Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of the Earths oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south and is bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, the Mariana Trench in the western North Pacific is the deepest point in the world, reaching a depth of 10,911 metres. Both the center of the Water Hemisphere and the Western Hemisphere are in the Pacific Ocean, the oceans current name was coined by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the Spanish circumnavigation of the world in 1521, as he encountered favourable winds on reaching the ocean. He called it Mar Pacífico, which in both Portuguese and Spanish means peaceful sea, important human migrations occurred in the Pacific in prehistoric times. Long-distance trade developed all along the coast from Mozambique to Japan and therefore knowledge, extended to the Indonesian islands but apparently not Australia. By at least 878 when there was a significant Islamic settlement in Canton much of trade was controlled by Arabs or Muslims.
In 219 BC Xu Fu sailed out into the Pacific searching for the elixir of immortality, from 1404 to 1433 Zheng He led expeditions into the Indian Ocean. The east side of the ocean was discovered by Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa in 1513 after his expedition crossed the Isthmus of Panama and he named it Mar del Sur because the ocean was to the south of the coast of the isthmus where he first observed the Pacific. Later, Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan sailed the Pacific East to West on a Castilian expedition of world circumnavigation starting in 1519, Magellan called the ocean Pacífico because, after sailing through the stormy seas off Cape Horn, the expedition found calm waters. The ocean was often called the Sea of Magellan in his honor until the eighteenth century, sailing around and east of the Moluccas, between 1525 and 1527, Portuguese expeditions discovered the Caroline Islands, the Aru Islands, and Papua New Guinea. In 1542–43 the Portuguese reached Japan, in 1564, five Spanish ships consisting of 379 explorers crossed the ocean from Mexico led by Miguel López de Legazpi and sailed to the Philippines and Mariana Islands.
The Manila galleons operated for two and a half centuries linking Manila and Acapulco, in one of the longest trade routes in history, Spanish expeditions discovered Tuvalu, the Marquesas, the Cook Islands, the Solomon Islands, and the Admiralty Islands in the South Pacific. In the 16th and 17th century Spain considered the Pacific Ocean a Mare clausum—a sea closed to other naval powers, as the only known entrance from the Atlantic the Strait of Magellan was at times patrolled by fleets sent to prevent entrance of non-Spanish ships. On the western end of the Pacific Ocean the Dutch threatened the Spanish Philippines, Spain sent expeditions to the Pacific Northwest reaching Vancouver Island in southern Canada, and Alaska. The French explored and settled Polynesia, and the British made three voyages with James Cook to the South Pacific and Australia and the North American Pacific Northwest, one of the earliest voyages of scientific exploration was organized by Spain in the Malaspina Expedition of 1789–1794.
It sailed vast areas of the Pacific, from Cape Horn to Alaska and the Philippines, New Zealand and the South Pacific. Growing imperialism during the 19th century resulted in the occupation of much of Oceania by other European powers, and later, Japan, in Oceania, France got a leading position as imperial power after making Tahiti and New Caledonia protectorates in 1842 and 1853 respectively. After navy visits to Easter Island in 1875 and 1887, Chilean navy officer Policarpo Toro managed to negotiate an incorporation of the island into Chile with native Rapanui in 1888, by occupying Easter Island, Chile joined the imperial nations
Gull
Gulls, often referred to as seagulls, are seabirds of the family Laridae in the suborder Lari. They are most closely related to the terns and only related to auks, skimmers. Until the 21st century, most gulls were placed in the genus Larus, an older name for gulls is mew, cognate with German Möwe, Danish måge, Dutch meeuw, and French mouette, this term can still be found in certain regional dialects. Gulls are typically medium to large birds, usually grey or white and they typically have harsh wailing or squawking calls, longish bills, and webbed feet. Most gulls, particularly Larus species, are ground-nesting carnivores, which take food or scavenge opportunistically. Live food often includes crabs and small fish, gulls have unhinging jaws which allow them to consume large prey. Apart from the kittiwakes, gulls are typically coastal or inland species, the large species take up to four years to attain full adult plumage, but two years is typical for small gulls. Large white-headed gulls are typically long-lived birds, with an age of 49 years recorded for the herring gull.
