It’s not often that you get to peek into the lives of a federally endangered species. Here at China Camp, we’re lucky to have a healthy population of a critically threatened bird, the Ridgway’s rail. This secretive, hen-size marsh bird—mottled gray-brown in color with a rusty chest—scurries along the serpentine channels and under the cover of pickleweed in our wetland areas. There’s plenty of those in the marshes at China Camp, known to have some of the healthiest salt-marsh wetlands in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Since we can’t guarantee that you’ll spy these elusive rails, we’re bringing you the next best thing: an expert on the birds and the marshlands the call home. Julian Wood, the San Francisco Bay Program Leader with Petaluma-based Point Blue Conservation Science, will share key information on the Ridgway’s rail and its habitat. Julian, whose work focuses on wetland bird communities around the Bay Area, will discuss latest findings on Ridgway’s rails, and why it’s so important to restore and protect the places where they and other wetland species still thrive.

For more on China Camp’s rails, see this article.

Space is limited; registration is required. Cancellation notified via email.

Date: Wednesday, December 3

Time: 6 p.m. – 7 p.m

Location: China Camp Village museum

Cost: free to FOCC members; $5 donation appreciated for non-members

Ages: 12 and older; under 18 must be accompanied by a parent or responsible adult

ADA accessible: yes

RESERVE NOW

Photo of Ridgway’s Rail by Len Blumin/Wkimedia Creative Commons