Marin Science Seminar Presentation: "San Francisco Bay Has a Renewed Sense of Porpoise" Get the flyer here. (January 29, 2014)

After an absence of 65 years, harbor porpoises have returned to San Francisco Bay. This talk will focus on the historical use of San Francisco Bay by harbor porpoises, the causes of their leaving, and speculate on the reasons of their return. The ecological implications of the return of this predator to the Bay will also be discussed.

Jonathan Stern, an alumnus of Terra Linda High School, is a lecturer and adjunct professor in the Department of Biology at San Francisco State University. He has studied minke whales since 1980, and is currently a Co-Principal Investigator at Golden Gate Cetacean Research, studying harbor porpoises, bottlenose dolphins and minke whales in local waters of the San Francisco Bay. He has also studied gray whales, killerwhales, fin whales, humpback whales, and pilot whales. Dr. Stern was the first volunteer at the Marine Mammal Center when it opened in 1975. He worked at NASA/Ames constructing a computer model to investigate the effects of climate change on CO2/O2 exchange in terrestrial plants. He misses playing bass in the Bert Wills Band when he lived in Texas, and playing guitar in "the Jungle Studs" a legendary Marin County band.