We published more than 129 stories in print and online this year. Here are seven of our particular favorites.
Meet the Urban Osprey
July 2018
Writer Kim Todd takes us into a seeming natural history puzzle: why are there suddenly so many osprey in the San Francisco Bay Area? Along the way we get to know a much-beloved raptor she calls “a little bit punk. A little bit geeky.”
The New California State Parks
April 2018
“California is America in fast forward,” Parks Forward Commissioner Lance Conn tells writer Alissa Greenberg, in this wide-ranging story about the future of the most-visited park system in the nation. “If you’re not broadening access, parks are dead.”
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Disrupt the Street Tree
January 2018
Why do cities look the same? Why do people say there’s no there there in Silicon Valley? Bay Nature digital editor Eric Simons walks from Apple to Google to observe the South Bay’s surprisingly anonymous street trees — a cosmopolitan collection you’re likely to find well-represented in just about every other urban area on the planet.
Breaking Our Illusion of Control Over Disasters
January 2018
Scientist Faith Kearns has researched drought and wildfire for a decade. After the 2017 North Bay fires, she writes, something finally seems to have changed in our conversations about natural disaster.
Imagine the Future San Francisco Bay Shoreline
July 2018
Can the Bay Area design its way out of sea level rise? Zach St. George follows a year-long challenge meant to provide inspiration in our thinking about the future.
Are Baby Rattlesnakes the Most Dangerous Biters?
May 2018
No doubt you’ve heard this one before — baby rattlesnakes are more dangerous than adults because they can’t control their venom. But you’ve heard wrong, writes Tony Iwane in our most popular mythbusting story of the year.
What’s In a Scientific Name?
October 2018
Latin names can be off-putting. But look deeper, writes graduate student Grace Ha as she decides on the name for a new species she’s discovered, and you’ll understand everything better.
