Ventura Audubon Society

Who we are

At Ventura Audubon our main project area is Ormond Beach. Ormond Beach is uniquely located at the urban/agricultural/wetland interface of Ventura County. It is part of a Globally Important Bird Area, has been designated WSP critical habitat by the USFWS and an Environmentally Sensitive Habitat Area (ESHA) by the Local Coastal Plan of Oxnard. It is one of a few locations in California where 31 special status species survive and where the threatened Western Snowy Plover and the Endangered California Least Tern successfully breed and winter. Ventura Audubon Society has been collecting population data on these species for over 20 years, has had 16 years of species monitoring ,11 years of protective fencing , 4 years of a landmark dog/animal ban, and 5 years of an Integrated recovery program involving Volunteers and landowners.

Service Learning Opportunities with Ventura Audubon

THESE NEED TO BE UPDATED!

Beach Surveys

Population, Wrack and Disturbance Monitoring

Snowy Plover Reaction Scoring

Video scoring nesting plovers

Social Media Creation

Website , and Social Media Content

Beach Surveys

Our shorebird recovery program on Ormond and Hollywood beach entails science (nest monitoring, nest site selection research), habitat protection ( fencing nesting areas, signage, predator exclosures) and outreach (our volunteer naturalist program)

This opportunity will entail participating in a short virtual training to familiarize yourself with how to complete in field monitoring of Western snowy plovers and recreation disturbances , Population and Beach Wrack Surveys . The training will be provided over Zoom 3 times during the semester . A field guide will be provided with references for wrack and plover identification. These surveys will be completed independently and within social distancing guidelines.

Disturbance Monitoring

Habitual disturbance of over wintering plovers is believed to have an impact on the breeding success in the coming spring. During this time plovers are in a constant roost and forage cycle in preparation for breeding. Interruptions in this cycle by way of off leash dogs, and active recreators, can have drastic influence on their populations. After completion of the short virtual training you will then be ready to monitor plover disturbance at Ormond Beach. This will entail setting up a provided Spotting scope at 1 of 3 locations for a minimum of 1 hour. Utilizing survey 123 on your smartphone OR a provided data sheet , you will record the number of plovers in the flock and any recreation happening nearby. You will then record the reaction, and how long it took the plovers to return to the roosting area if flushed and upload the responses and any video to the survey 123.

Population and Wrack Survey

The plover population at Ormond Beach has been documented for over 20 years. This information is used to inform USFWS in regards to their ESA Listing. Currently we survey for plovers and document the abundance and distribution of wrack at Ormond Beach to gather metrics on population viability in relation to food sources. After completing for the short virtual training you will then be ready to complete the Population and Wrack Survey at Ormond Beach. This entails using Survey 123 or a google drive data sheet ( whichever is preferred) to gather data at marked data points along the beach , you will be documenting sexes of plovers, flock size and location, and abundance and distribution of wrach and seagrass at the tideline. You will either record the data within the survey 123 or take notes and record it into the google drive .

WSP_ReactionScoreExamples_video.mp4

Reaction Scoring

In 2018 Ventura Audubon Society began a project to quantitate disturbance reactions of Endangered and Threatened shorebird species ( Western snowy plover and CA Least tern). Remote sensing cameras were placed adjacent to the nest cups and recorded in durations of up to two hours. These videos capture normal nesting , breeding, and brooding behaviors and also instances of minor and major disturbance events .

In choosing this opportunity you will be scoring the reactions of Western Snowy Plovers on a scale of 0 to 6 , every 30 secs and entering those scores into the provided data sheet . You may choose to do as many or few of the videos as you like, the amount of time given for service learning will be based upon the video length and completion of the data sheet in its entirety.

To get an idea of what reaction scoring is like feel free to watch the video attached and then email Kat for access to the google drive where the data is located. Volunteer@venturaaudubon.org

Website : Banded Bird Page

VAS has recently undergone an update. With that we have expanded on what content we have available on it. This opportunity will allow you to help develop the “Banded Bird” webpage , from design, content creation and launching , its creation is up to you( with help from us ) . We are looking for a page that explains banded birds, how to report them and then updates from the field when our Biologist find them.

Open to 1 person or possibly a small group

Social Media Content

Through VAS’s thriving instagram and Facebook we offer photographer takeovers and call to action items but would like to expand our content . This opportunity would have you develop engaging content for our social media platforms , these could be live Q and A’s with people who are currently championing environmental and bird friendly initiatives, a kahoot quiz night over zoom, or taking over “ what's that bird” anything that would be engaging and interesting to our audience.

https://www.venturaaudubon.org/instagram

Contact Kat Whitehouse at Volunteer@Venturaaudubon.org for more information on any opportunities or to receive access to the google drive where the data forms are located

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