San Jose runs from the flat valley floor up into the oak-studded coastal hills, and the wildlife tracks that gradient. Western fence lizards do push-ups on every sunny fence, California scrub-jays and Anna’s hummingbirds hold the yards, and the grasslands south of the city still hold burrowing owls, one of the harder birds to find in any American city. Coyotes and black-tailed deer move down the creeks, and the salt ponds toward the bay draw avocets and stilts by the thousand.
Everything below is pulled live from recent research-grade observations near San Jose. Browse by group, explore the map, and identify what you find with Huck.
240,071
recent observations
30
species listed
18
birds
6
plants
3
mammals
Naturalists have logged 240,071 research-grade observations across the 30 most-recorded species near San Jose. The most frequently seen is the Western Fence Lizard, with 16,150 recorded sightings.
Birds account for the largest share of what gets recorded there (18 of the species listed here), followed by plants (6).