Gulls nest in large, densely packed noisy colonies and they lay two or three speckled eggs in nests composed of vegetation. The young are precocial, being born with dark mottled down, gulls—the larger species in particular—are resourceful and intelligent birds, demonstrating complex methods of communication and a highly developed social structure. For example, many gull colonies display mobbing behaviour and harassing would-be predators, certain species have exhibited tool use behaviour, using pieces of bread as bait with which to catch goldfish, for example. Many species of gulls have learned to coexist successfully with humans and have thrived in human habitats, others rely on kleptoparasitism to get their food. Gulls have been observed preying on live whales, landing on the whale as it surfaces to peck out pieces of flesh. Gulls range in size from the gull, at 120 g and 29 cm, to the great black-backed gull. They are generally uniform in shape, with bodies, long wings. The tails of all but three species are rounded, the exceptions being Sabines gull and swallow-tailed gulls, which have forked tails, and Rosss gull, gulls have moderately long legs, especially when compared to the similar terns, with fully webbed feet.
The bill is heavy and slightly hooked, with the larger species having stouter bills than the smaller species. The bill colour is yellow with a red spot for the larger white-headed species and red
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian peoples of the Americas and their descendants. The term Amerindian is used in Quebec, the Guianas, Indigenous peoples of the United States are commonly known as Native Americans or American Indians, and Alaska Natives. Application of the term Indian originated with Christopher Columbus, who, in his search for Asia, the Americas came to be known as the West Indies, a name still used to refer to the islands of the Caribbean Sea. This led to the blanket term Indies and Indians for the indigenous inhabitants, although some indigenous peoples of the Americas were traditionally hunter-gatherers—and many, especially in the Amazon basin, still are—many groups practiced aquaculture and agriculture. The impact of their agricultural endowment to the world is a testament to their time, although some societies depended heavily on agriculture, others practiced a mix of farming and gathering. In some regions the indigenous peoples created monumental architecture, large-scale organized cities, chiefdoms and empires.
Many parts of the Americas are still populated by peoples, some countries have sizable populations, especially Belize, Chile, Greenland, Mexico. At least a different indigenous languages are spoken in the Americas. Some, such as the Quechuan languages, Guaraní, Mayan languages, many maintain aspects of indigenous cultural practices to varying degrees, including religion, social organization, and subsistence practices. Like most cultures, over time, cultures specific to many indigenous peoples have evolved to incorporate traditional aspects, some indigenous peoples still live in relative isolation from Western culture and a few are still counted as uncontacted peoples. The specifics of Paleo-Indian migration to and throughout the Americas, including the dates and routes traveled, are the subject of ongoing research. According to archaeological and genetic evidence and South America were the last continents in the world with human habitation. During the Wisconsin glaciation, 50–17,000 years ago, falling sea levels allowed people to move across the bridge of Beringia that joined Siberia to northwest North America.
