Ornithology & Mammalogy Department field note finding aid

We just published another finding aid to the Online Archive of California! The finding aid one is for one of our most frequently consulted collections - The Ornithology & Mammalogy Department field note collection.

The collection consists of the research field notes created and assembled by the Ornithology and Mammalogy Department. The field notes are arranged in folders by last name and are housed in 55 archival boxes. The collection spans from 1880-2010 with most decades being well represented. The collection is not a comprehensive collection of staff field notes from the Ornithology and Mammalogy department. Other field notes exist in the personal papers of some of the staff represented in this collection as well as in the Ornithology and Mammalogy department.

I recently pulled some field notes from this collections to show to our Teacher Institute on Science and Sustainability in order to show the variety of ways that people recorded scientific data and observations. Here are some scans of notes from the collection that I brought with me.

Two journal style pages from D.A. Cohen's field notes from April 1899.

One illustrated page from Frank Tose's visit to Cedros Island July 22, 1922.

Section of a page from Paul Covel's collecting book from 1926. I am familiar with most of the names in the O&M field note collection but didn't know who Paul Covel was. Once I did some research I was delighted to find out that he was the first municipal naturalist in America and worked at the Bird Sanctuary at Lake Merritt in Oakland, CA.

This is just a small sample of the field notes that are part of this amazing collection.

- Danielle Castronovo

Archives & Digital Collections Librarian