This is the Pepperwood Podcast, a production
of Pepperwood, a non -profit conservation organization
based at a 3 ,200 -acre nature reserve near Santa
Rosa, California, in the heart of the traditional
homeland of the Wappo people. At Pepperwood,
we aim to inspire conservation through science.
And on this show, we talk to scientists, stewards,
and environmental educators about what they do
and how they do it. We hope to give you a glimpse
into the real experiences of folks who devote
their lives to taking care of local ecosystems
and sharing them with others. Welcome back to
the Pepperwood Podcast. Today, we're talking
science with one of our valued volunteers and
a bonus special guest from our science team.
Pepperwood's science team has a few data collection
projects that depend on contributions from volunteer
scientists. These projects include the Phenology
Project, which we discussed with volunteer steward
Gary Morgritt during the first episode of the
podcast, and cover board surveys at our forest
monitoring plots, which we learned about in Season
1, Episode 3 with Michaela Freed. I've been directly
involved with both of those two projects, first
as a volunteer and ultimately as a staff member.
But in this episode, I get to learn along with
you about another volunteer -driven project,
Pepperwood's Breeding Bird Survey. Something
that sets research projects apart from other
volunteer opportunities at Pepperwood is that
they require specific training for the volunteers
involved. To volunteer for other Pepperwood events,
like our monthly volunteer workdays, You don't
need any prior experience. We will teach you
everything you need to know the day that you
participate. But for science projects, it often
requires a developed skill set to collect quality
data. In some cases, we can provide the training
to help interested volunteers develop that necessary
skill set. But certain skills take many years
to learn. And in those cases, we need to recruit
volunteers that have previous expertise. And
that is very much the case for the breeding bird
survey. Today we're going to hear from longtime
volunteer Sean Jean, who was essentially headhunted
for the breeding bird survey by Nicole Barden.
Nicole was a staff member at Pepperwood for many
wonderful years and still returns nearly every
season to teach a birding class. Please check
out our classes and events page for an opportunity
to spend time in the field with Nicole at one
of our birding classes. It is always a great
experience. She met Sean when he was the coordinator
of the West Sonoma County Christmas Bird Count.
That is part of a national annual community science
event organized by the National Audubon Society.
It's an excellent, very long -standing project,
and I'll provide a link to our local Christmas
bird count in the show notes. Sean's many years
of experience as a birder has helped to make
him a valuable member of Pepperwood's Breeding
Bird Survey team. I sat down with Sean in November
of 2025 and asked him to tell me about the project,
when it happens, how it happens, and how he developed
the impressive bird identification skills that
it takes to participate. So the first time I
came was probably 10 years ago, and I've been
doing it ever since. It's a springtime event,
and they've been doing that since before I started.
It's usually three times. If you can. We had
some issues with COVID that kind of killed it
one year. I'm sure. Yes. But normally you go
three times. You start, and we have what's called
a transect. And along your transect, there's
a certain number of stops or points that you
stop and listen. And you try to identify everything
you can in that spot, around that spot. in a
five -minute period. Ah, so you sit your watch
for five minutes. Five minutes, yep. And are
you only identifying by ear or are you using
more than one sense? It's mostly by ear. If you
see them, so what we do is you walk the transect.
Ours has 10 stations. I'm not sure they all,
I think they all have 10 stations. There's four
different transects on the property. Okay. And
I do one called Rogers Canyon. A little more
in the cut. It's pretty rugged. And so we have
to walk through there. And we had another gentleman
that used to join us that didn't like all the
poison oak. So he said, I'm not doing this anymore.
You have to pick your zones when it comes to
walking these transects. That makes sense. But
it's beautiful down there. We've walked down
there and just we love it every time. But so
you go to each transect. You start. You set your
stopwatch or whatever, and you count for five
minutes, and then you just mostly listen because
you're hearing probably 90 % of the birds, and
so you have to be able to identify them by sound.
Right. And so you have to be a reasonably good
birder to do that. Do I know all the birds? No.
Every once in a while, I'll hear one that I don't
know, and I'm like, oh, I don't know that one.
Mystery bird. That goes in a certain column,
I'm sure. Well, it's funny because when I hear
one that I know that I don't know, I know it's
only a couple of things. You've narrowed it down
based on the whole list. I know there's only
a couple of birds around here that I don't know
really well. So some of those birds are like
some of the warbler species. They all sound very
similar. And some I only hear really occasionally.
