CAS Ornithology and Mammalogy Blog 

Surveying birds in Milne Bay Province, Papua New Guinea

Friday, 12/16/11

We recently spent a very successful 2-month field trip in the island province of Milne Bay, Papua New Guinea surveying birds and collecting samples to screen for various avian diseases.  We had an amazing crew - collaborator David Mindell, Post-doctoral researcher Jerome Fuchs, Berkeley PhD student Zachary Hanna, San Francisco State University Masters Student Molly Dodge, PNG National Museum researcher Bulisa Iova, and the amazing artist Isabella Kirkland.  We spent two months sailing on the SV Dalai, a French-build sloop owned and operated by Bruno and Carmen Montel.

This ship was an excellent way to get around, and the crew and field team were amazing.  We departed from Alotau, Milne Bay Province in September, and returned in November after sailing to Normanby Island, the Amphlet Group, Dawson Island, BudiBudi Atoll, Woodlark Island, Ginetu Island, Gawa Island, and the Trobriand Islands, just to name a few of the key islands.

We captured and sampled over 500 birds, including this Emerald Ground Dove (Chalcophaps indica), and the Collared Kingfisher (Halcyon chloris) below.

Although it may look like I’ve not blogged for a while, this is not so.  We were invited by the New York Times to blog in their very excellent series, Scientist At Work, and this link should direct you to most of our posts from the recent field trip:

http://scientistatwork.blogs.nytimes.com/tag/papua-new-guinea/

Feel free to post comments or questions here, and enjoy!

CAS Ornithology and Mammalogy Blog 

Casual Sunday birding in Golden Gate Park… With the camera

Monday, 02/06/12

Well, it’s a sunny Sunday in Golden Gate Park.  The weather was warm and pleasant, and the winter birds were active.  My wife Tiffany and I took a stroll up the hill and into the park near Lloyd Lake, where there are often plenty of ducks, gulls, coots, and even a grebe or two.  I had my camera with me since I needed a little practice using my long lens on birds. Although none of these are great photos, they show some of the common species that you can see here in the park:

A couple Song Sparrows (Melospiza melodia) were skulking in the underbrush near Stow Lake.  They are difficult to see, but have a very distinctive pattern of banding on the chest which come to a spot in the center.

Here you can see the Song Sparrow’s streaking pattern very nicely.

And of course, the Dark-eyed Juncos (Junco hyemalis) are common around many footpaths.  This junco was in a group of 4-5 others and feeding on bread and bird feed scraps left on the ground by some earlier hikers.  The Song Sparrows were also with them, but the sparrows were more skiddish and more quickly jumped into the thicket behind them while I got these photos.

Several Ring-necked Ducks (Aythya collaris) have been hanging out in Lloyd Lake, near the 25th Avenue north entrance to the park.  Although the Mallards are still slightly more abundant, the Ring-neck Ducks have been common here this year with over 20 in the lake today.

The Hooded Mergansers (Lophodytes cucullatus) were my favorite sighting today.  They are always very spectacular (the male is above), and are great divers.  We often see a pair here on Lloyd Lake, and today there was one male and two females.  The male was pretty cheeky, and allowed us to get a pretty close look and some decent photos.  He aggressively chased two male Mallards away from a patch of weeds where he was diving, despite the fact that he was only a fraction of the Mallards’ size.

Here is a male Hooded Merganser swimming alongside a female.  They stayed closely together most of the time.

I was surprised by how few gulls I saw this morning.  Lloyd Lake is a great place to see Mew Gulls (Larus canus) this time of year, and we got great looks at several.  They are smaller than the Ring-billed or Western Gulls, and have almost no visible marking on the bill.

The much larger Western Gull (Larus occidentalis) was also present (although I took this photo on the Stow Lake boat dock).  These tend to be a little more aggressive than the Mew Gulls, and they respond quickly to the many people who bring bread to feed the ducks.

My wife Tiffany told me that there were Widgeon here too, and this is one of the reasons that we walked up to the lake.  Here is a male American Widgeon (Anas americana) in non-breeding plumage, with the obvious white forehead.  There were only about 3-4 pairs, but they too were relatively easy to see and came pretty close.

We looked for the Wood Ducks (Aix sponsa)  that we often see on the western side of the lake, but we failed to spot them today.  I still haven’t photographed them, and I was hoping to get a nice photo of their head pattern in the sun.  Instead, we saw a lone male Green-winged Teal (Anas crecca) sleeping with its bill tucked into its back feathers.

American Coots (Fulica americana) were common on all of the bodies of water in the park (as usual),

And we got great looks at Pied-billed Grebes (Podilymbus podiceps) on both Lloyd Lake and Stow Lake.

Last but not least (unless you are talking about size) were Anna’s Hummingbirds (Calypte anna).  We saw several out servicing the flowers.  I understand that the Academy is working on upcoming pollination exhibits which will most certainly feature hummingbirds.  Anna’s Hummingbird is a year-round resident that survives well on the parks many flowers, which provide a great source of nectar and pollen.

