This program has two components – a lecture on Saturday afternoon and a field trip that same Saturday evening. There is a two hour break in between to allow participants to eat dinner. You can choose to sign up for just the lecture or both the lecture and field trip. More information about each follows below.

LECTURE

Date: Saturday, May 6th, 2023

Time: 2:30 – 4:00 PM

Location: Steele/Burnand Anza-Borrego Desert Research Center (401 Tilting T Dr, Borrego Springs, CA 92004)

Cost: $10 (For lecture only. If you opt for the field interactive, the lecture is included in that cost.)

Students may attend the lecture for free.

Join us for our lecture and field trip series, Anza-Borrego: In Focus. Our presenter, Don Endicott, will begin with a primer on bats that covers their distinguishing features and physiology including their exceptional echolocation capabilities—“seeing with sound” in complete darkness. Don will discuss his research in Anza-Borrego assessing bat populations and recovery trends after a human-caused fire on January 18, 2020. This fire burned many of the native California Fan Palms in the core of Borrego Palm Canyon’s First Grove and it was suspected that resident native bats, particularly Western yellow bats, were likely killed while in their palm frond day roosts. Through the use of acoustic monitoring techniques, it is possible to identify species present and quantify bat activity levels. Don will discuss the survey methodology and over two years of data and lessons learned from the acoustic survey of bats captured by a professional grade ultrasonic bat recorder positioned in the heart of First Grove.

Please register in advance. Register Here

FIELD TRIP

Date: Saturday, May 6th, 2023

Time: 6:00 – 9:00 PM (end time is approximate)

Location: Meet at the ABF office: 587 Palm Canyon Dr. #122, Borrego Springs, CA, 92004

(different from the State Park store, but in the same shopping center!) We’ll carpool and/or caravan to our field sites. Exact locations will be sent out shortly before the event. Please inform Samantha if you are not meeting at the office.

Cost: (If you sign up for the field trip, the lecture is included in this cost).

Student – $25.00

ABF Member – $50.00

Non-member – $60.00

This field trip will be an extension of the earlier lecture (though it’s not required that you attend both), held as an interactive and hands on excursion to visit native bat habitat. Participants will caravan to various locations in the Borrego Valley to view bats, listen to their sounds using Don’s acoustic monitors, and learn more about this fascinating but lesser-known animal. The exact end time will depend on bat activity and participant interest.

We’ll meet at the ABF office, then caravan to our field locations. Exact locations will be sent out shortly before the event.

Limited to 20 people.

Please register in advance. Register Here

About The Presenter, Don Endicott:

A retired civilian research engineer and executive in the field of Navy Communications and Network Technologies in San Diego, Don discovered a second career as a volunteer naturalist. He is a National Association of Interpretation Certified Interpretive Guide, receiving his training in Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. A long-time hiker and explorer of the remotest portions of the Park going back to the 1960s, Don serves as a Volunteer Naturalist, Archaeology Technician, and Archaeology Site Steward for Colorado Desert District, California State Parks. Closer to home in San Diego, he is a Mission Trails Regional Park Trail Guide and public educator for the San Diego Natural History Museum and the San Diego Humane Society as a member of Project Wildlife’s “Bat Team”. Don presents three different multi-media talks on Bats, Mountain Lions, and Peregrine Falcons at regional venues. He contributes full spectrum bat echolocation call recordings to the San Diego Natural History Museum and to Wildlife Acoustics, a bioacoustics monitoring systems company. He is a field contributor to herpetofauna surveys at Cabrillo National Monument and monitors nesting Peregrine Falcons for the National Park Service and US Fish & Wildlife Service. Don is co-author of 50 Best Short Hikes San Diego (Wilderness Press, 2018) with the late Jerry Schad. He was recognized as Anza-Borrego Desert State Park’s volunteer Naturalist of the Year in 2018 and received Anza-Borrego Foundation’s second annual ABF Achievement Award in 2015.

Cancellation Policy
Notification must be received at least 7 days before the first day of the event if you need to cancel and wish to receive a refund. A $10 cancellation fee will be retained for each registration. For cancellations made after the 7-day deadline, we cannot issue refunds for any reason. We understand that unforeseen or emergency circumstances may arise, but our nonprofit organization operates on a limited budget and, while inconvenient, this policy enables us to sustain our programs even with last-minute cancellations. If ABF cancels a program, we will issue a full refund or credit.