Birds of Malibu Lagoon | Zoom Program

[Posted by Chuck Almdale]

I recently gave a Zoom presentation on the Malibu Lagoon, featuring the wonderful photography of Jim Kenney, to the UCLA Retirees Association. This program was considerably scaled-down from a presentation I gave in 2015 to the SMBAS chapter. This version focused on the shorebirds and gulls, with a nod to a few common bird families at the lagoon, some data and lagoon history. The last 20 minutes is questions and answers. The UCLA people were kind enough to send me a link so now it’s preserved for posterity.

Birds of Malibu Lagoon
UCLARA | Chuck Almdale | Time 1:06

From their YouTube site:

Malibu Lagoon has long been a favorite spot for local birders. Santa Monica Bay Audubon Society has hosted a monthly field trip there for over 30 years, but many may have forgotten – or never knew – its history over the past few decades. In this introduction to the lagoon, we’ll see many of its denizens as photographed by SMBAS photographers, discuss a little bit of lagoon history, the Snowy Plover colony, and why keeping records of your “local birding patch” is a useful and fun form of citizen science.

Speaker: Chuck Almdale (misclistsKITTY@verizon.net) [take out the KITTY], a retired accountant in the film industry began watching birds 45 years ago and began censusing Malibu Lagoon birds in 1979. Since joining Santa Monica Bay Audubon Society in 1989, he has served it in various capacities including President, Vice-president, Program chair and for about 20 years, Field Trip chairman. He has led their birdwalk at Malibu Lagoon for the past 20 years. He has also edited their blog and written most of their postings since its 2009 inception. When not at the lagoon, he birds around the county, state, country and the world, and has seen slightly over half of the species of birds in the world. He finds that the vocation of accountancy is adequate preparation for the avocation of censusing birds.