JUD VANDEVERE
by Esta Lee Albright
Reprinted from the August 2004 Soundings
I
like to call Jud Vandevere "the naturalist's naturalist." As Jeff
Norman puts it, "You always know that, if you need that special piece
of information, you can call Jud and he'll have it." That's really
not the whole story, however, because Jud has created ground-breaking research
and introduced people to nature for more than fifty years. Eighth graders,
college students, Lyceum, Earth Watch teams, UC Extension, Elderhostel,
plus anyone assisting his research projects. He was so dedicated to getting
children out of the classroom and into nature, that when he taught eighth
grade at Washington Union School District, he got himself a school bus driver's
license so he could take them. That also put him on school bus route as
a substitute driver but he considered it worth the extra job.The stuffed toy Judson C. Otter was named after him. For eight years, six days a week in the summertime, Jud was the first naturalist at Pt. Lobos. At that time, "the sea otters had eaten their way up the coast" from their discovery in Bixby Cove in 1938, and they were a main attraction at Pt. Lobos. In 1956, when they were first seen off Pt. Lobos at Gibson Beach, except for directions to the bathrooms, questions about sea otters were the most frequent. Jud soon gave up classroom teaching (and a lot of his other pursuits) to study this new fascinating animal, as researcher in residence at Hopkins Marine Station. He was able to learn through necropsies on dead otters, by long observance of otters in the water and ashore, and by collecting scat to be analyzed re sea otter diet. Soon he was speaking and writing in addition to naturalist work at Pt. Lobos, and advising other writers and film makers.
Being known for sea otter work, Jud's expertise with plants is sometimes overlooked. He created a herbarium for Pt. Lobos at an early date. He searched for rare grasses in Big Sur, sometimes taking his family along. Being a true Renaissance Man in the natural world, he has contributed many biological surveys for state and county governments.
Cetaceans
and sea otters both attracted him to the shoreline of Pt. Lobos. He had
already noticed whales during his journeys at age 21 as a purser for Black
Diamond Steamship Company, before his college work at San Francisco State.
Necropsies on dead beached animals gave him research experience with whales
and dolphins. One Pacific White-sided dolphin necropsy gave him the shocking
information of heavy loads of DDT and other toxins many years before current
research findings began giving us a "heads up." He testified before both
U.S. House and Congress on the original Marine Mammal Protection Act. He
was one of the founders who met in Ansel Adams' house to create the local
Ventana Chapter of the Sierra Club. A similar service was done for the CA
Native Plant Society and for Friends of the Sea Otter. The pioneering sea
otter research project in the Monterey Bay Aquarium called on his expertise.San Ignacio Lagoon, Roger Payne, Ken Norris, Margaret Owings, the Packard family, American Society of Mammalogists, killer whales rushing sea lions at Pt Lobos, discovering Pelagic cormorants nesting at Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park, political activist work, the first international conference on otters held in Surinam, Gerald Durrell, kit fox surveys in South County. There is much to be enjoyed on hearing Jud in ordinary conversation.
As I listened with delight while we were taking a break from tracking radio-tagged sea otters one year, I wished others were with us to hear it. So, a few friends are involved in an oral history project of Jud's life and work. Interviewers include Alan Baldridge, Jeff Norman, Dr. James Mattison, Jud's daughter Gwyn Vandevere and myself. We are using a recorder on loan from the local Maritime Museum and we will be looking to ACS and others for funding to duplicate the tapes. The original recordings will be preserved and protected, and copies will be available for research use at the Maritime Museum and The California History Room of the Monterey Public Library.
Esta Lee Albright works as a naturalist on whalewatch boats.
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Last updated August 29, 2004.