In early spring, downtown San Francisco’s office workers are treated to quite an air show outside their office windows: peregrine falcons!
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Falcon City
March 6, 2009 •
Jessica Taekman
Bay Area native Jessica Taekman spends her spare time hiking, surfing, and baking.
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Gray Whale Migration
February 6, 2009 •
Now is the time to see gray whales migrating along the California coast and maybe even appearing inside the Bay.
Down on the Farm
October 1, 2008 •
There are many local farms in the Bay Area where families can visit to learn about how food is grown and raised and meet the farmers who make it happen.
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Whales at the Farallon Islands
July 11, 2008 •
Picture hungry tourists swarming around an all-you-can-eat buffet. Only the tourists are 100 feet long and weigh almost 200,000 pounds. These are blue whales, the largest animals ever, and they’ve come to feast on some of the tiniest animals on the planet: millions upon millions of tiny shrimplike krill.
Book Review: Raptors of California
October 1, 2007 •
Raptors of California, by Hans and Pam Peeters, University of California Press, 2005, 305 pages, $17.95 Here in California, we are fortunate to have 27 species of raptors, a designation that includes eagles, hawks, and falcons. It’s not unusual for … Read more
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Book Review: Birds of Napa County
October 1, 2007 •
Birds of Napa County, by Herman Heinzel, Heyday Books, 2006, 132 pages, $12.95 www.heydaybooks.com The common image of Napa County is a world of wine, fine cuisine, and row upon row of grapevines. But Herman Heinzel’s Birds of Napa County … Read more
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The Biggest Bony Fish in the Oceans Swims in the Gulf of the Farallones
October 1, 2007 •
Weighing in at almost 5,000 pounds, measuring over ten feet across, infested with scores of parasites, carrying more eggs than any other vertebrate, and shaped like a giant dinner plate, the giant ocean sunfish (Mola mola) is a creature defined by superlatives.
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Presidio, Past and Present
April 1, 2007 •
San Francisco’s Presidio is among the richest historical sites in the Bay region, or perhaps in all of California, a place with structures and changes in the landscape that go back to the arrival of the Spanish in 1776 and … Read more
The West Coast’s Living Sand Dollars
January 1, 2007 •
There’s a lot more to the western sand dollar (Dendraster excentricus) than meets the eye. Most people who spend any time at the beach are familiar with the sand dollar’s skeleton, or test—the rigid, white flattened disk that commonly washes … Read more
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Bay Area Resources for Accessible Outdoors
October 1, 2006 •
Universal access to nature and recreational activities is a work in progress, and opportunities, though currently somewhat limited, are expanding. Here’s a list of resources.