And so I'm like, oh, I know it's a warbler. I
don't know which one. So now we have this nice
tool, eBird type stuff, where you can actually
put it on and listen with that as well. And I
sit there, I'm calling out what I'm hearing,
and usually one of us, so I go with my friend
John Cotting, and when we have a few others that
join us, Dana Riggs, she's a biologist who tries
to join us every time, but she's not, she's busy,
she can't always make it, so sometimes it's just
John and I. And so he's the recorder, I'm the
guy who knows most of the birds, and so I yell
them out. And he writes them down. And we make
notations like... It's close. It's within 50
meters, I believe, is the distance, or it's more
than that. So we say close or far. We say whether
it's singing or just calling. We say whether
we see it or whether we just heard it. And we
say things like, oh, this bird was carrying nest
-making materials. So you're trying to identify
that kind of activity, whether they're nesting
or not. So it's a nesting bird survey. The fact
that they're here and they're singing is probably
indicative of the fact that they're making a
nest somewhere. That's the kind of singing type
of calls indicate they're trying to reproduce.
So we've gotten pretty good in knowing what to
expect in each of the transect locations. So
the 10 spots we go down, it's like, okay, we
normally get this here. We've done it enough
times now. We normally get this here. So we sort
of know what to expect. Every once in a while,
we'll get something that we don't expect, and
that's always fun. And then it's also sometimes
we don't get anything, and you're like, well,
where did I go? So you never know. Sometimes
you get good results. Sometimes you get lesser
results, we'll say. And that's probably why you
have a little bit of repetition built in. You're
going three times over the course of the season,
right? Right. So usually we start in April, and
we like to go at least two weeks later, usually
three weeks, maybe four even if we can, and work
it out. But the season is really April through
early June. So we try to go kind of mid -April,
mid to early May, and then very early June if
we can get it. Throughout those three surveys,
do you tend to find different time frames where
different species are active? Or are you sort
of looking at the same pool of species the whole
time? When we come... In April, you'll find that
some birds aren't here yet. Some are migrants,
so they're not all going to be here yet. Most
of them are, but one or two still haven't made
it. The other thing we do, I didn't mention this,
is that we start at the top of the canyon the
first time, and we hike to the bottom, and we
finish, then we hike back out. Then we start
at the bottom of the canyon the second time.
We hike up, so we kind of do a different order.
And then we do it the other way again. It's about
two and a half miles down the canyon. Then you
have to walk back out. And it's not easy walking.
Maybe two miles. Pretty rugged. It's rugged,
but it's not that hard. That's good. Okay. So
we can do that. So you're kind of getting some
variation. So over the course of a couple of
months, maybe you're getting a little variation
in like late arrivals and maybe early leavers.
And you're getting some variation from the time
of the day, right? No, we always do it. So we
always do the same time of day. So we start at
sunrise or within 10 or 15 minutes of sunrise
is when we try to start because that's when the
birds are the most active and they're singing.
You're identifying why I will never be a great
birder. You've got to be a morning person. I
would say I'm not the most morning person, but
when I have an event like this, I will come do
it. Very good. Yeah, so we always do it early.
And what we find is that some birds will, by
June, have already stopped singing. So we don't.
They're probably there. They've done their work.
But we don't hear them at that point. So generally,
the first time we go out, some birds aren't here
yet. So things like lazuli bunting. It's a wonderful
bird. It's very bright blue, pretty, and has
a wonderful song. Wonderful song, you say? I
think we ought to hear it for ourselves. Here's
a recording of the lazuli bunting song. But...
When we go out the first time, we don't always
hear it. It may not be here yet. The second time,
we usually hear it. The second time, well, this
year, in the last two years, we had Western tanagers
in one stop or two stops, maybe, in the last
couple of years. But when we went out the third
time, nothing. We couldn't hear them. Ah, but
what would it sound like if they did hear the
Western tanager? They're there, but they aren't
singing anymore. They've made their nests. They're
sitting on their eggs, I guess, and they're just
not singing anymore because they've done what
they were singing. The singing there is over
because they've done what they needed to do.
Sure. Do you find that by switching directions,
you said the first survey you go out, you kind
of go from the top of the canyon down, second
time you go from the bottom of the canyon up.
Is that trying to catch any variability in like
the very first break of dawn versus, you know,
maybe, I don't know, how long does it take you
to do the survey all together? It takes us usually
close to three hours. Okay. So like three hours
later is a pretty big difference for a bird.
Yes. Yes. It shouldn't take us three hours, but
we get distracted with, oh, there's a cool bird
over there. So we stop and do that for a minute.
That's got to be half the fun, right? Yes. So
we do a little of that. We could probably do
the whole thing in two hours if we really needed
to, but we don't ever try to go that fast. So
yes, there's a variation. Some birds are singing
early. Some are a little bit more later morning,
I guess. And so they want us to sort of hit the
spots at different times so we can capture that.
