FR36 Opening Lectures | 2018 | Free

FR36 Opening Lectures | 2018 | Free

This event is included in the Basic Registration fee and open to all. This year’s Spotlight Organization is Mad River Alliance.

The Humboldt County Bird of the Year Awards will take place after the mayor welcome and before the Mad River Alliance talk.

Mad River: Past, Present, & Future. Presented by Dave Feral

Dave Feral is the executive director and founder of Mad River Alliance & Humboldt Steelhead Days,
Mad River Alliance is a community driven river group organized to protect clean water and the ecological integrity of the Mad River watershed for the benefit of its human and natural communities. Dave oversees all programs including; scientific research, monitoring, education and conservation.

Keynote: Jack Dumbacher, Curator of Birds & Mammals, California Academy of Sciences.

“The Future of Deep Forest Owls in California: A dilemma for conservation of Northern Spotted Owls”

In the last 50 to 100 years, the eastern Barred Owl has made its way to the western USA. Presumably helped by human landscape alteration, they now inhabit all of the range of the endangered Northern Spotted Owl and much of that of the California Spotted Owl. In recent years, evidence is mounting to suggest that Barred Owls have become a primary threat to Spotted Owls – they are fierce competitors, aggressive territory holders, faster reproducers, and have even been anecdotally reported to kill Spotted Owls. And they are spreading faster than ever. In this talk, Dumbacher will discuss the natural history and conservation concerns for both species, and discuss research and potential actions that are being considered by different management agencies.

Jack Dumbacher is curator of Birds and Mammals at the California Academy of Sciences and professor of Biology at San Francisco State University. He has been working on California Barred Owls since 2006. Both Northern Spotted Owls and Barred Owls are common species in Humboldt County.

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