A magnificent pictorial tribute to the San Francisco Bay and the Delta region, which together make one of the world's great estuaries. This book celebrates the Bay's beauty and its importance to the region, and inspires those who are helping restore and protect it.
A look at what Native American life was like in the Bay Area before the arrival of Europeans. Two hundred years ago, herds of elk and antelope dotted the hills of the San Francisco–Monterey Bay area. Grizzly bears lumbered down to the creeks to fish for silver salmon and steelhead trout. From vast marshlands geese, ducks, and other birds rose in thick clouds “with a sound like that of a hurricane.” This land of “inexpressible fertility,” as one early explorer described it, supported one of the densest Indian populations in all of North America. One of the most ground-breaking and highly-acclaimed titles that Heyday has published, The Ohlone Way describes the culture of the Indian people who inhabited Bay Area prior to the arrival of Europeans. Recently included in the San Francisco Chronicle’s Top 100 Western Non-Fiction list, The Ohlone Way has been described by critic Pat Holt as a “mini-classic.” Praise for The Ohlone Way “[Margolin] has written thoroughly and sensitively of the Pre-Mission Indians in a North American land of plenty. Excellent, well-written.” —American Anthropologist “One of three books that brought me the most joy over the past year.” —Alice Walker “Margolin conveys the texture of daily life, birth, marriage, death, war, the arts, and rituals, and he also discusses the brief history of the Ohlones under the Spanish, Mexican, and American regimes . . . Margolin does not give way to romanticism or political harangues, and the illustrations have a gritty quality that is preferable to the dreamy, pretty pictures that too often accompany texts like this.” —Choice “Remarkable insight in to the lives of the Ohlone Indians.” —San Francisco Chronicle “A beautiful book, written and illustrated with a genuine sympathy . . . A serious and compelling re-creation.” —The Pacific Sun
This book is geared for advanced level research in the general subject area of remote sensing and modeling as they apply to the coastal marine environment. The various chapters focus on the latest scientific and technical advances in the service of better understanding coastal marine environments for their care, conservation and management. Chapters specifically deal with advances in remote sensing coastal classifications, environmental monitoring, digital ocean technological advances, geophysical methods, geoacoustics, X-band radar, risk assessment models, GIS applications, real-time modeling systems, and spatial modeling. Readers will find this book useful because it summarizes applications of new research methods in one of the world’s most dynamic and complicated environments. Chapters in this book will be of interest to specialists in the coastal marine environment who deals with aspects of environmental monitoring and assessment via remote sensing techniques and numerical modeling.
Engineering within Ecological Constraints presents a rare dialogue between engineers and environmental scientists as they consider the many technical as well as social and legal challenges of ecologically sensitive engineering. The volume looks at the concepts of scale, resilience, and chaos as they apply to the points where the ecological life support system of nature interacts with the technological life support system created by humankind. Among the questions addressed are: What are the implications of differences between ecological and engineering concepts of efficiency and stability? How can engineering solutions to immediate problems be made compatible with long-term ecological concerns? How can we transfer ecological principles to economic systems? The book also includes important case studies on such topics as water management in southern Florida and California and oil exploration in rain forests. From its conceptual discussions to the practical experience reflected in case studies, this volume will be important to policymakers, practitioners, researchers, educators, and students in the fields of engineering, environmental science, and environmental policy.
The original report From the Sierra to the Sea: Ecological History of the San Francisco Bay-Delta Watershed was a product of a three-year effort to develop a landscape level overview of the natural ecological structure, function and organization of the watershed, and the way it had changed over the course of the 19th and 20th centuries. Technical review and contributions from government and water agencies helped produce a collaborative document that provided information on the historical ecological baseline in order to assist in what was envisioned at the time as the most ambitious restoration effort ever undertaken in the United States. We are proud of the fact that the original document is still used as an objective reference, and has provided a foundation and inspiration for similar but more intensively researched localized efforts by others in the Bay-Delta watershed. This 20th anniversary edition contains a new Afterword describing changes to the estuary and its watershed since the report was originally published in 1998.
The San Francisco Bay, the biggest estuary on the west coast of North America, was once surrounded by an almost unbroken chain of tidal wetlands, a fecund sieve of ecosystems connecting the land and the Bay. Today, most of these wetlands have disappeared under the demands of coastal development, and those that remain cling precariously to a drastically altered coastline. This volume is a collaborative effort of nearly 40 scholars in which the wealth of scientific knowledge available on tidal wetlands of the San Francisco Estuary is summarized and integrated. This book addresses issues of taxonomy, geomorphology, toxicology, the impact of climate change, ecosystem services, public policy, and conservation, and it is an essential resource for ecologists, environmental scientists, coastal policymakers, and researchers interested in estuaries and conserving and restoring coastal wetlands around the world.
Lakes across the globe require help. The Lake Restoration Handbook: A New Zealand Perspective addresses this need through a series of chapters that draw on recent advances in modelling and monitoring tools, citizen science and First Peoples’ roles, catchment and lake-focused restoration techniques, and policy implementation. New Zealand lakes, like lakes across the globe, are subject to multiple pressures that have increased in severity and scale as land use has intensified, invasive species have spread and global climate change becomes manifest. This books builds on the popular Lake Managers Handbook (1987), which provided guidance on undertaking investigations into, and understanding lake ecosystems in New Zealand. The Lake Restoration Handbook: A New Zealand Perspective synthesises contemporary issues related to lake restoration and rehabilitation, integrated with social science and cultural viewpoints, and complemented by authoritative topic-area summaries by renowned scientists and practitioners from across the globe. The book examines the progress of lake restoration and the new and emerging tools available to managers for predicting and effecting change. The book will be a valuable resource for natural and social scientists, policy writers, lake managers, and anyone interested in the health of lake ecosystems.
One of California's most remarkable wetlands, Suisun Marsh is the largest tidal marsh on the West Coast and a major feature of the San Francisco Estuary. This productive and unique habitat supports endemic species, is a nursery for native fishes, and is a vital link for migratory waterfowl. The 6,000-year-old marsh has been affected by human activity, and humans will continue to have significant impacts on the marsh as the sea level rises and cultural values shift in the century ahead. This study includes in-depth information about the ecological and human history of Suisun Marsh, its abiotic and biotic characteristics, agents of ecological change, and alternative futures facing this ecosystem.
San Francisco Bay is the largest and most productive estuary on the Pacific Coast of North America. It is also home to the oldest and densest urban settlements in the American West. Focusing on human inhabitation of the Bay since Ohlone times, Down by the Bay reveals the ongoing role of nature in shaping that history. From birds to oyster pirates, from gold miners to farmers, from salt ponds to ports, this is the first history of the San Francisco Bay and Delta as both a human and natural landscape. It offers invaluable context for current discussions over the best management and use of the Bay in the face of sea level rise.