Kern Audubon Society usually meets on the first
Tuesday of each month at 7PM. After a short period for announcements, introductions, etc., a program is
presented by an outstanding person(s) in the field of conservation, ornithology,ecology, history, or
biology. Generally, the programs are accompanied by Powerpoint, slide, or other media and there is usually
a lively discussion and question and answer period. A list of past speakers is given at the end of this
page.
After the program, there are refreshments, and winning raffle tickets are drawn for prizes such as bird
guides, photographs or posters, nature games, and other items donated by our members. In addition to a
fun time, the raffles are important to our treasury as we re-build our Chapter. June Program
End of Year GATHERING Tuesday JUNE 1st - DEEP PIT BBQ 5:30- 7:30PM F.A.C.T/Environmental Studies Area at CSUB (Turn north on Runner Drive from Camino Media, then right into the parking lot. Go thru parking lot onto dirt road to the fence.) 5:30 pm - Tours of FACT (Facility for Animal Care & Treatment), Cactus Garden & Desert Tortoise Compound 6:30pm - Catered DEEP PIT BBQ - $10/adults; $5 under 8 Dinner entertainment: Keyboardist ROD LEE Come & enjoy Kern Audubon's Webmaster and talented musician, Rod Lee, at the keyboard providing dinner music and special entertainment...maybe even some requests! Come enjoy a fun evening as we end our program year! PAST PROGRAMS Kern Audubon Society "What a Hoot!" "What A Hoot!" is the May 4, 2010, 7:00pm program of the Kern Audubon Society featuring Burleigh Lockwood, Fresno Zoo Director of Education, who will present a comparison of owls & hawks, their habitats and adaptations with hands-on demonstration. Lockwood is a wildlife biologist with a BS from Cal PolySLO in Environmental Biology and has worked for the US Forest Service while studying the Spotted Owl in the Sierra Nevada. She volunteered with the zoo for 12 years prior to coming on the staff in 1993. The public is invited to the program which is held at the Kern Sup't of Schools, 17 th & L Sts. Bakersfield. Call Ted Murphy (325-0307) for more information. Kern Audubon Society "Wildlife, Solar & Dust at Owens Lake- -Add Water & Stir" Mike Prather - Birder, Conservationist & Owens Lake "hero" An enormous wildlife resource has returned to Owens Lake, a migration stopover for tens of thousands of shorebirds and waterfowl that was lost nearly 100 years ago. The lake was dried as a result of water gathering by the City of Los Angeles, but now is receiving careful application of water to control the regional dust storms born with the lake's death. Roughly 35 square miles of Owens Lake's surface are covered with shallow ponds or sheet flooding resulting in thousands of acres of rich feeding habitat for sandpipers, snowy plovers, ducks and geese, with 9 more square miles of ponds and sheet flooding currently under construction. In 2001 the National Audubon Society designated Owens Lake an Important Bird Area and in 2008 included it as one of ten IBA's in California that would receive staff time and resources from Audubon California. Creation of a collaborative lakewide conservation action plan is being led by Eastern Sierra Audubon and Audubon CA in partnership with LA Department of Water and Power, Department of Fish & Game and the State Lands Commission. Today hundreds of birders and wildlife watchers are visiting the lake on guided fieldtrips to see this amazing migratory spectacle. Nesting snowy plovers (the largest inland site in California), large flocks of least and western sandpipers, thousands of American avocets, peregrine falcon, white-faced ibis and more are watchable wildlife at Owens Lake. Now the challenge is to determine how much of the rare resource can be protected in perpetuity. Can a balance be found between the need for water by Los Angeles and the need to protect wildlife, including its enjoyment by the citizens of California? Mike Prather is a big part of the reason Owens Lake has been restored and we are fortunate to have Mike, who was honored by Audubon California as one of its top volunteers for 2008, present the April 6th program. Mike has been residing in Inyo County since 1972 when he and wife Nancy moved to Death Valley to teach in a one room school house. He has actively been working on land and water issues in the Owens Valley since 1980 with the Owens Valley Committee (past president), Eastern Sierra Audubon (past president) and Sierra Club (past chapter chair). The re-watering of 62 miles of the Lower Owens River and the massive wildlife return to Owens Lake as a result of the Los Angeles Owens Lake Dust Control Project have been the center of Mike's conservation focus since the early 1980's. The enhancement and protection of the Owens River and Owens Lake Important Bird Areas attracts most of his current efforts and he invites everyone to join in the fun. Mike and Nancy live in Lone Pine and are retired (or 'real tired') from thirty years of teaching
Unless noted otherwise, meetings will be in the Kern Superintendent of Schools
Office at 17th and L Streets. There is free parking on the street or in the parking structure north of the
building. Meetings are open to the public and there is no admission charge.
