Pomona Valley Audubon -
Chaparral Naturalist Archives

In 1971 as vice president of Chaffey College, I introduced Jack Smith as speaker at an all-college lecture. I presented him with the 1957 edition of the AOU Checklist of North American Birds, which clearly showed that grackles did not occur in California. He had had the audacity to write chat he had seen a "grackle'' fly over his home on Mt. Washington in Los Angeles County.

Since that time the "great-tailed grackle" has moved in from southwestern Arizona and nests in many places in southern California.

The "common grackle" is a rarity that has been recorded regularly by chasers in Death Valley in San Bernardino County. This spring, as reported by Kimball Garrett in the May/ June issue of the Western Tanager, the common grackle was spotted for the first time in Los Angeles County in Torrance.

Some time later at a dinner meeting of the Friends of the Upland Library, Jack confessed that while writing a column in his backyard he needed a bird name and picked "grackle." Little did he know what a storm of protest that record caused among birders of the late 60's and 70's. Yet as Kimball says he predicted the occurrence of both species of grackle in our state.

What a sense of humor!

Migration on the Net

For the first time. US Geological Survey Biological Resources Division (BRD) researchers are displaying the spring migration of snow geese on the Internet. You can watch their progress at http://north.audubon.org

The National Audubon Society and the BRD are leading a cooperative education project called Wild Wings, Heading North. The project highlights animal migration by tracking ten snow geese, captured in November and fitted with satellite radios at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in New Mexico. The 3,100 mile spring migration from the desert to the tundra spans 5 months (February to June).

The web site includes daily updates of maps and data on the bird’s location, weather information, geographic and cultural areas along their route, a field journal of observation and discussion forums where students can share messages and ask questions.