Exploring Nature in the San Francisco Bay Area

  • New Google Earth: Going Underwater and Back in Time

    New Google Earth: Going Underwater and Back in Time

    At the California Academy on Sciences on February 2, Google announced a new version of Google Earth that holds tremendous promise for conservationists worldwide, and no shortage of data on the underwater world just off our coast.

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  • Steelhead Spawning

    Steelhead Spawning

    Steelhead are coming to spawn in a stream near you. If you’re lucky, you may see some making their way upstream.

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  • Native Species Put the Art in BART

    Native Species Put the Art in BART

    On a typical walk through a BART station, it’s hard to ignore the advertisements covering the available wall space. But a few ads are most striking in their mystery: A Steller’s jay? A black-tailed deer? Both with nothing but a subtle BART train in the background. No message. No sell. What are these all about?

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  • Brown Pelicans, Victims of Extreme Weather

    Brown Pelicans, Victims of Extreme Weather

    Recently, people have been finding debilitated, or even dead, brown pelicans up and down the West Coast. Initially baffled, scientists now believe the birds’ expanding range clashed with an unusually severe winter storm in December 2008.

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  • GGNRA Big Year Comes to a Close

    GGNRA Big Year Comes to a Close

    What brings together professionals and amateur naturalists, butterfly specialists and evolutionary biologists, children and adults, all in the name of endangered species? Try the Golden Gate National Recreation Area’s Big Year for Endangered Species.

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  • Time for Dungeness Crab

    Time for Dungeness Crab

    Fall is harvest time for crab fishermen, who place “crab pots” offshore to catch Dungeness crabs. The crabs, the largest species on the West Coast, have a complex lifecycle that takes them from the open ocean to the Bay and back again.

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