What are some the biological consequences of climate change in Northern California?
What do you want to know about the natural world? Thanks to donations from readers like you, Bay Nature has teamed up with the naturalists at the California Center for Natural History to answer your questions about the world every other Tuesday. Some questions find their way to naturalist Michael Ellis, whose answers appear in our quarterly print magazine. Email us your questions at atn@baynature.org!
Where Do Turtles Go in Winter and Summer?
Where do turtles go in the winter and summer? —Alma, Sebastopol I am assuming you are referring to our only native freshwater turtle—the western pond turtle—which you might see basking in the sun and then quickly kerplunking right into the … Read more
Fasciated Plants and Where to Find Them in the Wild
What is this weird belt-like growth on poison oak? Fasciated plants have fascinated humans for thousands of years due to their gnarled and belt-like growth patterns on stems or bizarrely elongated flowers. Fasciation has been documented in over 107 plant … Read more
How Do I Start Out Tidepooling?
Which species am I most likely to see in a Northern California tidepool, and how can I try to identify them? There is something fascinating about tidepools. They are places of liminality, an in-between world that is neither fully land … Read more
Meet the Bay’s Incredible Swimming Worms
I think I saw a worm swimming in the Bay, what is it? It was mid August in 2015 when I first held one, its long thread like body rolling and pulsing in my hand. Tickled by the anticipation of … Read more
What Do Water-Loving Creatures Do in Summer?
How do slugs and salamanders survive the summer? Ah, seasons. The Bay Area may not have the distinct seasonality of New England, but there is a definite cool and rainy season and a definite dry and hot season, and our … Read more
How Can You Tell a Gopher Snake from a Rattlesnake?
If the snake you encounter looks perturbed, don’t count solely on head shape when you ID it.
There’s a Mole That Only Lives on Angel Island?
S.I. insularis lives only on an island in the middle of the Bay.
Will California Ban Rodenticides that Kill Predators?
The California Assembly has passed a bill that would outlaw so-called “second generation” anticoagulant rodenticides.
Are Fox Squirrels Replacing Gray Squirrels in California?
A reader notices more fox squirrels and less native western grays.