Some of the volunteers here will join us sometimes
and we don't. There's a few of them that have
done it a few times now, and we always like having
them. They're learning, and we like to help them
learn. And having an extra set of ears can be
good, just because we don't always hear every
last thing. Especially if there's like, I don't
know, 10 or 15 species of birds all calling at
once. That can be really difficult to discern
every one of them. So by having people spread
out... By the way, when we stop at these points...
We're supposed to stay within about 30 feet of
it. But if there's three of us, I will all go
different directions and try to get in different
spots. So maybe we're hearing a little bit different
things. Okay, so we're amplifying the data collection
process a little bit. Yeah, and it really makes
a difference. I think if one person's doing it,
they're going to miss something. If you have
two people, they're going to catch most of it.
If you have three people, you're probably catching
most of it. How long did it take you, would you
say? And I'm sure it's an ongoing process. But
learning the bird calls. by ear and being able
to identify a species. How long before you felt
even reasonably confident at that? And what process
was that? That's interesting. So for the longest
time, I didn't try to do that. I started birding,
my wife and I were in the Peace Corps, and we
were given a book, and we were in Nepal, the
country, and there's 800 species of birds in
Nepal. And they're all really cool. Bright colors,
all this neat stuff. And we had a lot of downtime,
so that's when I started birding. I was in my
mid -20s. And when I got back, I decided I was
going to keep doing it. And so I got involved
with the local Audubon. And at first, it was
just a challenge to try and learn all the birds,
let alone try to understand their songs. Or to
even know them by sight, if you're lucky enough
to see them. So learning your birds, yes, first
there's sight. Then there's what habitat they're
in. You can kind of narrow down what kind of
bird it might be by habitat. You can start identifying
them by silhouette or habits, so how they move.
Are they fast? Are they slow? Are they jittery?
You know, those kind of things. So size. So I
was learning all of that first, and it took me
a long time to be, what I would say, competent
at identifying the birds, sometimes just at a
glance. Maybe that's all you get. That's all
you get. And some birds are so similar, you might
not be able to tell exactly what bird it is,
but you know it was a certain sparrow group or
something like that. But you might not know exactly
which one. So it took me probably, again, working.
I'm not a full -time birder like some people
who just have all day to go do it every day.
They get really good at it. But in your spare
time? In my spare time, it took me some years
to get good at that. I wouldn't know how long.
But I realized that I was missing a lot of birds
because I could hear them, but I couldn't see
them. Right. And so some birds are obvious. Even
people that don't do birding probably recognize
the songs of some birds like robins and some
of the sparrows, blackbirds. But because you
haven't paid attention, you just know. Sean is
right that we all, hopefully, hear the calls
of common local birds like robins and sparrows
and blackbirds quite often, but I'm not sure
that we would all necessarily recognize which
species we're listening to. Let's take a moment
to listen in to those calls. Here's the American
robin's song. Or the robin might make a tweet
and tut call like this. Here's the titular song
of the song sparrow. And here is a classic conch
lorry from a red -winged blackbird. Next time
you are out in your neighborhood or local park,
see if you can recognize those calls for a taste
of what it must be like to be Sean and his fellow
birders out there walking the Breeding Bird Survey
transect. Okay, back to Sean's story. So I started
realizing that I was... I could pay attention
to that. And I started doing that by ear more.
And it took me a while. But when you see a bird
and you see it calling, now it's kind of reinforced
in your mind. Multiple kinds of information at
the same time. So there's audio recordings that
you can try and practice with. And yes, that
can be effective. It's not quite the same. Well,
I'm at the experience of seeing a bird and then
hearing its call at the same time is more imprinting
on you, right? Yeah, well, it's exactly right.
So now I've seen that bird. I've heard that bird.
I can kind of remember that. But you still have
to do it regularly or you kind of forget. So
I go to Texas to visit family sometimes and there's
a whole set of birds there. I don't know all
those birds. I'm learning them, but every time
I go, I learn a little bit more, but then I forget
a little bit because I don't go back for a few
years. And then next time I go back, I'm like,
oh, okay, I recognize that, but I can't remember
what it is. So you really have to do it pretty
regularly to be competent at your... recognition
by sound. As spring approaches overall and you're
heading toward the season where you're going
to be doing the data collection, do you find
that there's a refresh process for all these
local birds that you're used to? Absolutely.
First of all, I kind of bird my own yard all
the time, but that's maybe 30 or 40 species.
In our area here, we probably have a couple hundred
species that could come through, or if you go
to the coast, there's a whole set of ocean birds
and that kind of stuff. And I really don't know
those because they're not there enough. But when
it's time to start thinking about doing the pepperwood
breeding bird survey again, I usually spend an
evening or two refreshing my memory using some
apps that I have. And then you mentioned also
with eBird. eBird's an incredible application.
eBird is put out by Cornell University, I believe.
