The levees of the South Bay salt ponds are maintained by a 70-year old clamshell dredge named the Mallard II. I come across the scoop marks of the Mallard II in many of my aerial photographs and have been eager to see it in action. So, I often have an eye out for its whereabouts.

Dredge [...]

I thought I would share this shot of the Cargill Newark Salt Plant. Taken a week ago at sunset, it also features a still, specularly-reflective water surface so elusive in kite photographs.

Salt plant at sunset.

Oftentimes my favorite episodes down in the South Bay begin with a ‘hmmm..’. These are largely precipitated by a pattern or object in the layers of that landscape that seems dissonant, curious, or perhaps just anomalous. A case in point is an odd looking object in the salt ponds at the edge of the Dumbarton [...]

Wayne has suggested that we take a look at the outlet of Corte Madera Creek in Marin County as a potential Hidden Ecologies study site. I stopped by UCB’s Map Library and grabbed some background material like this 1946 aerial photograph:

It looks like the Greenbrae Boardwalk houses are there (many of them anyway) but not [...]

I got out on a couple of outings with my VS186A students this weekend. The first trip was Friday and included a brief visit to Alvarado including a tour of the backside of walled developments. From we headed a couple of miles south to the north side of the Coyote Slough Storm Control Channel and [...]

From Berkeley down to San Jose, the geography of the East Bay remains shaped by the early settlements in that region. A case in point is Mowry Landing, a shipping node in the 1800s that connected East Bay producers to San Francisco’s lucrative market (Google map here).
If one takes the prominent Mowry Avenue exit [...]

On Monday, 19 Septermber 2005 I stopped by the salt ponds adjacent to the old Dumbarton Bridge (now a fishing pier, Google map here).
The salt ponds immediately adjacent to the parking area had taken on a bright green water color. I wandered down one of the levee trails a short way and collected two samples [...]

I cannot help but marvel at the avian richness of the South Bay. When out and about on the salt pond trials you encounter birds at every turn and in great number. This combination of robust and varied communities juxtaposed against scenic backgrounds has me thinking in weak moments about investing in some nice long [...]

For the next day or two I will be playing with the graphic layout of this blog. If the style changes abruptly, it is probably just me exploring ready-made temples. In any event the content should remain stable. My goal here is to find a layout that works on most browsers, provides a quick link [...]

On August 15th, 2005, Dave Lash and I hiked the perimeter of Bayfront Park Google Map here.
A slough runs along part of the west and the entire north side of the park. On the east are pickle grass wetlands that extend to the Bay. On the south and continuing around part of the [...]