Sacramento Valley: A haven for birds – and birders

[depakid]

Egrets take flight early in the day at Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area west of Sacramento. Yolo is one of more than half a dozen wildlife refuges in the Sacramento Valley, one of the best places to see migratory birds from September to March.
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It was like a lottery-winning moment for birders. I looked up through the windshield, and there it was: brown and striped, gliding toward a tangle of reeds a few feet from our car — an American bittern. Bitterns are common at Gray Lodge Wildlife Area, but they're elusive and rarely seen. Even an ornithologist friend has seen only two or three.

Gray Lodge is one of more than half a dozen wildlife refuges in the Sacramento Valley, a habitat-rich basin that comprises the northern end of the Central Valley from Redding south to the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. The sheer number of migratory birds makes the Sacramento Valley one of the best places to see them from September to March. It has "one of the greatest concentrations of waterfowl in North America," says Mike Wolder, supervisory wildlife biologist for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service in Northern California.

More than 3 million ducks and more than 1 million geese stop in the Sacramento Valley each fall, Wolder says. They travel to and from their breeding grounds along the Pacific Flyway, which stretches from Russia to South America and is one of four major migratory routes for birds in North America.

About 45% of the Pacific Flyway's waterfowl winter in the Sacramento Valley, according to the Fish and Wildlife Service, making it the most important wintering home for ducks, geese and swans on the route. Although waterfowl are plentiful, songbirds, shorebirds, raptors and sandhill cranes are among the other avian species that use the pathway.

More: http://www.latimes.com/travel/la-tr-birding-20101003,0,5025346.story

[XemaSab]

1. The Sac valley has great birding

:D

[petronius]

2. The Valley has an amazing amount of wildlife area, but I think it's often overlooked

in favor of the coasts and the Sierra. I spent a day tooling around out there recently (technically, I was more in the San Joaquin Valley) and saw a bunch of great reserves that I pretty much had to myself...