Highway 1 at Montara was closed around noon on Sunday, January 1, at Montara after a fire on a power pole at the old Charthouse restaurant left a gaping hole.  PG&E crews worked to shore up the pole and the road was reopened about 2pm.

You can see daylight through the break in the power pole.  Click image for larger size.

Thousands of rare red phalaropes, many of them hungry, are looking for refuge in Half Moon Bay, reports the Mercury News. The birds normally live many miles offshore and are rarely seen on land. But, apparently driven by the storms that are churning our coast, they’re showing up around the Bay Area, especially on the Coastside, and a flock of 1,200 has been spotted in Half Moon Bay.

Weather may be to blame. The birds float and eat by skimming sea life from the surface of the water. Smaller than a robin, they are easily tossed and turned by turbulent ocean waves and can’t eat under those conditions.

“There are storms across the entire Pacific, from China to the west coast of California. It’s a steady stream of storms, with no break in between them,’’ said Steve Anderson, a forecaster with the National Weather Service in Monterey.

At a special public meeting held on Skyline, the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District (MROSD) Board of Directors last night unanimously voted to purchase the 151-acre Rapley Ranch and 50-acre Portola Lookout Peninsula Open Space Trust (POST) properties. The Rapley Ranch property is an addition to Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve and Portola Lookout is an addition to Long Ridge Open Space Preserve, and represents the third and fourth purchases within the Coastside Protection area.

Click “read more” to see the rest of the release.

Every year, juvenile steelhead die in Pescadero Marsh before they are able to make it out to sea. Last year, 300 died. This year, there is no accurate count.  Steelhead are a threatened species that comes to the creek to spawn every year. According to the County Times, it’s unclear whether the fish are dying from natural or human causes, but disease has been ruled out.

Every spring, adult steelhead swim upstream to spawn. As water levels decrease, a 40-foot sandbar forms on the beach, dividing stream from ocean and creating a brackish estuary rich in plankton for their newborn trout to feed. The first storms of winter break the sandbar open, delivering the young fish to the ocean and beginning the process anew.

The problem, explained Joanne Kerbavaz, a resource ecologist with State Parks, is that a portion of the young fish suffocate before they reach the ocean.

There are a number of theories as to why, one of which has to do with the movement of water in the marsh. The water contains saltwater on the bottom and freshwater on top. When the sandbar breaks and the marsh flows out to sea, the water gets mixed together and the fish lose their oxygen. Another hypothesis is that naturally occurring hydrogen sulfides are stirred up off the bottom of the lagoon, killing the fish.

There is some concern that the die-off may be the result of changes made over the last 20 years. California State Parks has been working for twenty years to restore the creeks. They have removed numerous farmers’ levees built to prevent flooding. In 1991, Caltrans built a bridge over the watershed.

Leland Yee is Speaker pro Tempore of the California State Assembly

Dear Editor,

I want to publicly thank Senator Dianne Feinstein and Congressman Tom Lantos for their commitment to the recent passage of the Rancho Corral de Tierra Golden Gate National Recreation Boundary Adjustment Act of 2005.

This Act will significantly increase the size of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, but more importantly it will permanently protect over 4,000 acres of open space on the Peninsula.  In fact, these areas will protect land from the Pacific Ocean to the watershed four miles inland as well as sensitive coastal habitat for golden eagles, mountain lions, and falcons, among other wildlife.

With the additional land secured by Feinstein and Lantos, the recreation area will grow to nearly 80,000 acres, making it the nation’s largest urban park.  Thanks to our delegation’s leadership, generations of Bay Area residents will be able to enjoy this protected open space.

It is imperative that we continue to be vigilant in protecting our environment.  Currently, there is an effort by Congressional Republicans to end the long-standing federal moratorium on offshore oil drilling.  Lifting this moratorium could have a devastating impact on our coastal communities, particularly to commercial fishing and tourism, which annually contributes over $50 billion to the state’s economy.

I look forward to continuing to work with our Congressional delegation in protecting our environmental resources.

Sincerely,

Leland Y. Yee, Ph.D.

Montara photographer Darin Boville sent us a picture from the monarch butterflies sanctuary at Natural Bridges State Beach at the north end of Santa Cruz. The butterflies travel 2,500 miles from western Canada in one of nature’s great migrations.

According to what I read online they usually get 11-14,000 here during the migration. The docent said that this year they only have 6,000. He ascribed the difference to “things vary"--maybe he wasn’t a scientist!

Thee National Weather Service has issued an urban and small stream flood advisory for Coastal San Mateo county over the next few hours.

