06 Jun Nature’s Fanny Pack: A Hootin’ Survey Season Start
A week in the life of a wildlife Intern
For this month’s blog I’ll be covering a week in the life of a wildlife intern! With all of our surveys having picked up we have been busier than a bumble bee. Currently, our surveys have picked up with a mixture of our waterfowl flocks nesting on Alcatraz, our Northern Spotted owl surveys, a continuation of our plover surveys, and a start on our harbor seal surveys counting their pups.
BIRDS OF ALCATRAZ
On Alcatraz, disturbance monitoring occurs as the surrounding waters of the island are busy with boat and aircraft traffic. Once our western gull colonies sound the alarm; Brant’s cormorants flush! Large disturbances have been mainly provoked by the occasional redtail hawk video below on how our gulls go after these raptors. Taking notes of these disturbances are important to monitor our cormorants as these little sensitive waddling fellows when stressed too much will vomit or flush and abandon their nests. Our Alcatraz population of Brant’s cormorants has been recorded as one of the largest in the world!
NORTHERN SPOTTED OWLS
Throughout GOGA and Point Reyes we have been conducting Northern Spotted owl surveys checking for a variety of things. The presence of a male/female, their occupancy, nesting, and productivity. In order to sex individuals vocalization is heard and aging is confirmed looking at the tail end tips the shape and color, if there’s a thicker white outline on the end tips of the feathers and the tail is pointed it’s a subadult S1 and an S2 has white outline with round ends. If there’s no white outline and the shape is rounded it’s an adult. We have come across a couple nesting pairs and below are some of my favorite videos capturing their majestic presence.
HARBOR SEAL MONITORING
At our Marin headlands, in Point Bonita, we are doing harbor seal counts and have seen a couple of still pregnant females! The counts include multiple rock locations at Point Bonita when the tide is below 3ft to see the rocks be the most exposed. Seals can be seen sunbathing and pups riding their moms backs clumsily trying to get on rocks to bask themselves.
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