Those who have been following the saga of the Carpinteria snowy plovers know that they had a big year in 2022, with nine separate nesting attempts at the site just east of the mouth of Carpinteria Creek. State Park employees, lifeguards, campers, and volunteer snowy plover docents all helped out, keeping an eye on the…

Update: We had a fun outing at the marsh. Details of our visit are in the eBird trip report. For this month’s outing we have a special treat: A visit to the normally-restricted western portion of the Carpinteria Salt Marsh Natural Reserve. Important: All participants in this month’s outing must fill out the following two…

For this month’s Carpinteria Birdwatchers online meeting we’ll talk about a group we’ve never covered before: terns! Learn about these graceful birds that go from resting peacefully on the beach to diving headfirst into the ocean. The meeting will be at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, September 15, 2022. See you there via Zoom or YouTube…

For this month’s group outing we’ll put our warbler-ID skills to use by visiting a famous local warbler-watching site: the 8th Street footbridge over Carpinteria Creek. Join us for a fun, low-energy outing to see what warblers (and other birds) we can see and hear. Location: 8th Street footbridge in Carpinteria Date/time: Saturday, August 20,…

You’ll recall that in last May’s meeting we talked about the nine most-common warbler species in Santa Barbara county. This month we’ll cover a dozen more species you can see locally if you play your cards right: rarities. Join us at 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, August 18, 2022 via Zoom or YouTube livestream for a…

Just a quick note to mention that due to a combination of people being on vacation and me (John) being sick (though I’m getting better), we will not have an official Carpinteria Birdwatchers group outing this month. Look for an update in the blog as to our next group outing, which should take place in…

This month’s Carpinteria Birdwatchers Zoom meeting will take place a little later in the month than we’ve been having them. The meeting will be on the evening of Thursday, July 28, 2022, at 6:30 pm Pacific, and will feature special guest Jenny Slaughter. Jenny will talk about two topics: An update on the status of…

For this month’s meeting we’ll visit Franklin Park in Carpinteria. This small city park features a variety of trees and other vegetation, and is very popular with birds. When I looked in eBird I saw that there has never been a checklist submitted from the park during the month of June. We’ll fix that! 🙂…

At this month’s Carpinteria Birdwatchers Zoom meeting we’ll cover two topics: the latest news on the historic nesting of snowy plovers at Carpinteria State Beach, and an overview of Santa Barbara County’s wrens. As part of the wren discussion we’ll also have a brief tutorial on Merlin Sound ID, a wonderful tool for identifying bird…

Over the past week birdwatchers in the area have been noticing brown pelicans showing up in places they aren’t normally seen, like inland lakes. Now the following message has been sent out by the Santa Barbara Wildlife Care Network: Over the weekend, SBWCN experienced an unusually large influx of brown pelican patients. In just two…