Alaska was a glacial refugium because it had low snowfall, allowing a small population to exist, the Laurentide Ice Sheet covered most of North America, blocking nomadic inhabitants and confining them to Alaska for thousands of years. Indigenous genetic studies suggest that the first inhabitants of the Americas share a single population, one that developed in isolation. The isolation of these peoples in Beringia might have lasted 10–20,000 years, around 16,500 years ago, the glaciers began melting, allowing people to move south and east into Canada and beyond. These people are believed to have followed herds of now-extinct Pleistocene megafauna along ice-free corridors that stretched between the Laurentide and Cordilleran Ice Sheets. Another route proposed involves migration - either on foot or using primitive boats - along the Pacific Northwest coast to the south, archeological evidence of the latter would have been covered by the sea level rise of more than 120 meters since the last ice age
Riparian zone
A riparian zone or riparian area is the interface between land and a river or stream. Riparian is the proper nomenclature for one of the fifteen terrestrial biomes of the earth, Plant habitats and communities along the river margins and banks are called riparian vegetation, characterized by hydrophilic plants. In some regions the terms riparian woodland, riparian forest, riparian buffer zone, the word riparian is derived from Latin ripa, meaning river bank. Riparian zones may be natural or engineered for soil stabilization or restoration and these zones are important natural biofilters, protecting aquatic environments from excessive sedimentation, polluted surface runoff and erosion. They supply shelter and food for aquatic animals and shade that limits stream temperature change. When riparian zones are damaged by construction, agriculture or silviculture, biological restoration can take place, usually by human intervention in erosion control and revegetation. If the area adjacent to a watercourse has standing water or saturated soil for as long as a season, because of their prominent role in supporting a diversity of species, riparian zones are often the subject of national protection in a Biodiversity Action Plan.
These are known as a Plant or Vegetation Waste Buffer, research shows that riparian zones are instrumental in water quality improvement for both surface runoff and water flowing into streams through subsurface or groundwater flow. Particularly, the attenuation of nitrate or denitrification of the nitrates from fertilizer in this zone is important. The use of wetland riparian zones shows a high rate of removal of nitrate entering a stream. The meandering curves of a river, combined with vegetation and root systems, slow the flow of water, sediment is trapped, reducing suspended solids to create less turbid water, replenish soils, and build stream banks. Pollutants are filtered from surface runoff, enhancing water quality via biofiltration, the riparian zones provide wildlife habitat, increased biodiversity, and wildlife corridors, enabling aquatic and riparian organisms to move along river systems avoiding isolated communities. Riparian vegetation can forage for wildlife and livestock. They provide native landscape irrigation by extending seasonal or perennial flows of water, nutrients from terrestrial vegetation are transferred to aquatic food webs.
The vegetation surrounding the stream helps to shade the water, mitigating water temperature changes, the vegetation contributes wood debris to streams, which is important to maintaining geomorphology. From a social aspect, riparian zones contribute to nearby property values through amenity and views, space is created for riparian sports such as fishing and launching for vessels and paddlecraft. The protection of zones is often a consideration in logging operations. The undisturbed soil, soil cover, and vegetation provide shade, plant litter, and woody material, factors such as soil types and root structures, climatic conditions and vegetative cover determine the effectiveness of riparian buffering
United States
Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power.
The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations.
In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
Cormorant
Phalacrocoracidae is a family of some 40 species of aquatic birds commonly known as cormorants and shags. Several different classifications of the family have been proposed recently, there is no consistent distinction between cormorants and shags as these appellations have been assigned to different species randomly. Cormorants and shags are medium-to-large birds, with weight in the range of 0. 35–5 kilograms. The majority of species have dark feathers, the bill is long and hooked. Their feet have webbing between all four toes, all species are fish-eaters, catching the prey by diving from the surface. They are excellent divers, and under water they propel themselves with their feet with help from their wings and they have relatively short wings due to their need for economical movement underwater, and consequently have the highest flight costs of any bird. Cormorants nest in colonies around the shore, on trees, islets or cliffs and they are coastal rather than oceanic birds, and some have colonised inland waters – indeed, the original ancestor of cormorants seems to have been a fresh-water bird.
They range around the world, except for the central Pacific islands, no consistent distinction exists between cormorants and shags. The names cormorant and shag were originally the names of the two species of the family found in Great Britain, Phalacrocorax carbo and P. aristotelis. Shag refers to the birds crest, which the British forms of the great cormorant lack, as other species were discovered by English-speaking sailors and explorers elsewhere in the world, some were called cormorants and some shags, depending on whether they had crests or not. Sometimes the same species is called a cormorant in one part of the world and a shag in another, e. g. the great cormorant is called the black shag in New Zealand. Van Tets proposed to divide the family into two genera and attach the name cormorant to one and shag to the other, but this flies in the face of common usage and has not been widely adopted. The scientific genus name is Latinised Ancient Greek, from φαλακρός, Cormorant is a contraction derived either directly from Latin corvus marinus, sea raven or through Brythonic Celtic.