And they have a anthropological center there.
And they have a couple different products. And
one of them is called Merlin. And Merlin is when
I used ID. If I'm not certain or if I'm in Texas
and I really don't know, I can hold out my cell
phone and it's got the Merlin app on it. And
it's... Not 100%, but it's probably 90, 95 %
correct. Right. So essentially you have AI technology
that's listening alongside you and it's doing
that same process of trying to identify and it
will give you a readout of what it thinks it's
hearing. Yeah. And it works in a lot of places,
but not everywhere. So for instance, birding
in Hawaii a couple of years ago. Merlin didn't
work at all. Oh, okay. I mean, a couple of birds.
So that data set, it's still learning. It's still
learning that set, yeah. So it didn't help much
there. But in Texas, it was awesome because I'm
like, you know, I'd see the bird and I think
I know what it is. And then I would check the
thing. Oh, yes, that's what it was. So right
now, and you're using that more so it sounds
like a backup or like a cleanup hitter. I try
not to rely on it unless I'm really somewhere
I don't know anything. And then I will use it
to help try to learn. But when I'm here in my
local territories where I know most of the birds,
I just sort of use it occasionally if I'm a little
uncertain or I'm hearing a little different call
that I normally hear. For instance, the other
evening I was hearing some owls, and they were
great horned owls, and they were making a noise
I hadn't heard them make before. I'm like, is
that them? And so I put the app out. Sure enough,
that was them making that noise. It was a noise
I'd never heard them. It wasn't their normal
hoots, you know. It was kind of a cat sound.
It was like a meow almost. I found something
close to what Sean is describing in the Cornell
Lab Macaulay Library, the database that generously
provides us with access to the bird vocalizations
that you hear on the podcast. Sean has confirmed
that the following is a slightly louder, harsher
version of what he remembers. Listen for the
meow -like call interspersed with the well -known
great horned owl hoot pattern. According to the
Macaulay Library notes on this recording, this
is courtship behavior between a male and female
great horned owl, with the female calling and
the male hooting back. Interesting. Yeah, it
was really different. Yeah, well, that's nature
for you, right? No matter how long you've studied
it and spent time in it, you're always going
to hear something new. You're going to get some
new information. Yeah, and I'm kind of a nerd
that way. I was very excited when I realized
they made a different sound. Yeah, I bet. I bet.
A new thing in your catalog, right? File that
away. That's so exciting. What would you say
makes it possible for you to keep coming back
year after year? It sounds like a pretty intense
process. What inspires you to keep returning?
Well, I don't know. It's a good question. I like
what I'm doing. There's a whole series of reasons,
probably. First of all, I think Pepperwood is
an awesome place. It's a great thing I think
they have here. It's a wonderful property, and
the science, the studies and things they're doing
here I think are just fantastic, and they need
to be done, so I'm glad someone's doing them.
I'm just excited to be able to participate a
little bit and help. I don't know a lot about
a lot of things, but I do know birds, so I'm
happy that I can do that one thing. So, yeah,
I like doing that. Sometimes if it's raining
out and you're looking at it kind of going, well,
shoot. But usually we don't, we postpone that.
And so it can be difficult to find a time that
works for everybody in the group to come up.
But that's the hardest thing. I mean, once you're
up here and doing it, you're doing it and it's
a nice day. So we always enjoy it. It truly does
sound like a nice day. And data collection should
be a pleasure if possible. We love that our diligent
volunteers enjoy their time out on the reserve.
But there are outcomes to this work that go far
beyond a series of pleasant spring mornings communing
with our avian neighbors. Once Sean and his fellow
birders complete their data sheets, our science
team can use them to gain insights into the population
dynamics of our local species and track how ecosystems
respond to stewardship interventions, disturbances,
climate change, a myriad of other variables.
Michelle Halber, Pepperwood's Ecology Research
Manager, was kind enough to join us again on
the podcast to discuss what happens to the breeding
bird survey data once it has been collected.
Well, one thing to remember is data is on a piece
of paper. So quite literally, we take that paper,
we scan it, we process it, digitize it, which
is basically entering it into a computer. Sure.
