Richardson Bay
View from Strawberry on the Richardson Bay. In the right half Aramburu Iceland, in the background the skyline of San Francisco.
The Richardson Bay is a shallow, species-rich foothills of the Bay of San Francisco, named after William A. Richardson, a captain, businessman and landowner from the first half of the 19th century. The Bay extends for a distance of about five kilometers and a width of about three kilometers.
Despite the strong use of their surrounding urban land, the bay is a breeding and transit area for a variety of water and shore birds. Because about 40,000 annually birds are spotted here, among whom was Rallus longirostris obsoletus endangered species such as ( engl. California Clapper Rail) are, Richardson Bay was classified as an Important Bird Area.
From the late 1960s to the 1980s, the Aramburu caused by landfills Iceland in the northwest area of Richardson Bay was a resting place of seals. While at times around 30 per cent of the seal population in the Bay of San Francisco Aramburu Iceland sought refuge, they are gone until today entirely from the island. This is attributed to the increasingly disturbing influences of man and to the silting of a nearby deep-water channel in the bay.
Large areas of the bay are covered with seaweed, which makes Richardson Bay has become a major occurrence of aquatic plants in northern California. From the San Francisco Foundation in collaboration with the San Francisco State University -funded studies in the Bay devote himself since 2007, the extent to water depths affect the planting of sea grass.
In the early 1960s, the non-profit environmental organization National Audubon Society acquired a 369 hectares of area and founded the sanctuary Richardson Bay Sanctuary.