Cormoran is the Cornish name of the sea giant in the tale of Jack the Giant Killer, sea raven or analogous terms were the usual terms for cormorants in Germanic languages until after the Middle Ages. Cormorants and shags are medium-to-large seabirds and they range in size from the pygmy cormorant, at as little as 45 cm and 340 g, to the flightless cormorant, at a maximum size 100 cm and 5 kg. The recently extinct spectacled cormorant was rather larger, at a size of 6.3 kg. The majority, including nearly all Northern Hemisphere species, have dark plumage, but some Southern Hemisphere species are black and white. Many species have areas of coloured skin on the face which can be blue, red or yellow
Northern California
Northern California, often abbreviated NorCal, is the northern portion of the U. S. state of California. The 48-county definition is not used for the Northern California Megaregion, the megaregions area is instead defined from Metropolitan Fresno north to Greater Sacramento, and from the Bay Area east across Nevada state line to encompass the entire Lake Tahoe-Reno area. The arrival of European explorers from the early 16th to the mid-18th centuries, in 1770, the Spanish mission at Monterey was the first European settlement in the area, followed by other missions along the coast—eventually extending as far north as Sonoma County. Northern California is not a geographic designation. Californias north-south midway division is around 37° latitude, near the level of San Francisco, though, Northern California usually refers to the states northernmost 48 counties. This definition coincides with the county lines at 35° 47′ 28″ north latitude, the term is applied to the area north of Point Conception and the Tehachapi Mountains.
Because of Californias large size and diverse geography, the state can be subdivided in other ways as well, the state is often considered as having an additional division north of the urban areas of the San Francisco Bay Area and Sacramento metropolitan areas. The coastal area north of the Bay Area is referred to as the North Coast while the region north of Sacramento is referred by locals as the Northstate. Since the events of the California Gold Rush, Northern California has been a leader on the economic, scientific. In science, advances range from being the first to isolate and name fourteen transuranic chemical elements, other examples of innovation across diverse fields range from Genentech to CrossFit as a pioneer in extreme human fitness and training. It is Home to one of the largest Air Force Bases on the West Coast, Northern Californias largest metropolitan area is the San Francisco Bay Area which includes the cities of San Francisco, San Jose and their many suburbs. In recent years the Bay Area has drawn more commuters from as far as Central Valley cities such as Sacramento, Fresno and Modesto.
The 2010 U. S. Census showed that the Bay Area grew at a faster rate than the Greater Los Angeles Area while Greater Sacramento had the largest growth rate of any area in California. The states larger cities are considered part of Northern California in cases when the state is divided into two parts. The first European to explore the coast was Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo, sailing for the Spanish Crown, in 1542, beginning in 1565, the Spanish Manila galleons crossed the Pacific Ocean from Mexico to the Spanish Philippines, with silver and gemstones from Mexico. The Manila galleons returned across the northern Pacific, and reached North America usually off the coast of northern California, in 1579, northern California was visited by the English explorer Sir Francis Drake who landed north of todays San Francisco and claimed the area for England. In 1602, the Spaniard Sebastián Vizcaíno explored Californias coast as far north as Monterey Bay, other Spanish explorers sailed along the coast of northern California for the next 150 years, but no settlements were established.
