county government whose chief job, so far, is to oversee a coherent approach to mitigation for impacts of development and other land disturbances. Projects that degrade or eliminate habitat for certain plant and animal species can get permits to do so by following habitat conservation plans developed […]
Blue morph Snow Goose; © Ann Brice
I hope you’ve been getting out to enjoy our winter birds. It won’t be long before they start heading north again. I especially like visiting the Colusa National Wildlife Refuge because it’s relatively close to Yolo County, and it has a great platform for close viewing of a variety of ducks and geese, as well as a […]
Glaucous Gull; © Bart Wickel
January is a month for fresh starts and that is especially applicable to birders. As the calendar rolls into a new year, birders start their year lists anew and wait for January 1st to count their new year Black Phoebe and Anna’s Hummingbird on January 1st. For some of the more “intense” birders, this also […]
American Dipper; © Erna Tarara
The month of December was a relatively slow one for the birders of Yolo County, with storms drenching the Valley and dumping more than a dozen feet of snow on the Sierra. Rivers and bypasses have swollen, making ample habitat for ducks and geese. This influx of water should create shorebird habitat in rice checks […]
Short-eared Owl; © Erna Tarara
Winter is here, and we finally have rain! Many of us have been out birding and enjoying the green hills, as well as the flooded rice fields (see the related Conservation article by Michael Perrone). One of my favorite birds seen and photographed this season is the Short-eared Owl, which can be found at dusk hunting […]
Tundra Swans taking flight from Rivergarden Farms; © Ann Brice
From Knights Landing to a bit past the Colusa County line, the land along State Highway 45 and over to the Sacramento River belongs to River Garden Farms. It supports crops from alfalfa to watermelons in the growing season, and a remarkable variety of birds in winter. Three thousand acres of fallow rice fields are […]
Rough-legged Hawk; © Ann Brice
November sees thousands and thousands of waterfowl flood into the Central Valley, filling our refuges, fields and bypasses with the spectacle and deafening sound of geese as they take flight together. The temperature has dropped and the last few western neotropical migrants trickle through as they try to make their way south to their wintering […]
Scene from video by Mark Jones
The November issue of this newsletter noted that the Yolo County Board of Supervisors had voted in October to ban off-highway vehicles (OHVs) from Cache Creek. The notice was a bit premature. What the supervisors did was to ask their staff to draft an ordinance to close the creek to OHVs, and bring it back […]
Colusa NWR; © Ann Brice
The holiday season is upon us. I hope everyone will schedule time to take a trip to see our winter birds. The waterfowl are in at the refuges, like Colusa and Sacramento, and more birds are arriving at the Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area. Even the non-birders in your family will be impressed by the sight of […]
Lewis's Woodpecker at Lake Solano; © Ann Brice
Big news! Off-highway vehicles were unanimously banned on Cache Creek at the Yolo County Board of Supervisors meeting on October 26th. This was due in no small part to the persistence of Yolo Audubon board member Rick Williams and Cache Creek Conservancy president Jim Barrett in keeping the issue in front of the county. Habitat […]
Wilson's Warbler; © Manfred Kusch
Many of the common, English-language names for American birds have changed repeatedly over the years. In my time as a birder, the largest egret in Yolo County has been called American, common, and now great egret. Yolo’s most numerous jay has been called California, scrub, western scrub, and now California scrub jay. The local kite […]