And then we run all kinds of algorithms to see,
you know, what are the outputs? What are the
trends? What are the patterns over time with
our bird populations? Birds are indicators of...
ecosystem health. They really give us a sense
of how intact habitats are supporting them or
not, whether disturbance cycles like fire or
grazing are supporting them or not. And so all
this great data that our volunteers are collecting
becomes useful when we can finally look at it
and start pulling together the information to
tell stories about what these birds might be
experiencing or expressing. So, for example,
birds, they are indicators of, you know, how
well ecosystems are supporting them, whether
we see a lot of different birds or maybe, you
know, large abundances of birds or not. They
can tell us things about predator -prey relationships,
such as, you know, if there's a really good mouse
year, let's say, or small rodent year, in a year
or two we might all of a sudden see a lot more
hawks flying overhead, which we do see. The data
might tell us about disease cycles, you know,
like avian influenza might be impacting certain
species like corvids more than others, corvids
being crows, ravens, jays. And that seems like
information that regionally would be really important.
Right, right. And so, you know, birds might not
just be increasing over time or decreasing over
time, but going up and down with these different
disease and predator -prey relationships. But
ultimately, at Pepperwood, we're monitoring our
birds to really get a sense of how our land stewardship
is doing. Are we achieving the goals and objectives
of supporting native biodiversity that we're
aiming for? So, for example, we do a lot of grazing
in our grasslands, right? We do have a conservation
grazing program. Which I talk about. You sure
did. We got to talk about that quite a lot. That
was awesome. In a prior podcast. And there's
actually a grassland associated species called
Western Meadowlark. Have you ever seen Western
Meadowlark? I have heard Western Meadowlarks.
As a matter of fact, you have also heard Western
Meadowlarks if you have heard our previous episodes
of the podcast. The Western Meadowlark song was
the subject of a Season 1 Nature Sound Guess
Who Game prompt. I won't spoil which one, but
this is the striking, characteristic song of
the Western Meadowlark. Such a wonderful, complex
vocalization. And Michelle recommends looking
as well as listening for them. This is an amazing
bird. If you haven't seen one, I highly recommend
looking them up online. There's a great website.
eBird is a great place, resource for data and
information about birds. During the breeding
season, they have this brilliant yellow chest
that really is striking. And they tend to flock
in the grasslands. So if you're, you know...
Like us, we drive our little four wheel drives
along the roads at Pepperwood. And, you know,
I just love watching the flocks of birds kind
of, you know, fly out from in front of the in
front of the vehicle. But this bird, Western
Meadowlark, is a ground nesting bird. So it produces
its nests under, you know, large like bushes
or excuse me, bunches of perennial bunch grass
or like under little shrubs or things like gum
plant. If you know Grindelia, they're often found
under there. Another thing that really matches
its name, gum plant, very gummy, very sticky.
Yeah, it's a fun one. And then, well, I should
step back in that there is the North American
Breeding Bird Survey, which is, you know, an
international program focused in the North American
continent. their point counts that they have
are very similar to ours. Our project is basically
designed to be similar to theirs so we can compare
our results at Pepperwood with their results.
And unfortunately, their program, since it was
started in 1966, has detected significant declines
in western meadowlark populations in California,
especially in the Central Valley. Primarily due
to grassland habitat loss. Right. So all those
grasslands are not really grasslands anymore,
right? Right. And so this bird is being directly
impacted and we are detecting that in the international
data. But here at Pepperwood, we started our
program in 2007. We have about 900 acres of,
you know, wide open grasslands that we're actively
grazing. We're actively burning it and, you know,
to control for invasive weeds. Even though this
is a ground nesting bird that could be impacted
by cows walking around or fire moving through,
we are detecting significant increases at Pepperwood
every year by about 4 % per year. which is really
quite astounding and speaks directly to us, you
know, keeping our grassland habitats intact and
keeping those, you know, really important disturbance
cycles happening for the grassland community.
That's one of those incredible counterintuitive
feelings, right? We think that by introducing
disturbance, a ground nesting bird would... have
a decrease or you know be threatened by that
but in fact those disturbance cycles are actually
supporting that species specifically. Absolutely
and you know we do things like rotate cattle
and give different areas rest periods or we don't
burn everywhere all the time right so we're building
in kind of this heterogeneous stewardship and
impact which allows these animals to move around
and be supported. Well, tremendous. All right.
So Western meadowlarks are increasing, right?
And we can trace the difference at least between
us stewarding grasslands as opposed to developing
grasslands. That's a potential cause that we
can feel pretty good about. Any other things
that we've seen over the past several years?
Yes. Some other interesting stories that have
come out of the data have to do with our recent
wildfires, the Tubbs and Kincaid fires of 2017
and 2019. So different birds are apparently,
you know, being differently affected by wildfires.
So there are two birds that I'm going to talk
about that are kind of having opposite responses
to these fires. One is called a rentet. And these
are little brown birds that are associated with
shrubby chaparral habitats in coastal California.
And this is a quote I'm actually going to read
from Cornell Labs. I love their website with
all the information. I love this quote. Wren
tits are homebodies and maybe the most sedentary
bird species in North America. They rarely travel
more than 1 ,300 feet from where they were born.
