Flights of fancy

“DO you hear that?” Bob Shanman asks fervently as he leads a dozen bird-watchers toward a clump of shrubs in the Madrona Marsh Nature Preserve in Torrance. “That’s them!”

His followers, mostly middle-aged birding enthusiasts, rub the sleep out of their eyes as they traipse through one of Southern California’s last vernal marshlands, a 50-acre enclosure of marshes and grasslands, ringed by urban sprawl.

The rush of morning traffic on nearby Sepulveda Boulevard obscures the sound Shanman wants the group to hear. Then a flash of black and yellow feathers in a small oak tree draws their attention. Two Western meadowlarks, adorned by daisy-yellow on their throats, perch on a limb. The birds’ flute-like, descending notes penetrate the cool morning air.

“There you go,” Shanman calls out like an excited child. “It’s springtime! I love it!”

In fact, there is much for him and other bird-watchers to love in Southern California. Defying its reputation as a concrete jungle, the region holds a lofty status in the bird-watching world as home to more species than all but two states in the nation.

A constellation of birds -- 493 species in Los Angeles County alone -- flock to the area for its Mediterranean climate and its shorelines, wooded mountain ranges and sandy deserts. Southern California is also a popular rest stop for species migrating between Canada and South America.

And when spring rolls around, bird-watchers like Shanman get as fired up as football fans during bowl season. When migrant birds pass overhead and the trees and bushes jump to life with chirps, twitters, squawks and peeps, birders perk up, grab their binoculars and spotting scopes and rush outside.

“At this time of year, you never know what you will see,” says Shanman, the owner of the Wild Birds Unlimited store in Torrance.

To outsiders, bird-watching is a docile and dull hobby dominated by elderly white people who leaf through thick field guides and amble across marshlands spouting Latin bird names. But birders see the pastime as an escape to a simpler world where the concepts of time and place can vanish. It is their way of getting lost in nature.

“For me, time disappears,” says Martin Byhower, president of the Palos Verdes/South Bay Audubon Society. “I can go birding for four hours and not even know I’ve been gone for so long.”

Birding is also not as sedentary as it sounds. In their quest, birders such as Byhower will go almost anywhere. Waking before dawn, they traverse marshlands, case golf courses, kayak estuaries and explore urban water basins.

Enthusiast Tommye Hite, a semiretired human resources manager from Redondo Beach, acknowledges that she even scouts landfills and sewage treatment plants for rare species like the great sand plover she spotted recently at an Oxnard treatment facility.

“Sewage pumps aren’t that smelly,” she says.

A platoon of double-crested cormorants -- dark, goose-size birds -- sun themselves on the shore of a muddy island in the heart of the Sepulveda Basin Wildlife Reserve in Van Nuys.

Standing erect like soldiers with their faces tilted toward the warm morning sun, the cormorants seem oblivious to the carnival of activity around them as mallards, ruddy ducks and grebes splash, fish, fly and wade in the nearby water.

“When we walk around here, it’s just magical,” says Muriel S. Kotin, a San Fernando Valley Audubon Society member, as she leads a bird walks through the 225-acre reserve near the intersection of the Ventura and San Diego freeways.

This wildlife oasis, built in phases between 1979 and 1998 at the edge of a massive flood control basin, is one of many bird havens in the region that act as a buttress against development that has slowly consumed Southern California’s once-abundant avian habitat.

Such havens also make bird-watching as accessible as visiting a mall. The freeway-close Los Angeles County Arboretum and Botanic Garden in Arcadia is home to more than 200 species. The Upper Newport Bay Regional Park, within walking distance of the John Wayne Airport, gives shelter to endangered brown pelican, peregrine falcon and California least terns. Within a mile of the Los Angeles International Airport, the Ballona Wetlands offers habitat to more than 300 bird species, including snowy egrets and green herons.

Add to this avian abundance the dozens or so transients that make pit stops in Southern California while following one of the busiest migratory routes in the Western Hemisphere, and it becomes clear why the total number of species spotted in the region is growing even as some individuals continue to be threatened by pollution, development and habitat loss.

“You have everything in L.A. County, from coastlines to high-elevation mountains,” says Brian Sullivan, a project leader at Cornell University’s ornithology lab.

Some of the credit for the region’s profusion has to go to the birds themselves for showing adaptability in the face of a growing concrete-and-steel environment. In Glendale, peregrine falcons are picking pigeons off the tops of skyscrapers. In Rancho Palos Verdes, the threatened California gnatcatcher nests within putting distance of water hazards at the Trump National Golf Club. And in the San Gabriel Valley, squawking, flapping red-crowned parrots have taken over entire neighborhoods.

From an ecological standpoint, no one can be happy that once abundant species are now crowded into limited habitat. But for bird-watchers, it means avian nirvana is almost as close as the local Starbucks.

