Our fall 2011 issue includes a landmark foldout map of Bay Area Food Landscapes, along with features about volunteer hawk trackers, a citizen-run park in Napa, major habitat plans in the East Bay, stargazing with kids, and more! Cover photo by Ralf Burgert.
October 01, 2011 by Bay Nature
In this section, we survey the farms and ranches that still make up some 40 percent of the Bay Area’s …
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October 14, 2011 by Kate Marianchild
Would you believe that acorn woodpeckers have the most complex social relationships of any animal with a backbone? One expert says so. Watch the birds for a while, and you just might agree!
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October 01, 2011 by David Loeb
By Miles O. Hayes and Jacqueline Michel, Pandion Books, distributed by Heyday, 2010, 352 pages, $29.95.
It’s hard to argue …
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October 01, 2011 by Jenny Stampp
By Laure Latham, The Mountaineers Books, 2011, 364 pages, $19.95.
Hiking with kids can seem daunting, but Laure Latham is …
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October 01, 2011 by Dan Rademacher
Photos by Stephen Joseph, text by Linda Rimac Colberg, Mount Diablo Interpretive Association, 2010, 266 pages, $50.
Photographer Stephen Joseph …
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October 01, 2011 by Dan Rademacher
By Ariel Rubissow Okamoto and Kathleen M. Wong, 2011, UC Press, 352 pages, $24.95 paperback, $65 hardcover.
The latest installment …
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October 01, 2011 by Robin Meadows
By Laurence R. Costello, Bruce W. Hagen, and Katherine S. Jones, UC Agriculture and Natural Resources (anrcatalog.ucdavis.edu), 2011, 265 pages, …
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October 01, 2011 by Carly Peltier
Pease Press Maps (peasepress.com), 2010, double-sided foldout map, $7.95.
Whether you’re looking for a new lunch-break stroll or an all-day …
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October 01, 2011 by Sue Rosenthal
By Tom Courtney, Wilderness Press, 2011, 234 pages, $16.95.
Imagine hiking from inn to inn carrying only a day pack, …
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October 01, 2011 by Michael Ellis
Can bees see colors that people can’t? What about birds? How do scientists figure out what can be seen by other animals, especially small animals like insects?
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October 11, 2011 by Greg Retsinas
This park near downtown Napa has been run by volunteers for decades. A model for cash-strapped parks? Great views and extensive trails make it worth a visit to find out.
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October 19, 2011 by Daniel McGlynn
Two decades ago, parts of Claremont Canyon burned in one of the largest wildfires the Bay Area has ever seen. Since then, neighbors have steadily worked to make themselves at home in a fire-prone landscape.
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October 01, 2011 by Aleta George
On a stormy winter night in 2004, as the merchant ship Med Taipei plowed southbound off the coast of Monterey in 20- to 30-foot swells, 15 shipping containers slid into the sea. Such occurrences aren’t especially newsworthy–an estimated 10,000 containers are lost every year worldwide. But these containers are now part of an important research project.
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October 01, 2011 by Aleta George
Alameda County is facing tough decisions that have until now been mostly debated in distant desert landscapes. The county is developing new regulations covering large-scale solar. Native plant advocates and farmers and ranchers aim to make sure the policies protect sensitive habitats and high-value ag lands.
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October 01, 2011 by Aleta George
The Peninsula Open Space Trust has opened three more miles of the California Coastal Trail, which someday may run the entire 1,200-mile length of the coast. For now, there’s a great hike to be had between ocean cliffs and farm fields south of Half Moon Bay.
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October 01, 2011 by Aleta George
A substantial wetlands restoration project over at Hill Slough in Solano County is the latest such effort to clash with federal regulations about power lines and sailboats.
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October 01, 2011 by Aleta George
A new report on the state of bird populations shows mixed results for Bay Area populations. People continue to be the biggest threat, with habitat loss and other pressures, and the biggest hope, in the form of major and minor restoration projects all around the Bay.
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October 01, 2011 by Aleta George
Researchers plan to head out this winter looking for micro-plastic in the Bay. Their first-ever trawl last winter turned up concentrations that actually weren’t as bad as some recorded in other waterways. But that might just mean we’re sending more plastic to the Pacific.
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October 04, 2011 by Erik Vance
The hawk trackers of the Golden Gate Raptor Observatory go way beyond birding: These citizen scientists take to the highways and back roads, following radio-tagged birds that may roam just to the next valley, or all the way to Mexico. Along the way, the hawk trackers have contributed much to our knowledge of these well-traveled birds.
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October 01, 2011 by David Loeb
If it’s a Saturday morning, you’re more than likely to find me doing one of two things: visiting some wild …
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October 06, 2011 by John Hart
In eastern Contra Costa and Alameda counties, an ambitious vision for protecting big pieces of remaining open space is taking shape: From Black Diamond Mines and Mount Diablo to Brushy Peak and Sunol, several major agreements promise to replace ad hoc mitigation projects with a broader canvas of protected and connected habitat.
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October 21, 2011 by Alan Kaplan
Winter is a great time to head out and look at the night sky. In between storms, of course. And the Bay Area has lots of groups ready to help you and your kids get excited about stars!
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October 01, 2011 by Jacoba Charles
Bayer Farm brings open space and food security to a section of Santa Rosa that needs more of both. With help from the nonprofit Landpaths, people in the Roseland neighborhood are helping each other plant and harvest food, and community.
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October 01, 2011 by Jacoba Charles
In the Sunol Valley, beyond the subdivisions of Pleasanton, Fred Hempel grows tomatoes alongside other farmers growing figs, strawberries, and more. It’s all part of an unusual experiment in micro-farming unfolding under the leadership of Sustainable Agriculture Education on land owned by the San Francisco water department.
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October 01, 2011 by Jacoba Charles
For more than a century, Jeanne McCormack’s family has grown grain and raised livestock on a few thousand acres near Rio Vista. But she and her husband Al Medvitz didn’t take a straight line to ranching. Instead, they detoured through Africa and Asia. Now, they’re in it for the long haul.
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October 01, 2011 by Sibella Kraus
Even though foodie culture is an ever-growing phenomenon in the Bay Area, it’s still surprising to many that nearly half the land in our region is dedicated to ranching or farming.
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October 01, 2011 by John Muir Laws
The Darwin’s emerald moth is a neat trick of evolution: The larvae change color depending on what they eat. And they do it visually — but them in the dark and they fail to match their host plants.
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