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Photograph by Jacqueline Ramseyer
Bird's Eye View: Willow Glen residents Lowell Saumweber (right) and Gerry Ellis are avid bird watchers who volunteer with the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory.
Willow Glen residents flock together at bird observatory
Nonprofit uses birds to research impacts on local environments
By Kate Carter
It's not all for the birds at the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory, but it's certainly for the love of birds.
Volunteers and staff at the Alviso-based nonprofit research institution are studying birds in watershed areas of the South Bay to better understand the local environment and the effects that development and other human activity have on it. Three Willow Glen residents are involved in the observatory's efforts to learn more about birds and raising the funds to do so because, for them, "birding" is a way of life.
"The appeal of bird watching is observing nature--not only nature, but habitats in general," says Willow Glen resident and observatory volunteer Gerry Ellis. "You start on a simple backyard level, and you begin to have a general appreciation for nature. You naturally get a keener interest and get to know more birds."
The 20-year-old observatory is the nation's largest urban research effort that makes extensive use of volunteers like Ellis and other Willow Glen residents Vicki Silvas-Young and Lowell Saumweber, says observatory Executive Director Janet Hanson. The observatory has a staff of six biologists who work with about 100 volunteers on two specific projects--the landbird program, which studies birds near the organization's Coyote Creek Field Station near Highway 237; and the Birds of the Bay program, which monitors shorebirds in the bay's salt ponds south of the San Mateo bridge.
"We study birds," Hanson says. "They're very excellent indicators of environmental health--they're easy to see."
The best way to judge a habitat's long-term health, she says, is to note its abundance of different types of wildlife, such as birds, and to follow that data over time. The observatory's programs do that by logging a great deal of specific information about birds in a given area for years on a weekly or even daily basis, and then making that data available to environmental organizations and governmental agencies. Those groups then draw conclusions about the environment's status and use those conclusions to influence land-use decisions. The observatory has submitted more than 100 reports and publications during its two decades and is under contract with the city of San Jose and the Santa Clara Valley Water District.
"We take the information and give it to people who make decisions about how land is managed and used," Hanson says. "We do take a position on things, but we use science and facts to advocate."
The observatory also works to conserve birds and their habitats by fostering a love of birds and nature in interested individuals. It offers educational programs and birdwatching trips and connects people with its large group of active bird watchers, if they would like to join in.
"We're always anxious to educate people and show them what we're doing," Hanson says. "Our mission is one of research and one of education. People can participate in our research."
This fall, people are participating by watching for birds all over California, in an effort to gather information as well as additional funds. The observatory is in the midst of its fifth annual California Fall Challenge. Between Sept. 15 and Oct. 13, participating bird watchers choose a single 24-hour period to identify as many different bird species as possible in a specific county. The participants solicit donations for the observatory on either a flat or per-bird basis, and the information helps keep the county bird lists current. In addition, the bird watcher, or "birder," who identifies the most birds in a county wins a prize and the esteem of his or her colleagues in the subculture of birdwatching.
"It's our primary fundraising event for the year," Hanson says, adding that the observatory depends entirely on foundations, grants, contracts and individual donations. "We're trying to combine fundraising with having some fun; a side benefit is to collect information. The money will allow us to do the work we think is important."
Hanson says increased funding could also allow the observatory to expand its work into areas of Willow Glen along the Guadalupe River and the Los Gatos Creek.
Ellis, Silvas-Young and Saumweber are already using their birding skills in their own Willow Glen backyards, however, and made a team effort Sept. 29 in the bird challenge, logging birds in open space areas throughout Santa Clara County.
Ellis and Silvas-Young are veteran birders who have honed their skills as volunteer bird banders with the observatory's landbird program, while Saumweber--a novice birder--is using his accounting skills as the observatory's treasurer and plans to become more involved in birding.
As banders, Ellis and Silvas-Young have gone through an extensive eight-month training process to learn the meticulous record-keeping and important bird-care techniques necessary to safely collect birds, note their characteristics, attach a band to their legs and release them back into the wild. They both volunteer regularly, getting to hold in their hands the beings that give flight to their fancies.
"Banding, on top of birding, is very specialized," Ellis says. "You can see the birds up close and personal. Once you have them in hand, you see how complex a simple bird is. It makes birdwatching all that much more special--you may have had a bird at one point in hand."
Photograph courtesy of Vicki Silvas-Young
Factoring and Figuring: Two volunteers review data gathered from the bird banding operation at the observatory's Coyote Creek Field Station.
Ellis grew up in the South Bay and has lived in Willow Glen since 1953. He remembers learning to appreciate nature from a young age and began birdwatching when he was about 10. He doesn't consider himself an expert birder, but that doesn't matter, he says. With the basic gear of field guides and binoculars, anyone can get started birding.
"In birding, you can get involved at whatever level you want," Ellis says, from learning to identify birds in one's backyard or nearby park to those in Costa Rica and other exotic locales.
To really appreciate birding, though, Silvas-Young says, it's important to bird watch with an experienced birder.
"Where you start learning, birding is when you start going out with someone who is more knowledgeable than you," she says. "The key is to get out in the field."
Silvas-Young is a charter member of the observatory and has been bird banding since 1975, after she took a San Jose State University ornithology class from observatory co-founder Richard Mewaldt.
"I became hooked," she says.
She became "bird crazy," she says, and left school to take bird censuses for organizations contracting with the U.S. government. Then she worked as an outdoor education teacher for the Youth Science Institute in Alum Rock Park. Now she works in the corporate world, but she carries binoculars always and is constantly distracted by birds when she is outside, she says.
"It just doesn't work to talk to a birder outdoors," Silvas-Young says.
She says she has seen improvements in the habitat surrounding the observatory's field station during the 20 years it has conducted banding work there. In 1997, the group completed a 10-year study of the riparian area under contract by the Santa Clara Valley Water District. It is still drafting its final report of the project's results, Silvas-Young says, but the information they gathered is already influencing the water district's plans for restoring and maintaining Santa Clara County's waterways.
"We have come a long way," she says of the landbird program, with which she is most involved. "But we have a long way to go. There are a lot of contributions that the [observatory] can make to the valley in terms of quality of life and making sure development doesn't run over the place. The information that we produce could help agencies make good, sound decisions."
Water district wildlife biologist Doug Padley says the district uses information about bird migration patterns and nesting behavior to determine where and when to do construction work to minimize its impact on the environment. The scientific data also gives it clues about what kind of work to do, he says. The water district will be restoring the watershed along the Guadalupe River through Willow Glen in the coming years, with funding approved by voters who passed Measure B last November.
Padley says the observatory is one of many environmental organizations from which the water district gets information, but the observatory's data is uniquely research- and science-oriented to answer specific environmental questions, he says.
Padley says the water district's partnership with the observatory is more important now than ever before, as the water district has expanded its mission to not only regulate the county's waterways and flood control, but also to serve as stewards of the watersheds and the life in those environments.
San Jose Senior Planner Ron Eddow says the city asks the observatory and other environmental agencies to conduct and review Environmental Impact Reports for developments that could impact wildlife.
"We believe in the future the importance of the Coyote Creek Field Station and the research will become even more important," Silvas-Young says. "Land use in the valley is a big issue. The studies at [the field station] will guide good use of land in ways that are good for birds, wildlife and people."
Doing the research itself, though, is almost an end in itself for bird lovers. "I feel very privileged to do this," Ellis says. "It's helping out science, but it's very special on a personal level."
To contribute to the San Francisco Bay Bird Observatory or to find out about their programs, call 408.946.6548 or visit www.sfbbo.org.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