And where birds flock so do bird-watchers. The National Audubon Society has 18 chapters in Southern California, eight in Los Angeles County alone. California is home to the greatest number of birders in the nation -- nearly 4 million -- but the state falls near the bottom on participation rates, according to a 2001 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Survey. Fewer than one in eight Californians call themselves bird-watchers. But with baby boomers edging into retirement age, experts predict a huge bird-watching explosion in the next decade.

A California gnatcatcher emits a crow-like shriek followed by what sounds like the burst of air leaking from a tire.

A Steller’s jay sounds like a handsaw cutting through plywood.

The call of a white-throated sparrow cuts through the air like feedback from an amplifier.

And the great egret? A belch from a football lineman.

The most common birding misconception is that bird-watching is all about visual identification. The most successful birders play it by ear, honing their hearing to distinguish the calls and songs of hundreds of birds.

David Moody, an X-ray technician and avid birder from Redondo Beach, stalks through the Madrona Marsh a recent morning making a “pssst, pssst, pssst” sound that he hopes will flush birds out of hiding.

What sounds like a referee’s whistle blares from a nearby cottonwood tree. Moody knows the distinctive sound: a red-winged blackbird.

Some enthusiasts spend hours listening to digital recordings of bird sounds to sharpen their skills. Birders often don’t get a good look at a bird through the branches, leaves and weeds, and a trained ear can go a long way toward identifying the species.

“If you don’t use your ears, you lose 40% of the birds,” Moody says.

Another birding misconception is that bird-watching is a slow, noncompetitive hobby. To be certain, there are passive birders who wait for rare birds to flock to their feeders. But aggressive watchers seek birds out, often relying on Internet message boards to glean information about rare sightings.

In Los Angeles and Ventura counties, John Fisher holds the title of “compiler of rare bird alerts.” An avid birder for 30 years and a production coordinator for Disney, Fisher collects data about rare bird sightings that come in by phone or e-mail to a Los Angeles Audubon Society hotline. Fisher’s alerts then go out to hundreds of subscribers.

The alerts, posted on the Audubon website, among other places, read like a police all-points bulletin.

The adult male VERMILION FLYCATCHER along the Rio Hondo near Rosemead was reported again on February 20. The bird is between the western-most soccer fields south of the end of Rush Street.

In mid-December, Fisher issued an alert for a fulvous whistling duck in Pasadena. The long-legged brown duck that emits a clear double whistle had not been seen in Los Angeles County since 1981.

Within hours, Fisher says, nearly 50 birders rushed to the San Gabriel River to catch a glimpse.

“People will leave work and stop what they are doing to see a rare bird,” he says.

Olga Clarke, a retired secretary who has been birding with her husband for 50 years, is what birders call a “chaser.” When an alert comes across her computer screen, she and her husband, Herb, pack their binoculars, a camera and a field guide and speed out of their Glendale home.

“We think nothing of driving all night to be there first thing in the morning” after a sighting, she says, although she can’t recall the last species that provoked such an excursion. “There have been so many.”

Over the years, Clarke has compiled a list of about 5,000 birds she has spotted worldwide, with almost 600 of those in California.

When lists and numbers are involved in a hobby, someone inevitably makes it a competition. Who has spotted the most birds in Los Angeles County? Who has spotted the most in the nation? Who has seen the most species in one day?

But Clarke says birding is not about checking species off a list. Often the real fun comes when she spots something unexpected while scouting for birds. In October, she and her husband were bird-watching in Brazil when they spotted a jaguar mother and her cubs.

“You can see it all: animals, birds, flowers,” she says. “Once you get that fever, there is no cure.”

AS a light fog drifts over the Pacific, 37 bird-watchers, binoculars and cameras around their necks, climb aboard the Sea World UCLA, a 64-foot research vessel docked in Marina del Rey.

The quarry for this Saturday morning are pelagic birds. One of the tour leaders is Kimball Garrett, ornithology collections manager at Los Angeles County’s Natural History Museum and one of the most respected birders in Southern California.

This is not a trip for beginners. The boat will cruise the coast for eight hours straight. The only sustenance onboard is strong, black coffee and powdered nondairy creamer. The biggest disadvantage of bird-watching from a boat is that it’s nearly impossible to sneak up on a bird, particularly on open water.

After the boat clears the breakwater, one of the trip organizers begins to toss handfuls of popcorn into the water from one of four plastic bags at the back of the boat. This is the equivalent of chumming the waters to attract sharks. The popcorn draws a squadron of sea gulls that descend on the boat in a cacophony of flapping, crying and pecking.

But the birders are not interested in the gulls. The more common the bird, the less interested the bird-watchers. They are hoping a rare species crashes the gulls’ popcorn feast.

Meanwhile, the captain angles the boat toward a distant frenzy on the water where a pod of dolphins is feeding on sardines and gulls are swooping in for the scraps. In the middle of the splashing and squawking, someone notices an extra large, all-white gull with a black-tipped beak. This is no common sea gull.

“A glaucous gull!” someone shouts. Thirty-seven binoculars and cameras train on the big bird in the whirling center of flapping wings and squawking beaks. The glaucous gull, an Arctic bird rarely seen south of Canada, flaps its huge white wings and wrestles a sardine from its more common cousin.