Great Grey Owl
Tuesday May 4, 2010 - 7:00pm
Location: Kern Sup't of Schools
17th & L Sts., Bakersfield
(Street parking or the KSS lot at 18th & K)
Burleigh Lockwood
Tuesday April 6, 2010 - 7:00pm
Location: Kern Sup't of Schools
17th & L Sts., Bakersfield
(Street parking or the KSS lot at 18th & K)
Greg Warrick, Preserves Manager, "Nature Preserves of Kern County"
Tom Maloney, The Tejon Ranch Conservancy, Executive Director
Kelli Levinson, Kern County coordinator for "North American Birds", Birding Ecuador: A Summer's Journey
Jon Hammond, Tehachapi Mountain Birding Club, Journalist for Tehachapi News, Kawaiisu Indian Language teacher
Jordan Wellwood, Conservation Coordinator Audubon CA,"Protecting California's Birds"
David Pereksta, "Between Science and Magic...The Continuing Searchfor the Ivory-billed Woodpecker"
Barbara Reifel and Ginny Dallas, "Wildlife Destination: The Galapagos"
Kern Audubon Deep Pit Barbecue by Western Kitchen, Music by guitarist Dave Ogden
Dr. Robert Meese, UC Davis research associate, Tri-Colored Blackbirds
Reed Tollefson, Audubon CA manager, Kern River Preserve
Dave Clendenon, preserve ecologist, Wind Wolves Preserve
Josh Bradley, wildlife photographer,"Where the Viewfinder Takers Me"
Dr. Ted Murphy, Co-Chair Kern Audubon, "The San Joaquin Kit Fox"
Kevin Malamaa, an environmental consultant and avid nature photographer."Wildlife in Bolivia"
Alison Sheehey, Nature Ali, "The Big Picture in a Small Frame: the Natural History of Kern County"
Peter Bloom,
raptor biologist, "California Condor Conservation and the Tejon Ranch."
Graham Chisolm,CA Audubon Dir. of Conservation, chair Tejon Ranch Conservancy
Kern Audubon Barbecue and Potluck at FACT, Richard Noel " the Cordeen man" entertained us.
Birgette McDonald, "Birds and Pinipeds of Cape Sheriff, Antartic"
Scott Frazier, "Birding in Peru"
Bob Steele, "Birds of Tropical Australia"
Rob Hansen, environmental consultant, instructor at College of the Sequoias: "Sharing a Vision of the Tulare Lake Basin"
"Kern National Wildlife Refuge" -- Jihadda Govan, refuge biologist
Dr. John Wilson, Wintering Birds of Kern County
Karen Pestana, Bluebird Trail Coordinator for the Tehachapi Birding Club
Bill Moffat, Park Ranger and Preserve Manager: Tule Elk Reserve, Allensworth, and Tejon State Historical
Parks.
Mojave Desert SP
Andrea Jones, IBA Program Coordinator Audubon California.
Don Williams, president, Bakersfield chapter of the Turtle and Tortoise Club.
John Lindsay, Kern Superintendent of Schools Office.
Sanford "Sandy" Wilbur, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (ret.)
Dr. Steve Laymon, Bureau of Land Management.
Mr. Greg Warrick, Center for Natural Lands Management.
Dave Hardt, Manager of Kern and Pixley National Wildlife Refuges.
Reed Tollefson, Manager of the Kern River Preserve in Weldon, CA.
Dr. Maynard Moe, Professor of Biology at California State University, Bakersfield.
Glenn Olson, Audubon California Executive Director.
Larry Saslaw, Bureau of Land Management.
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