So basically these are birds that, little brown
birds that hang out, defend maybe like a one
or two acre area their entire lives. They mate
for life. They're just chill. And actually, they're
not really chill because when you hear them,
they're very active in that they constantly call
all day long and they sound like a little ping
pong ball dropping. That was a pretty great approximation
of a rent it by Michelle. But let's hear a recording
of that same vocalization. And they can make
a neat little rattle sound as well. So keep your
ears open for those sounds next time you're out
walking through a shrubby chaparral habitat.
Okay, back to Michelle's story about how our
data on wren tits demonstrated a distinct change
following the tub's wildfire in 2017. And so
working here at Pepperwood, we have a bunch of
chaparral right in front of the Dwight Center
and the barn where a lot of people congregate.
And almost every day I would hear them out there,
you know, doing their ping pong call. But after
the Tubbs fire, we heard barely anything. And
the chaparral in particular, it's a habitat that,
you know, these plants, these shrubs that are
there, the grasses that are there are really.
They burn hot. And basically our chaparral went
from, you know, thick cover of shrubs to just
black open space. Well, I'm thinking about the
way the Tubbs fire moved over the Pepperwood
property in particular, like the area near the
Dwight Center where we had a chaparral habitat.
That was really the hottest part of the fire.
Is that correct? Yeah, at least within the vegetation
types at Pepperwood. Exactly. Yeah, and that
is the area, the entrance to the preserve is
one of the areas that burned during the initial
high wind fire event. Right. And burned very
hot. Compared to even how that particular fire,
and as a wildfire, it wasn't at the levels we
would have wanted it for, like a controlled burn.
It was already a hot fire. But especially during
that, a big wind event in the... entrance to
Pepperwood, it was like especially hot. So it
consumed more than we ever would have wanted
it to, right? Absolutely. That's actually a good
point because our prescribed burning, even within
chaparral habitats, does not take that ecosystem
from, you know, dense cover to no cover. We can
have good fire on the ground and really control,
you know, and have it be more of a mosaic of
impact to maintain habitat. Because what we saw
basically from the data and our own observations
and not hearing them is that our detections of
rent hits from the point count surveys went from
about 10 to 12 per year. And then right after
Tubbs, we only detected two in the entire season.
The following year, one. In 2020, zero. In 2021,
zero. And that's not to say, yeah, there might
have been some out there that we didn't detect.
Maybe they moved to neighboring properties. That's
the hope. Right. Right. They are these homebodies,
but they can move. They can fly. So that's the
hope is that they got to a place of safety. But
we didn't detect them for a couple of years.
And then in 2022, you know, about five years
after the fire, all of a sudden we detected three.
And then in 2024, we detected eight. So they're
slowly coming back. They kind of repopulate the
area as that. vegetation finally recovers from
this sort of catastrophic event. Exactly. So
the wren tits sound like they, you know, I often
think about wildfire impacts. You know, the human
impacts were like the most intense, right? So
we lost our homes because we're kind of like
wren tits, right? We have very specific homes
and, you know, sort of locations that we spend
time in. So the wren tits and the humans kind
of had a similar experience where we had really
big big impacts, and then it took us a couple
of years to recover. Absolutely. Yeah, and people
are still recovering, so it is something to watch
over time. On the other hand, so rentits, of
course, had this decrease post -fire, but are
now recovering, whereas the opposite we saw in
lazuli buntings. Lazuli buntings are this beautiful
migratory bird. The breeding males are almost
like a brilliant turquoise blue on their head,
wings. and back. And they have this splash of
orange on their upper chest. They're just really
stunning. And as we've already heard this episode,
lazuli buntings have a lovely song. Let's hear
it again. This is a migratory bird that travels
from Mexico in winter to California in April
through summer. So they could not be more different
from a wren tit. They really travel. They like
to fly around. And we're so lucky to have them
here during the breeding season when they have
their brilliant colors. Now, lazuli buntings
are known as a post -fire specialist or fire
follower, meaning that their abundances often
increase in areas that were recently burned.
And... Folks think that this might be because
they're often kind of on woodland edges. They
like open forest canopy, more open shrublands,
and they eat a lot of insects, which there's
often kind of a surgence of insects after fire,
like your bark beetles and things like that.
So there's like kind of some special resources
available in a post -fire landscape that lazuli
buntings can really take advantage of. Right.
And so it attracts them to those areas. And so
what we saw is the abundance of lazuli buntings.
increased after both the Tubbs and Kincaid fires.
