Wingbeat Blog

I started birding early last year. Ever since then, birding has become one of my favorite things to do. Birds are always doing something interesting. Sometimes they are eating, flying, or singing. It is so wonderful knowing that every time I go birding, I am going to see something different. It could be a different bird, or a new behavior, but I know that it will be new and interesting every time. I enjoy both drawing and crocheting birds, and I just love birds in general. With my love of birds came a love of bird photography. Capturing fleeting moments with the push of a button (or in this case, a click of the shutter button) is super fun for me. With birds, they are literally …​

​The season of gift-giving, for me, is an excuse to think about each of the children on my mental list of family and friends. What are their interests? How have they grown in the last year?  What would help to stretch their imaginations, their curiosity, their knowledge?

For the youngest on my list, one of this year’s books will certainly be Robin Page’s The Beak Book (Beach Lane, 2021). Oversized, detailed illustrations by the author show a variety of bird beaks and their uses, from straining (ruddy duck) and ​sniffing (kiwi) to prying (red crossbill) ..

​I am an avid sixteen-year-old birder living in the Bay Area.  I began paying attention to birds over a decade ago, but really started birding when I was eight after picking up a bird guide at my local bookstore. I attempted to make my own bird guide, which was quite a challenge for an eight-year- old.  Unfortunately, it didn’t turn out like a Sibley’s Bird Guide.  Since then, birding has been a passion for me.  

​Today, birding has become a family affair.  My family …

​The Kids Bird Art Contest is a fun annual contest that brings science and art together. We typically invite kids ages 3-17 to spend time outside recording information about birds in their neighborhood or at a nearby park and then to create a scientific drawing with notes in the style of a nature journal or field guide. This year, in the spirit of SFBBO’s 40th Anniversary, we instead asked kids to recall a memorable experience they had with birds in nature and create a drawing and written story that reflects that encounter. 

Each year for SFBBO’s California Fall Challenge (CFC) fundraiser, we unveil new CFC T-Shirt design as part of our efforts to raise money to support our science and outreach work.

With this year being SFBBO’s 40th anniversary, we knew we had to do a special shirt to celebrate 40 years of conserving birds and their habitats and educating the community.

What better way to do that than by featuring 40 bird species? Science illustrator and graphic designer Julie Ho Sung was up for the challenge.

​With so many Bay Area bird species to choose from, we ultimately decided to include these 40, read below to learn about these birds and their connection to our work!

​The birds were 40 days old. 

It was August 20th and I was at Eden Landing Ecological Reserve in Hayward, a haven for many bird species, including the three Western Snowy Plover juveniles patiently waiting in a plastic pet carrier that was their temporary home. 

My colleague Ben Pearl, a biologist, held the carrier in one hand, a spotting scope slung over his other shoulder. He walked slowly across the moonscape ground, eyes peeled for movement that would let us know where the older plovers were hiding among white algae and shells. I followed a half step behind, our boots crunching softly on the dried earth.

SFBBO’s 40th Anniversary

The symbolism of their age was not lost on us. This fall the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory …

There is so much to learn from our more than human kin. I am fascinated by our feathered relatives. In the morning when I first wake, before I open up the curtains to take a peek at the day, I enjoy guessing what the weather is like outside according to the bird sounds. As a California Naturalist and Field Biologist, I love spending time outdoors observing wildlife. Living amongst the coastal redwood giants, surrounded by wetlands, rivers, beaches …

I started birding a few months ago, and it has quickly become my favorite hobby. I have always loved animals, but birds are definitely my favorite. Something about them just captivates me. The fast flutter of a hummingbird’s wings. The steady soar of a raptor. The cheerful “cheeps” of a baby killdeer. I love observing and identifying birds, and I am always thrilled to see a “lifer”!  Photographing birds is another hobby of mine, as well as drawing and painting birds. 

​When I heard about the Bird ID Techniques Workshop with Alvaro …

I have always had a fascination with birds, growing in Arandas, Jalisco Mexico my Abuelito kept many birds, he fed them, cared for them and I would help him with his daily tasks. But later in life, birds became part of my art inspiration, birds were my subjects and my muses but it was last year that I really started to learn and to be able to identify, both visually and auditorily, many species of birds.

When my family and I moved to the states we … 

​What is it that draws people to birding?  For some of us, it’s a single, unforgettable encounter; for others it’s more gradual, perhaps even accidental.  For Callie, in Joy McCullough’s Across the Pond, it’s part of the completely new life she discovers when her family moves from a small apartment in San Diego to a castle they have inherited in Scotland.

​​Shy and uncomfortable in new situations, Callie discovers that seventh grade (hers) at her new school will be “high school.”  Fearful of being an outsider among older students, she persuades her parents to …