The 2019 Sanderlings Bird-a-thon is Approaching!!!

Dear Sponsor,

The Drake’s Beach Sanderlings was the first, and is the longest running, youth Bird-a-thon team that the Point Reyes Bird Observatory has ever organized. I was one of the founding youth members and am now the team leader.

Since its beginning, the Sanderlings have established a very successful tradition of crisscrossing Marin County every fall, finding as many bird species as possible in twenty-four hours, and raising money for bird research and conservation. During the 2018 bird-a-thon, the Sanderlings were particularly successful when we found more bird species than any other team that year! Over the years our team members have changed as our youths get older, move away, or enter college. Wherever they have spread, Sanderlings members carry a passion for birds and nature with them that was, in part, nurtured by our team.

We are now preparing for our 2019 bird-a-thon! To support this team, I would like to invite you to become a sponsor of the Sanderlings. Your support sends a powerful message to the birding community that a team of young people can make an important contribution to bird conservation. This year, the Sanderlings bird-a-thon will be on October 5^th. When you become a sponsor, I will be sure to let you know how the day goes.

Becoming a sponsor is easy! Just go to: https://pointblue.securesweet.com/contribute_paymentspring.asp?userid=1&fundid=832 and enter your info, or follow the QR code, below. I hope you are able to support this wonderful team. Please feel free to contact me with any questions you might have.

 

Sincerely,

Aaron

Drake’s Beach Sanderlings Team Leader

The 2018 Drake’s Beach Sanderlings.

 

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Economics and the ESA

How much is a Kirkland’s Warbler worth?

What is the monetary value of a California Condor?

Once of the significant changes that is being made by the current presidential administration to the US Endangered Species Act (ESA) is to take the economic considerations of a project or a impacted species into account. This will mean that if a particular project could generate a lot of money, it might be able to move ahead even if it destroyed an endangered species. Also, if measures to save a particular species are expensive, they may be ignored in favor of a profitable project.

This is a terrible change.

Protecting a species should be undertaken simply for its own right. If that is expensive, so be it. If it is difficult, so be it. If it is unprofitable, so be it!

Economic considerations have no place in deciding which species to save and whether or not some species to go extinct. Period.

If economic considerations do become part of the endangered species conservation decision making process, we will all have to answer the two questions that I began this post with. Many industries will be working hard to put dollar amounts on species, and to make sure those values are as low as possible.

Here is a short video from Beau and the Fifth Column, a youtube content creator I like, on the subject.

Let’s talk about the Endangered Species Act, Chickens, and Painters….

And here is a link to written testimony by Dr. Jane Goodall to the U.S. House of Representatives on the value and importance of the Endangered Species Act.

Dr. Jane Goodall to the U.S. House of Representatives

One result of adding economic considerations into conservation decisions will be more extent species. And this during an ongoing extinction crisis.

 

 

 

 

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