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January 2014
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SPOTLIGHT
(Back row) Marco Gee, Brogan Trevethan, Garrett Coleman, Liam Lettire, Will Devine and Tommy Barr. (Front row) Laura Lettire, Christo Eikani, Matt Hourigan, AJ Tammen, Tristan Trevethan, Maggie Barr, Libby Ward, Maria Ward and Michelle Devine
Inspired in Service
ECRWSS
PRESORTED STANDARD US POSTAGE PAID DANVILLE, CA PERMIT NO. 70
St. Isidore’s eight-grade class is always looking for ways to make a difference in our community. Students joined together with Safeway in Alamo recently to help fill grocery bags for the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano Counties. It was a huge success with over 370 bags filled to the rim. Safeway was thrilled with the support and invited the students back to participate once again before the food drive ended on December 23rd.
New Year, New Downtown! This is a rendering representing the new look coming to the corner of Hartz and Prospect in downtown Danville. Castle Companies (co-owners of the Danville Hotel property) has installed a perimeter fence around the 1.12 acre site in preparation for upcoming demolition this month. Asbestos removal from the old structure is complete. The historic structures will be renovated and the rest will be replaced with approximately 35,000 square feet of new residential, retail and restaurant uses.
Native Wildlife Report–
Greater Sandhill Cranes visit California’s Central Valley once again
Postmaster: Dated Material
by James Hale
Sentinel Newspapers, Inc. 390 Diablo Road, Ste. 145 Danville, CA 94526 925-820-6047
One of the most elegant and conspicuous winter visitors to the refuges and farmlands in the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys– the state’s great Central Valley- is the tall, migratory Greater Sandhill Crane (Grus canadensis tabida). Its loud trumpetlike call is audible over long distances. While conducting research in the high Sierra at 7,400 feet on several occasions, I heard thousands of sandhill cranes calling as they migrated from their summer breeding grounds on their way to their wintering habitat. They were barely visible thousands of feet above the Sierra crest in expansive, V-shaped flocks. The pale, silver gray adults with a bare, red crown stand almost 5 feet tall. Their wings span almost 7 feet.
Adults may weigh more than 15 pounds. The adult plumage often becomes stained rusty from iron oxides in the water. Immature birds have reddish -brown plumage and lack the red crown. Sexes look alike. A bustle of shaggy feathers hangs over the rump of standing birds. In flight, with slow downbeat wing strokes and quick upstrokes, the neck and legs are fully extended. Six subspecies have been recognized in recent times. The sandhill crane has one of the oldest and longest fossil histories of any bird still found today. A 10 million year old crane fossil from Nebraska may be a prehistoric relative or the direct ancestor. The oldest definitive sandhill crane fossil is
2.5 million years old, over one and a half times older than the earliest remains of most living species of birds. A single, life size Native American Martis culture sandhill crane petroglyph in the Sierra on a granite boulder may be thousands of years old and the only one identified to date. Sandhill cranes are social birds that are usually encountered in pairs or family groups through the year and during the breeding season. During migration and winter, large flocks of non-related birds gather to forage and roost together. Sometimes thousands congregate at these sites. Sandhill cranes are mainly herbivorous as they forage for seeds and other plant material in shallow wetlands and various
This month’s Special Section:
New Year, New You!
pages 8-9
upland habitat. Cultivated grains such as corn, rice, wheat, and sorghum support large numbers of cranes in the Great Valley See CRANES page 6