Owens Lake Bird Festival
The Owens Lake Bird Festival is a celebration of the thousands of migratory birds as they travel through the Owens Valley and of the rich and precious natural environment of the Eastern Sierra. With over 30 outings offered, the Bird Festival covers topics including birding, botany, photography, geology, local history, and more. Over three days, over 150 participants will explore the unique natural landscape surrounding the Lone Pine area. Participants may also choose to take part in the catered dinner on Saturday night and enjoy the speech given by our keynote speaker.
The 2021 Virtual Owens Lake Bird Festival
We are excited to present the 2021 Owens Lake Bird Festival virtually this year! We will be hosting three virtual versions of some of our most popular outings over the course of two days. No need to worry about your favorite trip filling up this year!
When: April 23rd – April 24th, 2021
Where: via Zoom Meeting
Cost: $40 suggested donation. 100% of event proceeds will help fun dour programs to protect and care for the Eastern Sierra’s Public Lands.
*If the suggested donation is a barrier, you can request a reduced cost or free registration.
The Virtual Presentations
Owens Lake Habitat Management: It’s for the Birds!
Presented by Collette Gaal & Jeff Nordin
Friday, April 23rd at 5:30 pm – 7:00 pm
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power operates the Owens Lake Dust Mitigation Program on approximately 48.6 square miles of Owens Lakebed. Since the implementation of water-based dust control, Owens Lake has once again become an important stop-over for migratory shorebirds and waterfowl. While originally designed to control dust, shallow flooding areas are now also managed to sustain habitat for waterfowl and shorebirds. We will discuss how these areas are managed to benefit migrating shorebirds and waterfowl.
Photographing Birds on Owens Lake
Presented by Martin Powell
Saturday, April 24th at 5:00 pm – 6:30 pm
Presented by Martin Powell, Lone Pine native, local photographer, and popular Owens Lake Bird Festival leader, this presentation will feature Martin’s beautiful photos, the stories behind them, and highlights of the birds he photographs.
Owens Lake’s Importance in Western Hemisphere Bird Migration
Presented by Mike Prather
Saturday, April 24th at 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm
Presented by Mike Prather, Lone Pine resident and local icon in the birding community, this presentation will explore the importance of Owens Lake Lake to western hemisphere bird migration. Mike will share his knowledge and expertise of some of the most incredible birding in the world.
2020 OLBF Information
Although we had to cancel the 2020 Bird Festival, you can still see our list of events that we typically host. We are excited to host the in-person event again once it is safe to do so. We hope to see you at the next Owens Lake Bird Festival!
2020 Schedule of Events
2020 Schedule of Outings
2020 Outing Leaders
2019 OLBF Information
2019 Event Schedule
2019 Schedule of Outings
2019 Outing Leaders
Birds From 2019 Festival
Videos of the Festival
Owens lake birding Information
About Owens Lake
Map of Owens Lake
Birding Ethics
Lodging and Restaurants
Eastern Sierra Birding Trail Map
Updates
Pine nuts, a high-energy food, helped sustain Native peoples of the Eastern Sierra through the winter. Friends of the Inyo’s annual impact report, which we usually release at mid-year to celebrate the previous year’s accomplishments, is symbolically named thus to acknowledge the support of our donors, funders, and volunteers, whose generosity sustains our work of protecting and caring for the land and water of the Eastern Sierra.
Friends: May is that in-between month when we apply Earth Day lessons learned in April, as we prepare for summer, which begins in June. Read about what Friends of the Inyo has been up to – with your support, of course – in the May Juniper! Happy reading! And if you like what you read, happy sharing!
There are thousands of “winged” reasons to #KeepLongValleyGreen: The permanent avian residents of the lush meadows and Crowley Lake, as well as the many migrating visitors who grace the natural landscape with their presence and song! Read all about it and enjoy some breathtaking photography and thoroughly informative descriptions of our fine feathered friends in the April issue of “Every last Drop.” Help us share it widely.
