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Birds You’ll See in Wooded Areas

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Ruby-Crowned Kinglet

This is the second in a multipart series introducing birds typically found in valley and foothill areas of Northern California. The following “bird bios” describe birds you’re likely to see in heavily wooded areas and woodsy edges, such as in and near Lower Bidwell Park in Chico. These brief descriptions are excerpted from The Birds of Bidwell Park, a handy field guide that offers many more details, as well as finely drawn illustrations by Carol Burr, to help you identify regional birds. At last report the book was available in Chico at Bird in Hand, Made in Chico, C Bar D Feed Store, and ABC Books (next to La Comida). —Editor

Roger Lederer, Professor Emeritus of Biological Sciences at CSU, Chico, has birdwatched in more than 90 countries. Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, In My Neighborhood, Birds, Wildlife

Don’t Just Kill the Lawn When You Can Create Habitat

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Monarch butterfly

Some Californians seem shocked to hear the water people finally say: “Hey folks, rethink that yard! We don’t have enough water for lush lawns.” Why the surprise? California is the only state in the union where rain doesn’t typically come in summer, which (aside from the gold rush) is why they call it the Golden State. Describing the state’s crispy hillsides as “golden” is much more poetic than burned-out brown. California’s Mediterranean climate zones are perfect places to grow many exotics—almonds, pistachios, olives, citrus fruit, figs, apricots, wine grapes, you name it. Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, How We Live, Wildlife

Wild Horses, Please Drag Me Away

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Wild horses come in all colors. Photo by Jeremy Martin, U.S. Bureau of Land Management.

Horses originated here in North America. Ancestors of today’s horses migrated to Europe, Asia, and Africa but were frozen out here by the last ice age. Then horses came back. The thundering herds of Western yore started up from the escaped steeds of Spanish explorers and soldiers. Permafrost preserved remains of the ancient Yukon horse – the last horse of prehistory to live in North America – and, much to the surprise of researchers, DNA samples established that it was essentially identical, genetically, to both feral and domesticated modern horses.  (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, Travel

Can You Name That Bird?

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Can You Name That Bird

Many cities point to their open spaces as very special, but Bidwell Park is really the jewel in the crown of Chico. A very distinctive place respected and revered by the citizens of Chico, all seem to think they know it well, but there is a lot more to the park than many people realize. Hikers and bikers know the trails, baseball and soccer participants are familiar with fields, summer users know all the picnic areas, and parents and grandparents know Caper Acres and other children’s play areas.  (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, In My Neighborhood, Birds, Wildlife

Hostel Territory Inland

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Hostel Territory Inland

Many of California’s hostels are situated along the state’s long, long coastline, which seems only natural. Not every state has a coast, let alone so much of it, so of course people want to go coastal here. But the Golden State barely even begins at the Pacific Ocean. There are worthy hostels inland as well. Before we consider them, let’s recap the benefits of hostel-based travel, always the first choice of those who prefer to spend small but live big. Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, Travel, Hostels

The Road Not Taken

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The Road Not Taken

You’ve gassed her up, you’re behind the wheel, with your arm around your sweetheart in your Oldsmobile . . . —Tom Waits

If you were in the business of selling a popular dream—say, freedom, status, and mobility—and you began to notice your customers’ dreams shifting elusively, as dreams do, into something quite different from your product, what would you do? For automakers, the answer seems to be wake up, quickly, and smell the soy latte.  (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, How We Live

What Color is Your Organization?

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What Color is Your Organization

Not every idea threatens change to the status quo, but those that do are met with a fairly predictable response: attention, which can diverge into derision or fascination; resistance; and sometimes, acceptance. I just finished reading a book that’s bound to trigger all three, with plenty of fireworks along the way. Frederic Laloux’s Reinventing Organizations (Nelson Parker, 2014) has the attention-grabbing subtitle, “A guide to creating organizations inspired by the next stage of human consciousness.” Luckily for me, by the time I paid sufficient attention to that, I’d already been hooked by the book’s premise. Otherwise, I’d probably have veered off along the derision path and missed the “exhilarating and deeply hopeful” reaction the book has inspired during its few months of existence. It really is a guide, and “reinventing” is putting it mildly. Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, How We Live, Book Reviews

The Ecology of Home

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Ecology of Home

This part of California is home to me. I can’t claim generations of northern California kinship as my friend JoEllen Hall can. Jo descends from the pioneering Stover cattle ranching clan. Her family still wintered horses in upper Bidwell Park (good grazing) not all that long ago. Her mother was a talented trick rider, too, one of the first Little Nells ever chosen to reign over Chico State’s mythic Pioneer Days festivities. Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, How We Live

Birds of a Feather, and Not

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parakeets

Events make sense only in context. Sometimes the term context is used by naturalists to mean the environment or “field” in which a creature makes its living naturally. A caged parrot is out of context, then, and unable to teach us much about being a parrot. A lion or gorilla in a zoo may exhibit some genetically encoded behavior and physiology, but mostly they teach us how caged animals interact with each other, their keepers, and the observing public. Understanding context can be challenging.  (more…) Continue Reading →

Filed under: All Stories, How We Live, Birds, Wildlife