The first European inhabitants were Spanish missionaries, who built missions along the California coast, the mission at Monterey was first established in 1770, and at San Francisco in 1776
Sea urchin
Sea urchins or urchins, archaically called sea hedgehogs, are small, globular animals that, with their close kin, such as sand dollars, constitute the class Echinoidea of the echinoderm phylum. About 950 species of echinoids inhabit all oceans from the intertidal to 5,000 metres deep, the shell, or test, of sea urchins is round and spiny, typically from 3 to 10 cm across. Common colors include black and dull shades of green, brown, blue, Sea urchins move slowly, feeding primarily on algae. Sea otters, wolf eels and other predators hunt and their roe is a delicacy in many cuisines. The name urchin is an old word for hedgehog, which sea urchins resemble, Sea urchins are members of the phylum Echinodermata, which includes sea stars, sea cucumbers, brittle stars, and crinoids. Like other echinoderms, they have five-fold symmetry and move by means of hundreds of tiny, the symmetry is not obvious in the living animal, but is easily visible in the dried test. The irregular sea urchins are an infra-class inside the Euechinoidea, called Irregularia, irregular echinoids include, flattened sand dollars, sea biscuits, and heart urchins.
Together with sea cucumbers, they make up the subphylum Echinozoa, Sea cucumbers and the irregular echinoids have secondarily evolved diverse shapes. Urchins typically range in size from 6 to 12 cm, although the largest species can reach up to 36 cm, like other echinoderms, sea urchin early larvae have bilateral symmetry, but they develop five-fold symmetry as they mature. This is most apparent in the sea urchins, which have roughly spherical bodies with five equally sized parts radiating out from their central axes. Several sea urchins, including the sand dollars, are oval in shape, with front and rear ends. In these urchins, the surface of the body is slightly domed. This irregular body form has evolved to allow the animals to burrow through sand or other soft materials, Sea urchins tube feet arise from the five ambulacral grooves. Tube feet are moved by a vascular system, which works through hydraulic pressure, allowing the sea urchin to pump water into and out of the tube feet. The lower half of a sea urchins body is referred to as the surface, because it contains the mouth.
The internal organs are enclosed in a shell or test composed of fused plates of calcium carbonate covered by a thin dermis and epidermis. The test is rigid, and divides into five ambulacral grooves separated by five interambulacral areas, each of these areas consists of two rows of plates, so the sea urchin test includes 20 rows of plates in total. The plates are covered in rounded tubercles, to which the spines are attached, the inner surface of the test is lined by peritoneum
Great blue heron
It is a rare vagrant to coastal Spain, the Azores, and areas of far southern Europe. An all-white population found only in the Caribbean and Florida was once treated as a separate species, the great blue heron was one of the many species originally described by Carl Linnaeus in his 18th-century work, Systema Naturae. The scientific name comes from Latin ardea, and Ancient Greek erodios and it forms a superspecies with this and with the cocoi heron from South America, which differs in having more extensive black on the head, and a white breast and neck. It has head-to-tail length of 91–137 cm, a wingspan of 167–201 cm, a height of 115–138 cm, in British Columbia, adult males averaged 2.48 kg and adult females 2.11 kg. The feathers on the neck are long and plume-like, it has plumes on the lower back at the start of the breeding season. The bill is yellowish, becoming orange briefly at the start of the breeding season. Immature birds are duller in color, with a dull blackish-gray crown, and the pattern is only weakly defined, they have no plumes.
Among standard measurements, the chord is 43–49.2 cm, the tail is 15. 2–19.5 cm, the culmen is 12. 3–15.2 cm. The herons stride is around 22 cm, almost in a straight line, two of the three front toes are generally closer together. In a track, the front toes, as well as the back, the subspecies differ only slightly in size and plumage tone, with the exception of subspecies A. h. occidentalis, which has a distinct white morph, known as the great white heron. It is found only in south Florida and some parts of the Caribbean, the great white heron differs from other great blues in bill morphology, head plume length, and in having a total lack of pigment in its plumage. It averages somewhat larger than the sympatric race A. h. wardi and may be the largest race in the species. In a survey of A. h. occidentalis in Florida, males were found to average 3.02 kg and females average 2.57 kg and this is mainly found near salt water, and was long thought to be a separate species. Birds intermediate between the normal morph and the white morph are known as Würdemanns heron, these birds resemble a normal great blue with a white head.
