San Francisco Bay receives a great amount of attention from people all over the world, but few know how precious this bay is to wildlife. Each year thousands of waterfowl, waterbirds and shorebirds stopover on their way north or south making it a wonderful concentration area. The problem for most is getting into the bay. You need a boat. In 2012 I started a survey of the bay for red knots and other shorebirds, and to do it my wife Mandy and I purchased a small Zodiac with a 15hp engine and toured much of the South Bay. We continue working on the bay occasionally as we visit our sons and grandkids regularly.
When I was a young man, I fished with my…