Passing of Rich Stallcup

Rich Stallcup -- Ornithologist, Naturalist, Author, and Birder supreme – succumbed to complications from Leukemia on Saturday, December 15 2012 – the night of the Point Reyes Peninsula Christmas Bird Count.

Rich was one of the most famous, prolific, and beloved birders in California, and is known through-out the United States.  Together with our own Guy McCaskie, Rich is considered to be one of the true "Godfathers" of California ornithology.

Rich was a teenager when he began birdwatching in the early 1960s and he has continued to play a significant role in the State's birding world ever since. His birding discoveries on Point Reyes and Marin County are prolific and his Big Day and Bird-a-thon accomplishments are legendary.  Drafted into service during Vietnam and posted to Monterey, Rich recorded 18 "first" Monterey County bird species in a very short time. His Marin County "firsts" are said to number 90.

Rest in Peace Rich.  Yours was that too-rare combination of scientific expertise and human compassion.

Photo: At sea on Monterey Bay 18-Feb-1979 © D. Roberson

The Modernity of Jazz Album Covers: 1950s-1960s

From the blog "How to Be a Retronaut" -- The Modernity of Jazz Album Covers: 1950s-1960s. 

Very cool.

Our National Parks: Of, By, and For ... the Concessionaires?

Nowadays, it can cost upwards of several hundred dollars per night to stay in a lodge or hotel in one of our citizen-owned and much-beloved National Parks. You can also spend hundreds more partaking of amenities like camping, rafting, climbing, horseback riding, hiking, eating, etc.
 
So, what's the common link between all these things? 

Private concessionaires.

Now, is it a problem that the superintendents of some of our most beloved National Parks seem to have an, er, unhealthy relationship with these highly profitable operations?
 
Watchdog group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) believes it's a serious problem. So do investigative journalists at the Seattle Times.

On the other hand, the Obama Administration doesn't seem troubled at all.  

What do you think?

Grand Canyon NP Superintendent David Uberuaga by ERIKA SCHULTZ / THE SEATTLE TIMES

San Pasqual Valley (SD County) Bald Eagle

While out scouting our Escondido CBC area on Sunday, December 16 2012, we came across what is probably a fully mature adult Bald Eagle just off Bandy Canyon Road near the Santa Maria Creek bridge.  Approximate map coordinates are [33.074947,-116.97989].

This is the same tree -- probably even on the same limb -- where we had two Bald Eagles in our Escondido CBC area on 31-DEC-11, and also on 01-JAN-12. One of those looked to be a 3d-year bird, and the other appeared to be a mature adult bird. Sadly, however, that data is not available on the eBird range and point maps, presumably due to the chronic petulance and pedantry of the local eBird Gestap ... , er, monitors.

Please note the markedly ragged flight feathers on the left wing. (Unfortunately, the bird had launched and retracted landing gear before we got anywhere close enough to see any leg banding.)  It would be interesting to know if this bird also turns up at the Ramona Grasslands, which is only a few miles away by air. There was some question at least year's CBC if we were in fact counting the same BAEAs seen that day in Ramona.

***

AVISO! Your best viewing bet is to park at the Santa Ysabel Creek/Bandy Canyon Road trailhead and walk down the trail. But this bird is VERY skittish. We stopped a good distance away, hoping to get off a quick photo. However, the bird still bolted. We last saw it high up and headed southeast towards Ramona.

Cuckoo for Courtesy

There's been yet another ugly outbreak of argumentativeness in our home town on the subject of whether or not to play bird recordings in an effort to attract and see birds. 

Again, we think the ethical answer is pretty simple:  Do whatever you reasonably can to avoid having any direct impact on wildlife when in the field.

Thankfully, we've come a long ways from the days when both professional and amateur ornithologists regularly went into the field armed, not with bins and cameras, but shotguns and nets.  And no responsible birder would (we hope!) argue that it's ethical to toss a brick into a shrub to flush that bird that's maddeningly refusing to just come out and be seen. 

