Channel Islands

The National Park boat hugs up against the daunting black rock of a tiny cove - with all the crashing surf, it would seem impossible that anybody could make it up that tiny ladder hanging off the rock.

But while the boat negotiates and motors, everybody - the herpetologists, the children, the old lady, everybody makes it on to the island.

The real terror on Anacapa Island isn't the ladders, but the seagulls. It's springtime, and the island serves as a giant nesting site for western gulls - the largest breeding site for these birds in the world. Because these birds are just beginning to hatch their chicks, they are paranoid of the folks walking only feet from the nests. They dive bomb everybody - scaring everybody with their gaping beaks.

The Channel Islands are a string of eight protected islands of the coast of Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara. The unusual circumstances of these islands make them one of the most important ecosystems in the world - harboring endangered birds like the Xantu's Murrelet, and the island scrub-jay, whose sole domain is Santa Cruz Island.

A team of herpetologists are on the island today to evaluate the health of the island's lizard populations. Black rats (who made home on the island after a shipwreck) have consumed the island - threatening the rare birds, lizards and a deer mouse subspecies. In response, the National Park Service and conservationists launched a plan to kill off the rats with poison in the 1990's. It worked, and the rats have been eradicated.

In response, the once dwindling populations are showing all the signs of returning to healthy population size. Everything is recorded, including the number of deer mice inhabitating the rocky island.

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