In 2007 to 14, we saw about 1 to 10 detections
per year. So it wasn't really consistent, but
you know, we could have a few detections to up
to around 10. But in the years prior to Tubbs,
in 2015 to 2017, it was a peak drought and we
detected no Luzuli buntings at all. So because
there was a drought, you know, we were concerned,
like, is the drought impacting them? This is
a migratory. So, you know, is something happening
here at Pepperwood that's not attracting them?
Are we not supporting them? Or maybe is something
happening, you know, in Mexico along its flight
route? So these international migratory birds,
you really have to think beyond the property
that you're at. It really connects us across
space. And remarkably, after the Tubbs fire,
the spring after, we saw... Double the number
of lazuli buntings that we normally detect in
our sampling. We saw about 15 to 20 per year
for four years following these fires. So they
stuck around. And then in 2022, so about three
years after. the Kincaid fire, we're back to
business with just a few detections per year.
So there was this kind of upswing from nothing
to double what we normally see, and now activity
is kind of dying down again. So there's almost
opposite cycles for these two birds in this post
-fire environment, right? So for some species...
especially a really catastrophic fire, doesn't
seem like it really attracts them or supports
the habitat where they want to stay. And then
other birds come in and say, oh, this is a place
that I can take advantage of these new conditions.
Right, right. It's quite exciting to watch. And
that's why we have long -term data, right? Because
if I just sampled for a couple years, I'm not
going to have these patterns or trends become
apparent at all. Well, this is the beauty of
a long -term study that doesn't have like one
specific. you know, tactic in mind, right? We
didn't know the fires were going to come through
here. So you had years of data prior to the fire
already tracking what the populations or what
the, at least the behavior was demonstrating.
And then when the fire came, you said, aha, now
we can actually track how things are going to
go during, after, and in the several years after.
So that's really exciting. It is super exciting.
And one thing that we're really excited about
moving forward is we're starting to use more
audio recorders to automatically detect bird
song, and then we can use computers to identify
them. Is that going to replace our volunteer
project? Absolutely not. The point count is very
important. We have, like you said, this long
-term data set. It's also a standardized protocol,
right, that we can compare to this international
program. more automated formats we can put more
recorders out there 24 7 different times of the
year where we might have different groups of
migrating birds moving through um and also we're
thinking or we are i should say going to get
a what's called a modus tower and modus is spelled
m -o -t -u -s If you're like me and you're accustomed
to encountering acronyms, you might be wondering
what MOTUS stands for. But it turns out that
MOTUS is not an acronym. It is a Latin word meaning
movement, which makes sense based on what it
helps scientists track. Migratory species that
move over the landscape. We're fundraising right
now to help install and support this MODIS tower,
which is part of an international tracking network
for birds, bats, and even monarch butterflies.
Wow. So all these animals that are tagged as
they fly through get picked up by these towers
and it turns into this beautiful international
data set. So I think this is something that Ryan
Farrell mentioned back in our episode when we
were talking about what a Sentinel site is and
the idea that... MODIS towers are considered
to be a standard part of Sentinel sites. In so
many ways, as a Sentinel site, we go above and
beyond Sentinel site. But this was one element
of Sentinel sites that we had not had previously.
And you seem like you're talking about it with
a little more certainty. So this is a thing that's
going to happen. It is going to happen. And we're
super excited. And yeah, you know, we have the,
fortunately, Ryan is an expert at installing
towers and maintaining technology out in nature.
with all its challenges. So we're really, really
excited. And what this tower can do is it fills
in a major data gap in coastal California, and
it can just even more give us information about
how birds are migrating and possibly changing
their behavior given land use or climate change
or other factors like fire. Wow. Well, that's
exciting. All right. Can't wait to hear about
some of the stories that that MODIS tower starts
to tell us when that comes to pass. Michelle,
this is really exciting stuff. Thank you so much
for walking us through a little bit about what
we've learned about birds through this. The data
collection process sounded like so much fun,
but I wonder if the data analysis, at least in
its results, is kind of a fun process for you
as well. Oh, absolutely. It makes the fieldwork
come into more of a digital form, but then become
a reality and a story we can tell over time,
which is just, that's really why I love my job,
is seeing the results of all this hard work.
do without all of our fabulous volunteers. Absolutely.
Going out there, taking that data. All right.
This was wonderful. Thank you so much. Thank
you. What a pleasure to hear from Michelle about
the insights we can gain about bird populations
from the Breeding Bird Survey Project. Sean made
it clear that he and his fellow volunteers deeply
value the analysis results as well. I would imagine
that by seeing the overall big picture trends,
they can start understanding better what may
be happening, whether it's habitat, whether it's
climate, whether it's something else going on,
disease, who knows. But they can then devise
strategies maybe for making things better or
maybe things are getting better and they can
at least report on that. Well, one way or the
other, they can't predict or track that unless...
