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The Discriminating Guide to Adventure on the Mendocino Coast

Internationally-known birder, photographer and wildlife biologist Ron LeValley of Fort Bragg says a local group has initiated a “citizen science project” (not official, just something created by interested locals) to monitor three populations of nesting cormorants on the Mendocino Coast.

Why? By monitoring seabird populations you can measure the health of the ocean and determine whether there is sufficient food to sustain birds and marine life, says LeValley. He and others in the volunteer-staffed science project are counting and photographing cormorant nests and chicks weekly off Mendocino Headlands State Park (Brandt’s Cormorants), Point Cabrillo Light Station (Pelagic Cormorants) and Noyo Harbor off the jetty (Brand’s Cormorants).

In the past — for decades actually — scientists have measured the bird populations at the Farallon and Alcatraz Islands and then extrapoled about the ocean’s food supplies and health, according to LeValley

“If we took those traditional measures as our guide, we would arrive at the wrong conclusion because reproduction around San Francisco Bay is the worst in a long time,” says LeValley. “By contrast, our local colonies are thriving, indicating a healthy ocean.”  A healthy population of sardines is reflected in the bumper crop of baby cormorants this year.

LeValley predicts that the Mendocino Coast will become an important place for gathering information about seabird success and state’s ocean health in the future. In fact, he plans to make a presentation of the local group’s study at the 2010 international meeting of the Pacific Seabird Group in Long Beach, California.