Solano County Breeding Bird Atlas

The goal of the Solano County Breeding Bird Atlas project is to determine--through field observations--where each bird species nests within the county. The end result of the project will be a series of county maps, with interpretive text, that show the specific areas where breeding evidence was found. There are several similar projects for other counties in California, both completed and in progress.

Alhough the project began in 2005, much work remains and there is still time to sign-on and participate. If you are interested, contact Robin Leong or Murray Berner. This web page summarizes the project and provides some useful resources for the volunteers (below). There is a Yahoo Group (listserv) containing more helpful information. All volunteers should be subscribing to this listserv. Contact Robin if you need help subscribing to the Yahoo group.

Project Status

Field work in 2009 left us a little short of our goals of completeness in the fifth and planned final year for data collection. An atlas block is considered complete when breeding is confirmed for one-half of the species expected in the block. By this criterion, about 15 percent of priority blocks fell short. These blocks are concentrated in the east and southeastern part of the county; a few are relatively inaccessible. These will be the focus of the 2010 field season, the sixth and last. The addition of a sixth year is nothing new to North American atlas efforts. Several state and local atlases have done so, and some now plan for it before any field work begins. --Murray Berner, Atlas Compiler

Resources

(click photos to enlarge)
all bird photos