But for some reason, assaulting the ears of birds with phony calls becomes more difficult to figure out.  And more often than not, the 'reasoning' behind the arguments in favor of playing tapes is little more than, "I really want to see the bird, so it must be okay."

Meanwhile, we are proud to report that when we recently found ourselves in Monterey, California just down the road from the Common Cuckoo found in Watsonville, and when we found ourselves early one Saturday morning in the company of between 75 and 100 fellow birders patiently standing around for nearly two hours waiting for the bird to re-appear ... not one person played a tape.  No one even flashed out a cuckoo clock!

Instead of tapes being played and fences being trampled, we were frankly amazed to see one of the most civil, well-behaved impromptu mass gatherings we've ever been a part of.  We saw people helping complete strangers to get a better view, and we saw people willingly giving up prime viewing spots once they'd had a good look. 

In such a graceless and uncivil age, it did our hearts good to be even a small part of that gathering.

    

   

   

The Birds Are Coming!

Almost 50 years ago, Alfred Hitchcock launched a publicity campaign for his new project based on those four words. 

 

Now, NCM Fathom Events, Turner Classic Movies and Universal are bringing this American classic back to the big screen, newly restored and in celebration of Universal's 100th Anniversary, for only one day on Wednesday, September 19th.

 

TCM Event Series

Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds

In Select Movie Theaters Nationwide

Wednesday, September 19th - 7:00 PM (local time)*

 

*Additional matinee showings available at select movie theater locations. Check your local listings for details.

 

Turner Classic Movies Host Robert Osborne will introduce Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds and share with you an exclusive interview he conducted with the film’s star Tippi Hedren specifically for this special presentation. Hedren will not only reveal how “Hitch” hand-picked her to play the part of Melanie Daniels but also how the movie that launched her career -- ended it. Osborne will even reach deep into the TCM Archives to share more on set stories from Hedren’s co-stars: Rod Taylor and Suzanne Pleshette. 

 

Don’t miss your chance to see this chilling horror classic return to the silver screen, newly restored by Universal for their 100th Anniversary for only one day and experience it like never before!

 

Tickets are on sale now!  Go to this link, and enter your zip code to find your nearest participating theater and to purchase tickets today. 

 

Limited Seats Available – so buy your tickets early!  North San Diego County venues include:

 

Oceanside 16
401 MISSION AVE
OCEANSIDE, CA 92054
760-439-1327  

 

San Marcos 18
1180 W SAN MARCOS BLVD
SAN MARCOS, CA 92078
760-471-3734

Coming attractions

Tourism dollars for the birds (and more open-space habitat)!

Environmental costs and impacts of hobby birding

Rufous or Allen’s?

Any other ideas?  Leave them in Comments.

California State Parks chicanery

UPDATE 12 August 2012:  Gov. Jerry Brown has asked lawmakers to spend some of the newfound parks money on a matching fund to solicit future donations -- rather than return money to donors who gave when they believed the system was broke.  WTF!?  Meanwhile, California's Joint Legislative Audit Committee has voted unanimously to approve an independent audit of the state parks department to examine how and why nearly $54 million in two special funds went unreported -- even as budget cuts were threatening to close 70 parks.

UPDATE 28 July 2012:  The Sacramento Bee reports that two more high-level employees have departed the state Department of Parks and Recreation in the wake of a financial scandal. Ann Malcolm had been chief counsel at the Parks Department for two years.  The other is Jay Walsh, who was a special assistant to parks director Ruth Coleman.
Gov. Jerry Brown has directed the Finance Department to audit state parks to explain the $54 million surplus.  Brown also asked the attorney general's office to investigate. On Thursday, the attorney general set up the phone hotline and a special email address to collect tips. 

State employees and members of the public with relevant information are urged to call (916) 324-7561 or email ParksInvestigation@doj.ca.gov.

