Here’s what you do – you go over to Stow Lake in Golden Gate Park, somewhere near Heron Island, and start up your pig call. Soooo-weeeee! And soon you’ll see pig-nosed turtles, weighing up to 30 pounds.
Like this ugly customer. Click to expand.
Do some people abandon pets at Golden Gate Park?
Yes, some people do.
The Great Blue Herons of Golden Gate Park sometimes like to get up high and ball up. I guess they do that to warm up in the sun after a cold night.
Don’t miss your chance to see these critters this season via San Francisco Nature Education, the non-profit founded by attorney Nancy DeStefanis. They’ll have some programs, like Heron Watch and Birding for Everyone going on tomorrow, May 2, 2009, and on into the future. Check their calendar or thisone on SFGate.com.
Can you see the beak? Click to expand
This female hawk on Strawberry Hill / Island (it was already named before it became an island) in the middle of Golden Gate Park’s Stow Lake is feasting on something.
Can you guess what it is?
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See you after the jump.
Now you can a bunch of research by reading up on tomes of yore but if you want to search for buried treasure in Golden Gate Park, the best place to start must be at Stow Lake near Yelp-rated Strawberry Hill island.
Why? Well, just look at this recent photo. Something must be down there, ‘neath the spotlight:
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Happy hunting!
This decently-sized fish just couldn’t get enough wonderful Rainbow Bread (can you see a slice getting devored on the left?) the other day at Stow Lake in Golden Gate Park. Keep a look out for these critters when you rent a boat at Stow, just a stone’s throw away from the de Young Museum and the California Academy of Sciences.
Num num:
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The Great Blue Herons of Golden Gate Park need to mash up their crayfish treats before eating, so sometimes you’ll get to hear a wet splat and then see the guts fly.
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KERSPLATT!
A close up view from an earlier day:
Look out, little crayfish…
Here are your clues about whether your turtle is a red-eared slider – does it slide off of rocks into the water when you get too close and does it have red where you’d expect it to have ears, as shown? Well then, you’ve got yourself an exotic, invasive animule that doesn’t belong in Golden Gate Park.
The best place to see these critters is Golden Gate Park – here’s one from Stow Lake.
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Bad turtle! That’s a bad turtle, go away!
The gigantic Great Blue Herons high atop Stow Lake in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park usually want to stick around their one-hundred pound nests, so sometimes this is how they go to the loo.
Most of it makes it out of the nest, anyway.
Click to expand, go ahead, do it.
Yet another “pretty picture,” per ”Don’t Call Him Crazy” Rob Anderson.
Just as the Cliff Swallows come back to Capistrano every March (or so they say), the Great Blue Herons of San Francisco return to nest on a small island on Stow Lake every January.
See what it looks like via filmmaker Rick Bacigalupi of BaciPix, who presents Nancy DeStefanis, The Heron Lady. Check out SFNature.org for the latest, including new tours of Heron’s Head Park (aka Pier 98) in southeast San Francisco.
This fellow is a regular at the nests in the tops of of the Monterey Cypress of Stow Lake. He’s ready to fight and love all over again this year.
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Welcome back, Ardea herodias
The thing about American Coots (Fulica americana) is that they hate each other. Hence the terms ”old coot“ and “as crazy as a coot.”
Look for them fighting once again as Spring nears.
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