They have these numbers. Unless you're doing
the science. Unless you're doing the science.
Unless you're collecting that information, which
is what you're doing, which is so great. Yeah.
Absolutely. And it sounds like it's an enjoyable
process for you while you're going along as well.
Oh, yeah. That's why I do it. It's because I
do enjoy the birds a lot. That's wonderful. Yeah.
Thank you so much, Sean. This was really interesting,
and I really appreciate you talking to us. Sure.
My pleasure. Thanks again to Sean and to all
of our volunteer birding experts on the Breeding
Bird Survey team. They bring an amazing skill
set and invaluable time and dedication to Pepperwood.
Thanks also to Michelle for shedding some light
on what we've learned from this data. We have
so many resources to share with you this episode,
so please check out the show notes for some links.
First, Please help fund our incoming Modus Tower.
Follow the link to our donation page and join
one of Pepperwood's Circles of Giving. Cornell
Lab has a variety of resources that will help
you learn more about birds. We'll have a link
to the Macaulay Library, the source of the many
sound clips we heard this episode and previous
episodes. Check out all of those contributors
at the Macaulay Library link. Or you can hear
highlighted recordings at the All About Birds
website, where you can search specific bird species
or review which birds live in your area. The
Macaulay Library database is part of what drives
the phone application that Sean described using
to learn bird calls. It's called Merlin Bird
ID. So follow that link to download it to your
smartphone and start learning for yourself. In
addition to our own in -house analysis, Pepperwood's
breeding bird survey data is uploaded to Cornell
Labs eBird, a community science database where
you can upload your own observations by joining
eBird. You can follow that link to learn more.
Our data is also uploaded to the Environmental
Data Initiative, an avian knowledge network.
You can learn more about those at their links.
Finally, as promised at the top of the episode,
we will include a link to the West Sonoma County
Christmas Bird Count, where Nicole Barden first
met Sean and invited him to join us at Pepperwood.
So many cool bird resources to explore, but don't
switch off yet. It's time for this episode's
installment of the Nature Sound Guess Who Game.
Each episode, we play a nature sound for you
and challenge you to guess Which critter made
that sound? If you email your guess to podcast
at pepperwoodpreserve .org, you may become podcast
famous with a shout out on the next episode when
the answer is revealed. We didn't receive any
guesses on last episode's sound. I'm afraid I
may have intimidated you all from guessing by
hinting that it was tricky. Let's listen back
to last episode's mystery sound now. And that
sound was made by the Stellar's Jay. Yes, indeed,
the Stellar's Jay, Cyanoceta stellarii. Did you
think it sounded like a red -tailed hawk? That's
just what the Stellar's Jay wanted you to think.
This clever Jay species can be a master imitator
and has been known to imitate not only other
wild birds, but also squirrels, cats, dogs. chickens,
and even some mechanical objects. Here's a medley
of calls selected from Macaulay Library's collection
of Stellar's Jay vocalizations. The Stellar's
Jay is no slouch in the looks department either.
It is a large jay with a blue lower body and
a charcoal black crested head. It is one of only
two North American jay species with a crest on
its head. The other one is called simply Blue
Jay or Cyanoceta cristata. These two crested
jays have historically split North America, with
the Blue Jay being found in the east and the
Stellar's Jay in the west. Blue jay populations
are more recently expanding westward, and where
the two species overlap, they have been known
to interbreed and produce hybrid offspring. The
Steller's jay gets its current name from George
Wilhelm Steller, a German naturalist. Huh. A
North American species named after a European
adventurer who encountered them in the 18th century.
This is a very common occurrence, both for birds
and other taxa, and it's an artifact of the history
of colonization and the cultural erasure of the
indigenous communities who have shared a home
with these species for thousands of years. There
is a substantial and increasingly accepted movement
to correct this practice, known as Bird Names
for Birds. We'll include a link to the Bird Names
for Birds website, as well as an excellent article
from the American Birding Association called
Bird Names for the 21st Century, written by Ashwin
Sivakumar. The article features the seller's
jay and some of its alternative common names,
like pine jay, mountain jay, and long -crested
jay. Now. It's time to hear our new mystery sound
that you can try to guess before next time. Now,
this bird -obsessed episode would not be complete
without one more recording from Cornell Lab Macaulay
Library, so I will give you the hint that it's
definitely a bird. After this one, we're going
to take a break from birds and explore some other
taxa for the rest of the season, but let's see
if this little bird sounds familiar to you. Here
it comes in three. two, one. And here's your
second chance to listen in three, two, one. Okay,
folks, who's that bird? Email your guest to us
at podcast at pepperwoodpreserve .org. Until
next episode, thanks for listening. And don't
forget to keep your ears tuned into nature.