Legislative Republicans have urged Democratic budget leaders to repeal $15.3 million in annual funding for state parks that lawmakers passed in June.  "As you are aware, the recent budgetary scandals at the Department of Parks and Recreation have undermined the public's faith in government," wrote GOP Assembly members Jim Nielsen and Beth Gaines. "As leaders on the Budget Committee, it is imperative that we work together to restore credibility to an already damaged budget process.

Finally, the California State Parks Foundation, a longtime nonprofit partner with the state, wrote to the governor and Legislature to request a separate probe by the state auditor to assure an "autonomous and unimpeded audit" of state parks. It urged lawmakers to appropriate the surplus to keep parks open and to fund new revenue generating programs.

ORIGINAL POST: 

To all the well-meaning types who rose to the defense of numerous California state parks following threats of park closure due to budget problems  — well, it should come as good news that the breathtakingly incompetent Ruth Coleman, director of the system since 2003, resigned Friday (20 July 2012) after officials discovered that her department had sat on $54 million of unspent money that it had not reported to the Department of Finance as required by as required by long-standing state fiscal policy.  In an especially astonishing bit of accountability for these times, the park department's second-in-command, Acting Chief Deputy Director Michael Harris, was actually canned.

You may remember that this whole park-closure debacle arose from a shortfall of "just" $22 million.

These events came a week after the Sacramento Bee broke the news of another scandal – involving an unauthorized vacation buyout program offered to employees at park headquarters in 2011 – which cost the state more than $271,000.  Manuel Thomas Lopez, the former deputy director of administrative services at state parks, admitted to The Bee that he was responsible for the buyout.  He was demoted in October and resigned in May.

While we here at SDVO do not mean denigrate the efforts of those who sought to protect their favorite state parks, the take-home lesson here is that we continue to pay huge sums of state taxes to fund these parks, and to pay very well the people who run them.  Rather than merely acquiescing to the truly bone-headed idea of locking up our state park gems, or else falling prey to extortion by public officials, our efforts should have gone into making those of Ruth Coleman's ilk explain why they had so miserably mismanaged our irreplaceable public assets in the first place.  If we had done, just maybe we could have all saved a lot of time and effort and money.

Slashing and burning for the ducks of Wister

Some visitors to the Wister Unit near Nyland, California have been surprised to find the entire area surrounding the Nature Trail burned and bulldozed, with only a few trees still standing along the road.

What's going on here?

The California Department of Fish and Game (DFG) reports that the Imperial Wildlife Area was created in 1954 in order to safeguard habitat for migratory birds, alleviate crop damage to adjacent farms and to offer some unique recreation opportunities to Californians. Facilities at the area include roads, parking areas, portable restrooms, flat hiking trails, public phones, primitive camping, maps, bird check lists, and a special viewing platform is available. Drinking water, however, is not available.

So far, so good.

Then in  2008-09, extensive habitat "enhancement work" (at least from a hunter's perspective) at the Wister Unit was funded by a North American Wetlands Conservation Act (NAWCA) $1 million grant administered by DFG. The first step in that action was bulldozing salt cedars and phragmites from levees and units. Units were then burned to remove dense stands of cattails.

This latest effort looks to be more of the same kind of "habitat enhancement."

* * *

As background, Congress passed the NAWCA in 1989 to encourage partnerships to conserve North American wetland ecosystems for waterfowl, other migratory birds, fish, and wildlife. The NAWCA also encourages the formation of public-private partnerships to develop and implement wetland conservation projects consistent with the North American Waterfowl Management Plan (NAWMP).

If there's a problem with any of this, it's that NAWCA-fostered public-private partnerships often involve hunting organizations.  In the case of Wister, substantial money grants went to the California Waterfowl Association (CWA) of Roseville, California.  CWA is a nonprofit organization whose principal objectives are the "conservation, protection, and enhancement of California's waterfowl resources, wetlands, and associated hunting heritage."

Before CWA, Ducks Unlimited (DU), another non-profit with a core hunting mission, was involved in "enhancing" 6,000 acres of the Wister Unit through at least 11 major projects spanning a decade.   

