you're not homeless if you're paying for a campsite

Our ticket to Australia is on November 1 but we had to move out by October 18, and my parents couldn't take us in for a number of reasons, so Chris and I were homeless camping for about 10 days. No worries! We put most of our stuff in a storage unit, and camped up the California coast before ending up at my parent's.  We first stayed in Santa Barbara, but neglected to take photos. 

 We then spent 8 days at Lake Lopez, near San Luis Obispo. As we didn't have a camping stove, Chris and I got very good at making fires to boil water and cook some foods. The bird life there was very active, and we got to know our avian neighbors well, but didn't take many pictures. Chris also got to meet his first raccoon and his first deer (there were many).   One of the more comical sites at Lake Lopez was the rafter of turkeys that would move through the campsites:

 they sound so incredibly funny - chris and i would copy them for hours

 we then made our way up the famous Highway One!! Chris was very scared

 Big Sur is one of my favorite places, so I'm glad that Chris fell in love with it too

 The happy driver (photo by Chris)

The happy passenger

Stratton Island MBS

From August 18 to September 18, I worked and lived on Stratton Island.  Jenny was the Supervisor, I was the intern, and Stella was the Volunteer Manager. We ran a fall banding station with 7 nets in the mornings, did shorebird surveys at high tide, and Jenny and I did some invasive plant control with the lovely and charming plant known as Oriental Bittersweet. 

A sunset over the Western side of the Island, setting over Old Orchard Beach. You can also see the pond on the island where the herons and egrets like to hang out

The banding station: Jenny and Paula figuring out what bird they have using Pyle

My two favorite birds that we caught

 Cedar Waxwing

Ovenbird (photo by Jenny Howard)

Some interesting inverts around the place:

Eastern Egg Rock

From May 29 to August 11, I worked and lived on Eastern Egg Rock.  For a very eloquent description of what I did, see Sia's article for BirdLife (my tent is featured in his pictures!!)

The island is about 7 acres, depending on the tide

Egg Rock

my tent covered in a blue tarp with my friendly neighbors perched on top, before the modification i made which you can see in sia's article

Though small, the island supported a lot of bird life! Its residents included: 

Puffins

Ubiquitous fornicating Laughing Gulls

Common Terns

Arctic Terns

Roseate Terns

Black Guillemots

Leach's Storm-Petrels

The melodious Song Sparrow

the Savannah Sparrow

Spotted Sandpipers

and Common Eiders (though I didn't get a picture of any before the males turned ugly and the ducklings were all eaten)

At the beginning of the season, Razorbills also visited our island

the 12"x12" cabin was our center of food and research operations, lovingly known as the "egg rock hilton"

I started a garden! Kiah helped a lot

In my spare time (a.k.a. when there's not enough electricity to enter data and it's too hot to enter the colony/leave camp), I built this shower stall! Betsy, Sia, Kate, and Kiah all helped out a ton! 

Some bird action photos:

 Flying COTE

 Incubating and displaying COTEs

COTE chicks begging for food while they're still cute

 ARTE's fighting over a fish (they had a dismal year for productivity and food quality)

a club of puffins loafing on a ledge

Some Researcher action photos:

Kiah 

Jen P.

Me! (photo by: Janine Parziale)

and last, but not least:

the monarchs were doing really well this year, they were all over Base when we got back to the mainland!