Wednesday, January 25, 2017, 7:30 pm - 9:00 pm
Join us this January for an engaging look at the birds which visit this most important Pacific Flyway stop over.
Presented by Paul Collins
Paul will examine changes occurring with the breeding avifauna of the Channel Islands as a result of intensive conservation and restoration efforts during the past half century. Control and/or removal of introduced herbivores, rats, feral cats, and Golden Eagles have helped to facilitate the recovery of habitats and species adversely affected by overgrazing and/or predation. Decline of the pesticide DDT in the marine environment of the southern California Bight has led to the recovery of marine birds. This talk will identify what species have been removed, reintroduced, or have established new breeding populations on the islands. Significant changes include the addition of 26 species that have either been confirmed or are suspected to have nested for the first time on one or more of the Channel Islands.
At the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History for the past 43 years, Paul is currently the Curator of Vertebrate Zoology. He has conducted research on a wide array of taxa on the Channel Islands during the past 40 years and as a result has an extensive knowledge of the terrestrial and marine vertebrate fauna of the islands. He received a BS in zoology in 1973 and an MA in zoology in 1982 from the University of California Santa Barbara where he studied the origin and evolution of the Island fox for his Master’s thesis. Paul has published widely on a variety of topics related to the research he has conducted with the fauna of the Channel Islands. He recently published a checklist to the birds of the Channel Islands and is currently working on a book about them.
Doors open at 7:00pm