Given all this hunting organization involvement, it should not come as any great surprise when these kind of taxpayer-funded "habitat improvements" focus only on attracting ducks and geese, and on making it easier to shoot them.

It can also be a problem that state wildlife agencies like DFG often have dual missions: endangered species conservation on the one hand, and hunting and fishing enhancement on the other hand. That tends to create a political balancing act that doesn't always end well for non-game species that aren't otherwise protected by the Endangered Species Act or other specific laws.

* * *

Don't get us wrong.  Some of us here at SDVO have done our share of duck hunting.  Some of us even still have a fowling piece or two in the old gun rack.

The real problem, in our view, is the accelerating shift generally away from public projects, to these so-called "public-private partnerships."

This has been a groundswell change in American public administration philosophy based on the dogmatic ideal that government is inherently wasteful and inept, and that private interests will always do a better job of spending the public's money.

Moreover, this concept has been seized upon -- and often cynically in our view -- by a legion of lobbyists from hunting, conservation, and other organizations who adeptly recognized in this emerging "public-private partnership" concept a way to obtain substantial taxpayer funding, combined with broad action authority.  And the beauty of it is, it can all be shamelessly and openly done to primarily benefit these organizations' own memberships.

Unfortunately, what the hunter-friendly "habitat enhancements" at places like Wister show, is that so-called "public-private partnerships" most often involve granting private organizations like CWA and DU a way to further their private interests (i.e., duck and goose hunting for their members) by giving them access to the public checkbook, and by giving them a remarkable degree of control over re-shaping and managing our irreplaceable public lands.

Whelan Lake to get "free" water through 2031

UPDATE  03-August-2012:  The Oceanside City Council approved, on 01-August-2012 by 5-0 vote, Amendment 3 to the Water Supply Agreement between the City of Oceanside and Whelan Lake Bird Sanctuary, Inc.  The City will now provide recycled water to Whelan Lake from the San Luis Rey Wastewater Treatment Plant at no charge through June 30, 2031, in "exchange for use of habitat at the Sanctuary for future mitigation purposes for Water Utilities Department projects."

* * *

The North County Times reports that bird lovers can rejoice -- a compromise is in the offing that would allow Whelan Lake to continue receiving reclaimed water from the city.

The Oceanside City Council is set to vote Wednesday on a new agreement with the Whelan Lake Bird Sanctuary that would allow the city to continue providing free recycled water to the man-made lake through 2031 in exchange for the right to conduct future environmental mitigation projects at the property.

The agreement, if approved, removes a concern that the lake, on the northeastern edge of Oceanside near the city's wastewater treatment plant, might eventually run dry.

In 2011, the city put the nonprofit that runs the sanctuary on notice that it would have to start paying fair market value for the reclaimed water it was receiving for free from the city.

Without a long-term source of cash, sanctuary officials said they were not sure what they were going to do to keep Whelan Lake full.

Brent Jobe, president of the group, said Friday that everyone connected with the sanctuary is ecstatic about the compromise that has been worked out.

* * *

It took some sleuthing, but it appears that Brent Jobe is Director of Whelan Lake Bird Sanctuary, Inc.  This corporation is apparently the organization established to comply with the wishes of Ellen Whelan, who donated her family's entire 305-acre former dairy farm with the understanding that the land was to remain protected and used as a sanctuary for migratory and resident waterfowl.

Water would seem a crucial ingredient to fulfilling Ms. Whelan's wishes.  We here at SDVO wish the current owners well.

However, handing over use of the property to the City of Oceanside for "future environmental mitigation projects" could be fraught with grave danger if it's not absolutely clear who is in charge at the end of the day.  Be careful out there!

* * *

As an aside, we here at SDVO wish there were better access to Whelan Lake for birding.  But if the trust's mission is to provide a bird sanctuary rather than education or recreation, we understand completely that resources must be applied appropriately.  And we do appreciate all the infrastructure improvements made recently, as well as installation of a much more personable caretaker.