The theory that great white herons may be a species from great blue heron has again been given some support by David Sibley. The great white heron could be confused with great egret, but is larger, the reddish egret and little blue heron could be mistaken for the great blue heron, but are much smaller, and lack white on the head and yellow in the bill. In the southern reaches of its range, the great blue sometimes overlaps in range with the closely related, the cocoi is distinguished by a striking white neck and solid black crown, but the duller juveniles are more easily confused. More superficially similar is the slightly smaller grey heron, which may sometimes vagrate to the coasts of North America
Bolinas, California
Bolinas is an unincorporated coastal community in Marin County, California. The census designated place is located on the California coast, approximately 13 miles northwest of San Francisco by air, the community is known for its reclusive residents. Bolinas sits at an elevation of 36 feet above sea level and it is bound on the northeast by Bolinas Lagoon and Kent Island and on the south by Bolinas Bay and Duxbury Point. According to the United States Census Bureau, the CDP has an area of 5.8 square miles. The GNIS has cited archaic alternate town-names, including Ballenas, Baulings, Bolinas downtown is located on the eastern side of town along Wharf Road, which ends at Bolinas Lagoon. Downtowns buildings were built between 1850 and 1920. Brighton Avenue connects downtown to the south-facing Brighton Beach, in the southeast corner of town is the Little Mesa. The Big Mesa, known as the Gridded Mesa, lies to the west, by air, Bolinas is just 10 miles west-southwest of San Rafael, and 13 miles northwest of San Francisco.
While located just 2 miles from State Route 1, the area is not very accessible by car, the driving time from San Rafael is roughly 52 minutes, and it takes over an hour to drive to downtown San Francisco. Bolinas lies west of the San Andreas Fault, which runs the length of Bolinas Lagoon and continues northward through Olema Valley and Tomales Bay. Bolinas and the Point Reyes peninsula are on the Pacific Plate, moving north relative to Stinson Beach, Point Reyes National Seashore borders Bolinas to the northwest. Duxbury Reef State Marine Conservation Area encompasses Bolinas western shoreline and present day Stinson Beach were once encompassed by Rancho Las Baulines, a Mexican land grant given by Governor Pío Pico to Gregorio Briones in 1846. The first post office in the town of Bolinas opened in 1863, in 1927, a 300-acre former dairy farm on the Big Mesa was subdivided into a grid of streets and 5,336 lots measuring 20 by 100. Many of these lots were sold for $69.50 by the San Francisco Bulletin as a subscription promotion, portions of the mesa, including sections of Ocean Parkway, have since eroded into the sea.
A few streets on the mesa are paved and maintained by the county, but many are unpaved, the Big Mesa has no sewer system, and houses on the mesa have individual septic systems. In 1967, the Bolinas Community Public Utility District was formed by the Marin County Board of Supervisors, the BCPUD provides water service and solid waste pickup throughout Bolinas, and sewer service to the Downtown and Little Mesa. Bolinas beaches were hit hard by the 1971 San Francisco Bay oil spill, in November 1971, the Bolinas Community Public Utility District instituted a moratorium on new water permits, which halted the construction of new homes. The moratorium was based on the local water supply during the summer months and in drought years
Tern
Terns are seabirds in the family Sternidae that have a worldwide distribution and are normally found near the sea, rivers, or wetlands. Previously considered a subfamily of the gulls, they are now given full family status. They are slender, lightly built birds with long, forked tails, narrow wings, long bills, and relatively short legs. Most species are grey above and white below, with a contrasting black cap to the head, but the marsh terns, the Inca tern. The sexes are identical in appearance, but young birds are distinguishable from adults. Terns have a non-breeding plumage, which involves a white forehead. The terns are birds of open habitats that typically breed in noisy colonies, marsh terns construct floating nests from the vegetation in their wetland habitats, and a few species build simple nests in trees, on cliffs or in crevices. The white tern, lays its egg on a bare tree branch. Depending on the species, one to three eggs make up the clutch, most species feed on fish caught by diving from flight, but the marsh terns are insect-eaters, and some large terns will supplement their diet with small land vertebrates.
