Mark Prell

1 week ago | norcalpublicmedia.org | Mark Prell |Greta Mart

It's unknown exactly how many black bears live in Sonoma County, but one had a fatal encounter this week near Forestville. A four hundred-thirty pound male black bear was stuck and killed on River Road. CHP Public Information Officer David deRutte told KRCB News the bear was hit by a Chevy pickup truck at 4:38 am Tuesday morning along westbound River Road at Trenton Road. The driver of the truck was not injured, and the bear initially survived the impact.

1 week ago | norcalpublicmedia.org | Mark Prell

It's unknown exactly how many black bears live in Sonoma County, but one had a fatal encounter near Forestville. A four hundred-thirty pound male black bear was stuck and killed on River Road Tuesday morning. CHP Public Information Officer David Durette said the bear was hit by a Chevy pickup truck at 4:38 am along westbound River Road at Trenton Road. The driver of the truck was not injured, and the bear initially survived the impact.

1 month ago | norcalpublicmedia.org | Mark Prell

Adult female elephant seals make a number of different sounds. Here’s Marine Ecologist Sarah Codde. “So, you can hear that softer sound she makes is to her pup… And then you can hear kind of that different sound when she’s angry… It’s much like, deeper and, you know, has that kind of aggressive sound. Where this is, we call, warbling, and it’s just this kind of nice soft call to get her pup’s attention.” “Ha, ha, ha… ahh, those pups! I wonder what they’re saying?" asks Hines. “Right…” said Codde.

1 month ago | norcalpublicmedia.org | Mark Prell

In soundscape ecology we think of basically, three different categories of sound. One of those, and really the first, is geophony. It can be, really, quite musical, and here’s a good example of it. This is Sonoma Creek, in Sugarloaf Ridge State Park. And we’ve gotten a lot of rain; it’s mid-February, 2025. And, so the creek’s flowing quite well, and there’s this great low frequency plunging sound of the water. And then there’s the higher frequency stuff.

1 month ago | norcalpublicmedia.org | Mark Prell

In winter Elephant seals gather on Drake’s Beach, at Point Reyes National Seashore. Females give birth to pups and nurse them during this time. In this episode of Ear to the Wild Jack Hines talks to Marine Ecologist Sarah Codde about how many pups have been born so far, and what else she’ll be looking for during her survey. Elephant seal monitoring activities at Point Reyes National Seashore are authorized under National Marine Fisheries Service Permit Number 27424.