Natural History Journal

As a group, mammals are surprisingly diverse.  While all mammals breathe air, have fur or hair, and give birth to live young, they vary significantly in their habitats and modes of transportation.  While most walk or hop while moving about on land, some fly and others swim, some spending most or all of their lives in water!  While some of these aquatic mammals spend a good deal of time on land at the water's edge, like seals and sea lions, other mammals, such as whales and dolphins, never leave the marine environment they were exquisitely designed to inhabit. With 840 miles of coastline (ranking third in the nation behind Alaska and Florida), it is perhaps not surprising that marine mammals make up a significant portion of California's wildlife. Let's explore the variety of mammals that may be seen along California's beautiful coast and within its offshore waters. Sea Otter, Elkhorn Slough Sea Otters, the most aquatic members of the weasel family, only rarely come asho...

With all the less-than-great news floating around out there these days about the future of the environment in general, and birds in particular, it's refreshing to pause and reflect on the success stories the world of conservation has seen in the fifty years since the implementation of the Endangered Species Act in December of 1973. While human activity has undoubtedly caused bird populations to decrease drastically in that span of time, (and sadly those numbers may continue to drop) conservationists across North America have managed to make some pretty incredible changes for the better for a number of species as well.  The Endangered Species Act has protected over 1,600 species in its fifty-year history, and is credited with saving nearly 300 species from extinction.     The California Condor is one such example, a species that would be gone today if it weren't for the incredible work of a massive team of researchers and conservationists.  Other success stori...

For your daily dose of adorable, and to liven up the dreary days of winter, have a look at this family of Pygmy Nuthatches I encountered last July while birding on the coast near Carmel! Juvenile Pygmy Nuthatch in a Monterey Cypress Tipping the tiny scales at about one-third of an ounce (or around nine grams, the equivalent weight of nine paperclips), Pygmy Nuthatches are the smallest of the four North American species of nuthatch.  Though small, these little mites of the pines make their presence known as they call to each other with an incessant series of high-pitched piping notes that has been likened to a rubber ducky being squeezed.  Often, this sound pelting down from the treetops is the first indication that these active little birds are in the area. Juvenile Pygmy Nuthatch, begging for food. Juvenile Pygmy Nuthatch, awaiting its meal delivery. Pygmy Nuthatches do everything together: they breed cooperatively, with relatives helping a mated pair raise its brood of up t...

"What makes a duck a duck?" This question was posed to me the other day by a friendly gentleman who stopped to chat as I stood behind my spotting scope, peering over massive swells and crashing waves at a distant flock of dark specks bobbing on the surface of the water beyond the breakers.  These specks, I had informed him, were ducks.  More specifically, they were a delightful collection of three species of scoter, a highly specialized type of sea duck designed for life on the rugged, wave-battered coast.   Those are ducks?   I could feel the skepticism.   Yes, ducks.  But not dabbling puddle ducks, like the familiar Mallard, or even hardy diving ducks, like scaup.   These are sea ducks! Surf Scoters in Monterey Bay, off the coast of Moss Landing, California.  July. I answered his question the best I could with somewhat divided attention: Biology, physiology, behavior and life history all combine to make a duck a duck, so that even...

Because who doesn't love turtles?!  Turtles and tortoises, members of the order Testudines, are by far my favorite group of reptiles (though I am a fan of lizards as well!) and it is always a treat to come across one of our native turtles in the wild.  California's native Northwestern Pond Turtle But first, what is the difference between a turtle and a tortoise? Worldwide, there are fourteen turtle families (taxonomic groupings below order) and one tortoise family.  The turtles, which include such disparate families as the pond turtles, the sea turtles and  the snapping turtles, are generally at least partially aquatic, while tortoises are differentiated by their entirely terrestrial lifestyle. All turtles and tortoises are protected by architecturally advanced shells, rivaled by no other animals in their structural complexity and durability.  Hard shells provide a measure of protection for adult turtles, compensating somewhat for their slow speed which would ot...

And when I say a "moment," I really do mean a moment!  Warblers can be tricky to capture on camera, at least for a rank amateur like myself, because of their tendency to stick to areas of dense leafy cover, and their aversion to staying still for longer than, well, a moment.   But I happened to catch this beautiful Townsend's Warbler preening one morning last week in Monterey, and managed to snap a few of the better warbler photos I've ever managed to capture. Warblers are considered "birders' gold" by many, and rightly so!  Most of North America's 54 species of warblers sport yellow plumage to some extent, from the entirely yellow Wilson's, Prothonotary and Yellow Warblers, to those with more subtle patches of yellow, like the Black-throated Gray and Yellow-rumped Warblers.  While North America boasts a wealth of warblers, most of them are birds of Northern and Eastern forests.  During spring and fall migration, birders turn out en masse to catc...

More commonly known as "starfish," sea stars truly are shining stars of the tidepool.  Last week while exploring one of my favorite places, the coast and tidepools around Point Pinos, I was delighted to come across a couple dozen bat stars of all colors and sizes.   Though I still slip up and refer to these beautiful creatures as "starfish" on occasion, sea stars are not fish at all.  Having neither fins, scales, gills, or even blood, sea stars are echinoderms (members of the phylum Echinodermata), related to sand dollars, sea urchins and sea cucumbers. Residents of kelp forests and the rocky intertidal zone, bat stars are found from Sitka Alaska to Baja California, from tidepools to depths of 950 feet. Though sea stars appear quite sessile, or fixed to one spot, they are actually quite mobile, moving along the sea floor and tidepool substrates on hundreds of tiny little suction cup-tipped tube feet.  (Check out the photo below for a look at the underside of a bat s...