“That is a great bird,” a birder says, pumping his fist.

But most of the pelagic birds spotted on this trip are seen only from a great distance, with the sun reflecting on the water. That’s not a problem for Garrett, who demonstrates the uncanny ability to identify a species not only by its shape and sound but by its movements.

Amid the common gulls, Garrett points out a black-vented shearwater.

“How can you tell?” someone asks. The shearwater is about the same size and shape as the other gulls. Says Garrett: “The shearwater will flap fast then glide close to the water.”

Garrett, with a graying goatee, a baseball cap, blue jeans and a green jacket, doesn’t look the part of a renowned bird expert. As he looks out from the deck of the boat, he says he can’t remember what first got him interested in birds more than 40 years ago. His quest now, he says, is to add to his knowledge of habits, habitat and the intersection between birds and humans. “Birds are a window into nature,” he says.

Although he holds Los Angeles County’s largest birding list, having identified 453 of the county’s 491 birds, Garrett says anyone can enjoy bird-watching without having to identify the birds by name. The only bad birders, he says, are people who misidentify birds and refuse to admit their mistakes.

Suddenly, Garrett breaks off the conversation and raises his binoculars to the horizon. “Rhino auklets!” he calls out, spotting three small, stout, dark birds bobbing on the water about 100 yards off the bow. The rhinoceros auklet, resembling a football with wings, gets its name for the small horn on its orange beak.

The bird-watchers scramble to the front of the boat and train their binoculars on the auklets as they dive under the surface to feed on small fish. As the boat draws closer, the auklets attempt to take flight but are weighed down by their fish-stuffed bellies. They flap furiously and skim along the surface, leaving a trail of ripples on the sea.

“Ahhh,” the birders exclaim as they lower their binoculars to share a smile. Then the binoculars go back up. Someone spots another shearwater.

Or is it a parasitic jaeger? Does it really matter?

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

A field guide to: The bird-watcher

Latin name: Avian obsesus

Description: The average American birder is 45 and older, Caucasian and relatively affluent. Adults of the species typically wear earth-tone colors, L.L. Bean jackets and hiking boots. Binoculars and fanny packs are common accessories.

Voice: Birders normally speak in quiet tones until they spot a rare species, at which time they are sometimes known to screech and holler, often frightening away said species.

Habitat: Nearly one-third of bird-watchers live in the 16 states in the Southeastern quadrant of the U.S. California is home to nearly 4 million bird-watchers.

Nesting: Most birders are “empty nesters”: married with grown children who have moved out.

Range: Birders prefer nature reserves, marshlands, regional parks and estuaries but will scout landfills, sewage treatment plants and golf courses.

Source: Outdoor Industry Foundation’s 2004 Outdoor Recreation Participation Survey and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2001 report Birding in the United States: A Demographic and Economic Analysis.

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Where to bird-watch

in Southern California

El Dorado Regional Park

Where: 7550 E. Spring St., Long Beach

Info: El Dorado Nature Center, (562) 423-1091

What you may see: Egrets, herons, pelicans, ring-necked ducks and American kestrels, among others

Ballona Wetlands

Where: Enter the freshwater marsh at the southwest corner of Jefferson and Lincoln boulevards, Playa del Rey.

Info: Friends of Ballona Wetlands, (310) 306-5994

What you may see: Mallards, black-crowned night herons, pied-billed grebes, American coots, barn swallows, yellow-rumped warblers, common yellowthroats and Western meadowlarks

Madrona Marsh

Where: 3201 Plaza Del Amo, Torrance

Info: Madrona Marsh Nature Center, (310) 782-3989

What you may see: Ducks, coots, meadowlarks, finches and warblers

Malibu Lagoon

Where: 23200 Pacific Coast Highway

Info: Malibu Lagoon State Beach, (310) 456-8432

What you may see: Peregrine falcons, merlins, American kestrels, common snipes, Canada geese, Heermann’s gulls

Santa Fe Dam

Recreation Area

Where: 15501 E. Arrow Highway, Irwindale

Info: L.A. County Parks, (626) 334-1065

What you may see: Red-tailed hawks, egrets, osprey, herons and turkey vultures

Sepulveda Basin

Wildlife Reserve

Where: 6100 Woodley Ave., Van Nuys

Info: L.A. City Recreation and Parks, (818) 756-8190

What you may see: White pelicans, double-crested cormorants, grebes, ruddy ducks, raptors and red-winged blackbirds

Upper Newport Bay

Nature Preserve

Where: 2301 University Drive, Newport Beach

Info: County of Orange Division of Harbors, Beaches and Parks, (949) 923-2290

What you may see: Egrets, American avocets, American coots, blue herons, turkey vultures, brown pelicans, long-billed curlews and black skimmers

Sources: L.A. and Orange county parks, San Fernando Valley Audubon Society, Friends of Ballona Wetlands