Images

Colorful wildflowers in the Great Basin.

A breeding colony of California common murres (Uria aalge californica) on Prince Island off San Miguel Island off Southern California. Ecologists Josh Adams and Jonathan Felis of the USGS Western Ecological Research Center shot this and other high-resolution digital telephotos from a research vessel, and used the photos to identify nesting and feeding behavior.

This inset of the associated murre colony photo shows evidence of nesting and chick-feeding in a California common murre colony on Prince Island off San Miguel Island off Southern California.

Children react with delight as ecologist Carlton Rochester of the USGS Western Ecological Research Center shows off his reptile expertise at a San Diego Zoo festival.

An Agassiz's desert tortoise hides in a burrow; a radio transmitter is attached to its shell as part of a USGS study.

USGS biologists are leading the monitoring and reintroduction effort of the Southern California mountain yellow-legged frog -- federally listed as endangered with only 200 wild adults remaining in the mountains surrounding Los Angeles County.

In San Francisco Bay, a 15,000-acre tidal wetland restoration project is relying on USGS ecological and hydrological science to inform its planning phases and actions -- actions that will provide America's Silicon Valley with natural flood control, recreational access and wildlife habitat in the coming decades.

Lekking male greater sage-grouse in a sagebrush ecosystem. Photo by Tatiana Gettelman. 

Male northern elephant seal (Mirounga angustirostris) resting on a sandy beach along the coast of California.

Photo of a low elevation community that burned four years prior in the Calico fire, Death Valley National Park. Notice the large amount of plant cover, a large proportion of which is dominated by invasive species like red brome (Bromus rubens) and red-stemmed filaree (Erodium cicutarium).

This is a low elevation community that is unburned. It is immediately adjacent to the Calico fire perimeter (Death Valley National Park). The large amount of herbaceous plant cover (mainly red brome Bromus rubens and red-stemmed filaree Erodium cicutarium) in the understory make this extremely susceptible to burning.

The Western skink (Plestiodon skiltonianus) is a relatively common and widespread lizard in Southern California. It is more secretive and prefers more grassy habitat than the Western fence lizard or the side-blotched lizard, yet USGS and National Park Service biologists are finding signs of genetic isolation in all these species.

Clark's nutcracker in a whitebark pine

Open lodgepole pine cone in the Sierra

A closed lodgepole pinecone on a tree in the Sierra Nevada.

Lodgepole pines on the edge of a mountain meadow

Juvenile mountain yellow-legged frog in San Bernardino County, California.

USGS scientist, Adam Backlins, prepares to make the first-ever release of endangered mountain yellow-legged frog tadpoles into a mountain stream.

Whitebark stands at Evelyn Lake

A Forster's tern chick next to eggs near San Francisco Bay.

A Forster's tern chick with eggs near San Francisco Bay.