DURHAM, CA (MPG) – The 26th Snow Goose Festival of the Pacific Flyway concluded on Sunday, its four foggy days packed with birders who showed up even when the sun did not.
Cold, low-visibility weather settled over the valley for many outdoor events, but longtime attendees took it in stride.
“Fog or no fog, I’m here every year,” said Ellen Gardner, of Santa Rosa, who has attended the festival for more than a decade. “There’s always something new to learn, and the birds never disappoint.”
The annual celebration drew visitors from across Northern California and beyond, offering field trips, workshops, youth programs and indoor presentations focused on the region’s winter migration. Large flocks of snow geese, cranes, ducks and raptors continued their routines across the valley despite the weather.
Founded in 1999 as a small gathering of local birders, the festival has grown into one of the North State’s largest wildlife events, now featuring more than 50 guided trips in Butte and neighboring counties and a full slate of educational programs. Patrick Ranch Museum in Durham again served as the festival hub, hosting exhibitors, hands-on science stations and wildlife demonstrations. The annual Gathering of Wings banquet, the event’s primary fundraiser, was held in Chico.
A new field trip on opening day sent participants to the Feather River in Oroville, where longtime birder Karen Von Bargen led a slow, observation-focused walk along the 3.5-mile Parkway to highlight winter ring-billed gulls, mergansers, herons, raptors and other riparian species.
“The water that flows into the river from the fish hatchery has a lot of food in it from the harvesting of eggs and milt from steelheads,” Von Bargen said, pointing out the overflow falling into the river like a waterfall. “That is why the gulls hang out here.”
Von Bargen, a birder since childhood and a 20-year resident of Oroville, said the Feather River Parkway is one of the best inland spots in the region to see multiple species side by side, making it a great location for learning and relaxed comparison. The outing added a fresh look at the river corridor and broadened the festival’s reach beyond its traditional refuge-based tours.
“This is such an interesting area,” she said.
Von Bargen also led two other field trips, the Feather River Birds and Bath House on Jan. 23 and the Raptor Run–Monument Hill tour on the final day of the festival, both of which sold out early.
Snow Goose Festival activities included photography workshops, owl prowls, rice field waterfowl tours, refuge auto loops and Jr. Naturalist programs designed to introduce younger visitors to wetland ecology.
Even with the fog hanging low over the valley, the signature spectacle remained the mass liftoffs of snow geese from the surrounding rice fields. Visitors gathered along viewing platforms and auto loops at the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge Complex, listening to the layered calls of cranes, ducks and geese echo across the wetlands.
Organizers, who said birdwatching draws a large number of tourists to Northern California in the winter, are already planning for next year’s festival, with hopes of expanding field trips and youth programming.