...An urban and small stream flood advisory has been issued until 3 pm for coastal sections of San Mateo...Santa Cruz...And Monterey counties...Including the coastal hills.

At 11 am Doppler radar and satellite imagery was indicating enhanced precipitation with convective cloud development about 50 miles offshore from Santa Cruz.  This area of development is moving eastward and will impact the central coast over the next few hours. As the precipitation reaches the coast expect occasional rainfall rates of 0.5 To 0.75 Inches per hour. This will cause local flooding of urban areas and smaller streams are expected to show a marked rise in the heavier rain areas.  Also...The area of development is building to the west and this will be watched for possible thunderstorm development.

Motorists should be prepared for occasional heavy downpours and allow extra time for travel in localized hazardous driving conditions. As this situation develops this advisory will be updated if conditions become worse than expected

The County Times takes a look at the decision to reduce red-legged frog habitat by the Fish and Wildlife Service.

The Service seems mainly to be concerned with avoiding litigation. According to spokesman Jim Nickles:

“There’s lots of things we’re doing to recover the species. Critical habitat is a very expensive, time-consuming, litigious process,” said Nickles.

Nickles says that it’s better to work with private property owners.  The Coastal Commission seems less certain.

Chris Kern, district manager of the California Coastal Commission, said that he was certain that the coastal provisions would shield the frogs’ habitat from harm. The rest of the county was a different story, however.

“The loss of critical habitat beyond the coastal zone could affect the future of the species very strongly,” he said.

Furthermore, the federal agency’s proposal wouldn’t help take the red-legged frog off the threatened species list, said Kern.

Coastsider wrote about this decision on November 5.

The National Weather Service has issued a high surf advisory from midnight toight to 1am Sunday.

A strong storm system in the Gulf of Alaska has generated large swells that are expected to reach the central California coast Saturday morning. Swells are anticipated to be in the 14 to 18 foot range with a dominant swell period of 15 seconds. Swells will drop below advisory levels early Sunday morning.

Persons observing large waves are advised to stay well away from the water as breakers can unexpectedly wash over beaches… Rocks...And coastal structures without warning. A high surf advisory means that high surf will affect beaches in the advisory area...Producing rip currents and localized beach erosion.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service published Thursday a revised proposal that reduces by 82 percent the area proposed to be designated as critical habitat for the threatened California red-legged frog. The Service also opened a public comment period on the proposal, which ends on Feb. 1, 2006.

In northern San Mateo County, the habitat has been reduced from roughly the entire area between between Highway to 280 and the developed coastal zone, to the area around the Crystal Springs Reservoir.

The frog has been found on several Coastside development sites, including Wavecrest and Half Moon Bay’s new park.

The proposal is revised from a habitat area of 4 million acres in April, 2004, down to 800,000 acres today.  Critical habitat has been eliminated from Fresno, Mariposa, Plumas, San Diego, San Joaquin, Sonoma, Tehama, and Tuolumne counties.

Critical habitat represents the potential habitat of a species and does not necessarily reflect its actual habitat. This change in designation shouldn’t affect sites where the frog has been found.

Paradoxically, the analysis that reduces the critical habitat is based on lost development opportunities could total as much as $497 million over 20 years.

Of the 89,201 housing units projected to be built in the 23 counties over the next 20 years, 760 of them or 0.9 per cent, would not be built as a result of designating critical habitat, according to CRA International.  The projected impacts are greatest in following counties: San Luis Obispo ($166 million), Alameda ($91 million), Contra Costa ($88 million) and Santa Barbara ($41 million).

The Service is revising the habitat area becuase of a court order in a lawsuit brought by the Home Builders Association of Northern California, California Chamber of Commerce, California Building Industry Association, California Alliance for Jobs, and the Building Industry Legal Defense Fund.

Public comments on the proposed rule will be accepted until Feb. 1, 2006.  Written comments on the proposal should be submitted to the Field Supervisor, Sacramento Fish and Wildlife Office, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2800 Cottage Way, Suite W. 2605, Sacramento, CA  95825, or by facsimile to (916) 414-6712.  Comments may also be sent by electronic mail to . 

Requests for public hearings on the proposal must be submitted within 45 days to the Field Supervisor, Sacramento Fish and Wildlife Office, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 2800 Cottage Way, Suite W. 2605, Sacramento, CA 95825.

• Report on proposed habitat [PDF]


• USFWS website on red-legged frog habitat


• Full-sized map of 2005 proposed habitat in San Mateo County [PDF]


• Full-sized map of 2004 proposed habitat in San Mateo County [PDF]


• Full-sized map of 2005 proposed habitat in Northern California [PDF]

This report is based on the USFWS press release.  Click “read more” to see the release.