Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Galls and the CVBS

The gall book is in! The galls in my 11-9-07 post that look like puffy pink stars crossed with inflated rubber gloves crossed with udders appear to be made by the Spined Turban Gall Wasp (Antron douglasii).

A few notes about the Central Valley Birding Symposium (CVBS, Nov. 15-18, 2007):

The event was in a new location this year; in fact, we were the first people to stay in the new hotel. The hotel is right next door to an arena, and on the Friday of the CVBS, Ozzy Osbourne was playing. We could hear “Crazy Train” in our hotel room. Someone told me that Ozzy was opening for Rob Zombie, which isn’t fair – Ozzy is too established to open for someone. Would there be a Rob Zombie without Ozzy? Discuss.

During the CVBS, I went on a couple of field trips – Eastern Stanislaus County on the Friday of the event, and Woodbridge Regional Park in Lodi on Saturday. At one of our first stops on the Eastern Stanislaus County trip, we birded a very pretty piece of riparian habitat in the campground of Turlock Lake State Park/Recreation Area. Check out the enormous acorns I found there (the acorn obsession continues):

Here is a Pacific Treefrog that was under the sink in the bathroom at Knights Ferry (also during the Eastern Stanislaus County trip):

Here are some dinner plate-sized mushrooms at Woodbridge Regional Park in Lodi:

Well, I’m getting sleepy, so I’ll try to talk more about the CVBS in a future post.

Good night,
Sylvie

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