A bountiful, snowy winter. An impending flowerful spring. Lots of opportunities for engagement in water advocacy, exploration in Southern Inyo County, giving toward Eastern Sierra public lands protection by becoming a Friends of the Inyo business sponsor, and more! Read all about it in Friends of the Inyo’s Juniper E-Newsletter, which is hot off the press! Happy reading…and if you like what you read, happy sharing!
There is a lot happening in the world of Eastern Sierra conservation this month, but if you don’t read the February issue of Friends of the Inyo’s Juniper E-Newsletter, you’ll never know! Happy reading…and if you like what you read, happy sharing!
On behalf of Friends of the Inyo, we hope you are healthy and taking care of yourself and your community during this difficult time. We understand the responsibility that we have to do our part to help slow the spread of this virus and we will continue to prioritize the health and well-being of our employees, members, and community. We are fortunate at Friends of the Inyo that we are able to carry on our work on all of our campaigns. We have taken steps to keep our staff and community safe by closing our office. FOI staff are…
Thanks to everyone who joined us for the 2019 Owens Lake Bird Festival! We hope to see you April 24-26th, 2020. Here are the birds we saw at this year’s festival: American Wigeon Mallard Blue-winged Teal Cinnamon Teal Northern Shoveler Northern Pintail Green-winged Teal Redhead Ring-necked Duck Lesser Scaup Bufflehead Ruddy Duck California Quail Chukar Common Loon Eared Grebe Western Grebe Clark’s Grebe American White Pelican Great Egret Snowy Egret Black-crowned Night-Heron White-faced Ibis Turkey Vulture Northern Harrier Cooper’s Hawk Red-shouldered Hawk Red-tailed Hawk Virginia Rail American Coot Black-necked Stilt American Avocet Black-bellied Plover Snowy Plover Killdeer Spotted Sandpiper…
August 21 was the annual fall migration Big Day at Owens Lake. Big Days” are known in the birding world as days where we count as many individual birds as possible in one day. Our own board member Mike Prather organizes observers to assist Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) with these counts each spring and fall. This acts as a snapshot of peak migration numbers that help inform DWP’s management of the lake. While I’ve participated in many a spring Big Day, this year I decided to join the August event as well. The shorebirds and waterfowl…
The April 24th edition of the Inyo Register featured Friends of the Inyo’s event which returns for a fourth year in 2018.
Joanne Hihn took some amazing bird pictures on Owens Lake during the 2017 Owens Lake Bird Festival. Thanks for sharing Joanne…
Here’s the list of birds we saw at the 2017 Owens Lake Bird Festival: Gadwall American Wigeon Mallad Blue-winged Teal Cinnamon Teal Northern Shoveler Northern Pintail Green-winged Teal Canvasback Redhead Lesser Scaup Long-tailed Duck Bufflehead Red-breasted Merganser Ruddy Duck California Quail Eared Grebe Double-crested Cormorant American White Pelican Great Blue Heron Great Egret Snowy Egret White-faced Ibis Turkey Vulture Osprey Bald Eagle Northern Harrier Cooper’s Hawk Red-shouldered Hawk Swainson’s Hawk Red-tailed Hawk Sora American Coot Black-necked Stilt American Avocet Back-bellied plover Snowy Plover Semipalmated plover Killdeer Spotted Sandpiper Solitary Sandpiper Greater Yellowlegs Lesser Yellowlegs Willet Whimbrel Long-billed Curlew Marbled Godwit…
While the birds were the star of the festival, the people made it pretty great too: Saturday started out cold (photo by David Carle)… But we persisted, and had a great time (photo by Janet Carle). It was a gorgeous day to search for birds (Gabby Guerrero). We learned a lot from Bob Steele about the art of bird photography (Sam Dummer). Dave Herbst led his always popular exploration of the microbiotic life of Owens Lake (Janet Carle). (David Carle) This year’s festival offered many excited trips off the lake. Here’s the group…