Many terns are long-distance migrants, and the Arctic tern may see more daylight in a year than any other animal, the Chinese crested tern is in a critical situation and three other species are classed as endangered. International agreements provide a measure of protection, but adults and eggs of species are still used for food in the tropics. The eggs of two species are eaten in the West Indies because they are believed to have aphrodisiac properties, the Charadriiformes order of birds contains 18 coastal seabird and wader families. Within the order, the form a lineage with the gulls, less closely, with the skimmers, skuas. Following genetic research in the early twenty-first century, the terns are now treated as a separate family. Most terns were formerly treated as belonging to one genus, with just a few dark species placed in other genera, in 1959, only the noddies. A recent analysis of DNA sequences supported the splitting of Sterna into several smaller genera, one study of part of the cytochrome b gene sequence found a close relationship between terns and a group of waders in the suborder Thinocori.
The word stearn was used for birds in Old English as early as the eighth century. Variants such as tearn occurred by the century, although the older form lingered on in Norfolk dialect for several centuries
San Francisco
San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the cultural and financial center of Northern California. It is the birthplace of the United Nations, the California Gold Rush of 1849 brought rapid growth, making it the largest city on the West Coast at the time. San Francisco became a consolidated city-county in 1856, after three-quarters of the city was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake and fire, San Francisco was quickly rebuilt, hosting the Panama-Pacific International Exposition nine years later. In World War II, San Francisco was a port of embarkation for service members shipping out to the Pacific Theater. Politically, the city votes strongly along liberal Democratic Party lines, San Francisco is the headquarters of five major banking institutions and various other companies such as Levi Strauss & Co. Dolby, Weebly, Pacific Gas and Electric Company, Pinterest, Uber, Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation, as of 2016, San Francisco is ranked high on world liveability rankings.
The earliest archaeological evidence of habitation of the territory of the city of San Francisco dates to 3000 BC. Upon independence from Spain in 1821, the became part of Mexico. Under Mexican rule, the system gradually ended, and its lands became privatized. In 1835, Englishman William Richardson erected the first independent homestead, together with Alcalde Francisco de Haro, he laid out a street plan for the expanded settlement, and the town, named Yerba Buena, began to attract American settlers. Commodore John D. Sloat claimed California for the United States on July 7,1846, during the Mexican–American War, montgomery arrived to claim Yerba Buena two days later. Yerba Buena was renamed San Francisco on January 30 of the next year, despite its attractive location as a port and naval base, San Francisco was still a small settlement with inhospitable geography. The California Gold Rush brought a flood of treasure seekers, with their sourdough bread in tow, prospectors accumulated in San Francisco over rival Benicia, raising the population from 1,000 in 1848 to 25,000 by December 1849.
The promise of fabulous riches was so strong that crews on arriving vessels deserted and rushed off to the gold fields, leaving behind a forest of masts in San Francisco harbor. Some of these approximately 500 abandoned ships were used at times as storeships and hotels, many were left to rot, by 1851 the harbor was extended out into the bay by wharves while buildings were erected on piles among the ships. By 1870 Yerba Buena Cove had been filled to create new land, buried ships are occasionally exposed when foundations are dug for new buildings. California was quickly granted statehood in 1850 and the U. S. military built Fort Point at the Golden Gate, silver discoveries, including the Comstock Lode in Nevada in 1859, further drove rapid population growth. With hordes of fortune seekers streaming through the city, lawlessness was common, and the Barbary Coast section of town gained notoriety as a haven for criminals, entrepreneurs sought to capitalize on the wealth generated by the Gold Rush
