Tiburon, CA--The Richardson Bay Audubon Center & Sanctuary is hoping to attract more people than ever to the 3rd Annual Waterbird Festival, which celebrates the migratory waterbirds of San Francisco Bay.

On February 6, from 10am-4pm, the Bay Area public is invited to join the free celebration of these fascinating birds and the habitats they depend on. The Center will host naturalist-led bird walks, exclusive field trips (both at the Center and off-site), and fun bird-themed activities including an exhibit of the winning images of the 2015 Audubon Photography Awards. Visitors can wander the site, join a tour, or use our spotting scopes to see the waterbirds that call Richardson Bay home. There will also be expert speakers, including filmmaker Judy Irving (The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill) and Audubon’s Director of Bird Conservation, John Takekawa. Food trucks will be available onsite as well for lunch and snacking.

Each winter, hundreds of thousands of scaup, scoters, grebes, cormorants and more make their way to the San Francisco Bay to escape the harsh winters of their northern breeding grounds. Here they feed, rest and find mates, taking advantage of abundant natural resources and the protected waters of the bay.

Richardson Bay, and the 900-acre Audubon Sanctuary in particular, is attractive due its large eelgrass beds which Pacific herring use as a substrate for their eggs. The eggs, in turn, are eaten by ducks, gulls and shorebirds while the fish themselves become meals for cormorants, pelicans, grebes, seals and sea-lions. Pacific herring use Richardson Bay for spawning more than any other location in San Francisco Bay, and the resulting activity of birds and marine mammals can be a spectacular wildlife phenomena to witness.

The Sanctuary waters are closed to boat traffic (including kayaks and paddleboards) during the winter, which allows these birds to rest and feed undisturbed, providing a perfect location to observe wildlife in a more natural setting.

These are just some of the things that are planned for the 2016 Festival:

• Gull Identification Workshop with Peter Pyle;
• Judy Irving (Director of Pelican Dreams and The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill)
• Bird walk with Len Blumin (Blackie's Pasture area)
• Birding Basics with Rich Cimino
• Bird walks on Audubon Center grounds
• Bay boat charter trip on the Blue Runner
• SeaTrek kayak trip on Richardson Bay
• BYO kayak/SUP trip to Aramburu Island
• John Muir 'Jack' Laws sketching class
• Exhibit of Audubon Magazine's 2015 Photography Award winners
• Expert speakers
• Offsite field trips led by Audubon chapters in Napa and Alameda counties
• Food trucks

For full schedule and registration, see our website:  http://richardsonbay.audubon.org/waterbird-festival-2016