Another unphotographed highlight would have to be the California Quail (Callipepla californica) that we heard just north of Lloyd Lake.  As we approached the lake, we could hear some scraping in the underbrush, but I was unable to see what was in there.  I figured a junco, towhee, or even a squirrel, and walked on without working too hard to see it.  But later, when we were across the lake, we heard multiple clear “Chi-ca-go” calls of California Quail.  We walked back hoping to photograph one, but alas we were unable to see or even hear them again.  The quail are noteworthy, as I learned at a recent Golden Gate Audubon Conservation Committee Meeting, because California Quail were all but extirpated from the city limits.  There are believed to be only a single family group or “covey” that still lives around the Botanical Garden and Arboretum.  At first I suspected that this could be the same group that had just moved deeper into the park.  But as we walked toward the Academy, we heard another group of quail at the northeast end of Stow Lake - just across Martin Luther King Drive from the Arboretum.  I would still like to get a good look at the covey at Lloyd’s Lake, but it is tentatively great news to me that there may be another group settling there.

Why are the quail disappearing in the city?  It is believed that off-leash dogs are probably the major threat to ground-nesting birds in the city.  As the population rises and as people in the city want dogs for companionship, the impact on ground nesting birds is increasing.  Dogs are also a huge threat to shorebirds - especially the endangered Snowy Plover (Charadrius alexandrinus).  So please do your part and keep your dog on a leash unless you are in a designated off-leash area!

It was nice to get the camera out and shoot a few of the common local species.  In just a couple weeks, Gary Sharlow and I will be taking a group of photographers to Crissy Field to teach and practice some tricks for photographing birds in the field.  This will be a part of the adult programming that Gary has been developing, and a potential source of data and images for citizen science projects.

California Academy of Sciences - Climate Change Blog 

Letter to the Wall Street Journal: Check With Climate Scientists for Views on Climate

Saturday, 02/04/12

Thirty eight scientists, with expertise and who actually research climate change, address the Wall Street Journal.

“Do you consult your dentist about your heart condition? In science, as in any area, reputations are based on knowledge and expertise in a field and on published, peer-reviewed work. If you need surgery, you want a highly experienced expert in the field who has done a large number of the proposed operations. ” (read the rest here.)

The Naturalist Notebook 

Celebrate Engineering

Thursday, 02/02/12

Photo: Flying dragon (Draco volans). Alfius Leman

Test your design skills by creating a variety of simple objects from a Borneo glider to an aluminum foil boat for transferring marine specimens. Join us for these and other drop-in activities to celebrate National Engineers Week (February 19th -25th).

Saturday, February 18th, 11:00 am - 3:00 pm in the Classroom

The Naturalist Notebook 

Spotlight On…

Wednesday, 02/01/12

Check out this week’s featured specimen!

(Pictured below, really close up!)

Photo: N. Sincero © California Academy of Sciences

Can you guess what it is?

Here are some hints:

• This animal eats mainly grasses, leaves, fruits and bark.
• This animal can communicate over long distances via rumbles that cause seismic vibrations in the ground.

Leave us a comment with your answer! Then come see us in the Classroom on Sunday, February 5th at 2:30 pm for Science Story Adventures to see if you’re right and to learn more about this animal. Science Story Adventures is our program for children ages 4 - 8 and their caregivers. In the program, we explore the natural world through stories, specimens, games and crafts.

Teachers' Lounge 

Member Appreciation Month

Wednesday, 02/01/12

Love is in the air — and under the sea. From February 1 — 29, 2012 members enjoy special savings, access to our new aquarium gallery titled Animal Attraction, and programs highlighting the courtship and reproductive mechanisms that drive the evolution of life.

Plus, join or renew a Teacher membership today and receive a FREE general admission ticket so you can share the Academy experience with a friend. Use promo code LOVETIX when purchasing online.

Visit the membership website to find out more about becoming a member!

See our new gallery, Animal Attraction, opening Feb 11!

In a series of eighteen tanks, the exhibit will explore the concept that nothing in life is more important than reproductive success. If not for reproduction, plants wouldn’t bloom, birds wouldn’t sing, and deer wouldn’t sprout antlers.
 
For the first time, the Academy will use iPads as exhibit labels, allowing visitors to zoom in on gorgeous images, watch videos of these strategies and behaviors in action, and guide their own digital explorations using interactive touch screens throughout the exhibit. A striking wall of photos will illustrate additional examples of plant and animal reproduction and courtship strategies.
 
For more details on the exhibit read the press release or visit the exhibit website.

Teachers' Lounge 

A Changing Naturalist Center for 2012

Wednesday, 02/01/12

As the new year begins, we at the Academy are excited about the many new developments coming in 2012. Just in time for Valentine’s Day, a new aquarium gallery, Animal Attraction, will open February 11th, and prepare to be moved on May 26th with the opening of a major new exhibit and Planetarium show, Earthquake.

Changes are afoot in the Naturalist Center, as well. In order to free up resources to focus on creating more hands-on opportunities for visitors at the Academy to engage with science and sustainability, library materials are no longer available for loan.

The following is a timeline of when these changes will occur:

• New Naturalist Center lending cards are no longer available.
• March 1, 2012: Last day to renew an item already checked out
• April 1, 2012: Books and DVDs will stop circulating (any items checked out before April 1 will be due 21 days from the checkout date)

We know that access to books and DVDs is important to teachers and want to assure you that these resources will remain available for you to read and watch within the Naturalist Center space. Pages of particular interest can be scanned and e-mailed free of charge, or photocopied for a small fee.

On your next visit, stop by to check out the Naturalist Nook, a new space within the Naturalist Center dedicated to hands-on science activities, made possible by this shift. As always, the Naturalist Center will continue to offer reference services - helping you find answers to questions about the natural world and assisting with the identification of natural history specimens. The Naturalist Center is—and will continue to be—a dynamic resource for teachers and students who are curious to learn more about the natural world.

You can read all about the services, programs, and resources the Naturalist Center offers by going to their website and blog.

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