Author: A. Rentner

It’s a long journey for Swainson’s hawks (Buteo swainsoni) from South America to the San Joaquin Valley. The semiannual trek to their summer breeding grounds has ended for most of them and now they are being seen in large...

Animals are often named after some physical characteristic they may have such as the black bear or the white-tailed deer or the duck-billed platypus. They may also derive their name from a sound they make such as the screech owl...

Birders from all around the globe often come to central and northern California to observe a member of the corvid family that exists nowhere else on the planet. The yellow-billed magpie (Pica nuttelli) is not only native to the...

The Golden Eagle (Aquila chrysaetus) is a feathered superlative. It is the fastest, biggest and most global of all North American large raptors. Its territory is so widespread the bird has earned the title Holarctic, meaning it...

Birds are smart critters. Anyone who has watched tractors discing fields in advance of planting has seen hawks circling above watching for a vole or gopher forced into the open by the passing blades, an easy meal for any...