Farallon research station
These two homes were built in the 1870's for the lighthouse keepers. They are now part of the research station and house PRBO Conservation Science staff. To the right is a cement platform for collecting and diverting rainwater to a cistern.
The research station sits on a wave carved marine terrace on the Southeast Farallon Islands (a large complex of mostly submerged granitic peaks). This is part of a National Wildlife Refuge and Wilderness and soon to be enlarged Marine Sanctuary 27 miles to the west of the Golden Gate.
Geologically, the islands are a chunk of the southern Sierra Nevada mountains, sliced off by strike-slip faulting and moved north at a rate of approximately 60km per million years. The terrace was carved during one of the last few interglacial periods (probably 120 thousand years ago or 400 thousand years ago). During the last few full glacial periods you could probably walk from San Francisco to the Islands.
You can keep track of the birds and the weather on a live web cam here:
www.calacademy.org/webcams/farallones/
Cool fact: this island has it's own subspecies of arboreal salamander (Aneides lugubris farallonensis). Presumably it doesn't require trees as you're looking at all two of them. The salamander likely migrated to the island during a glacial lowstand sometime during the last million years, and probably survives on insects related to the marine bird and marine mammal foodwebs.
Farallon research station
These two homes were built in the 1870's for the lighthouse keepers. They are now part of the research station and house PRBO Conservation Science staff. To the right is a cement platform for collecting and diverting rainwater to a cistern.
The research station sits on a wave carved marine terrace on the Southeast Farallon Islands (a large complex of mostly submerged granitic peaks). This is part of a National Wildlife Refuge and Wilderness and soon to be enlarged Marine Sanctuary 27 miles to the west of the Golden Gate.
Geologically, the islands are a chunk of the southern Sierra Nevada mountains, sliced off by strike-slip faulting and moved north at a rate of approximately 60km per million years. The terrace was carved during one of the last few interglacial periods (probably 120 thousand years ago or 400 thousand years ago). During the last few full glacial periods you could probably walk from San Francisco to the Islands.
You can keep track of the birds and the weather on a live web cam here:
www.calacademy.org/webcams/farallones/
Cool fact: this island has it's own subspecies of arboreal salamander (Aneides lugubris farallonensis). Presumably it doesn't require trees as you're looking at all two of them. The salamander likely migrated to the island during a glacial lowstand sometime during the last million years, and probably survives on insects related to the marine bird and marine mammal foodwebs.