Stevens Creek Shoreline Nature Study Area

Stevens Creek Shoreline Nature Study Area is a 55-acre bayfront preserve next to Mountain View's Shoreline Park and is known as a birder's paradise. A half-mile gravel trail along San Francisco Bay passes regulars such as mallards, American avocets, sandpipers, black-necked stilts, snowy and great egrets, great blue herons, cormorants, pintails, and swallows; patient visitors may also spot burrowing owls or the endangered Ridgway's rail. The marsh vegetation shelters the rail and the endangered salt marsh harvest mouse.

The area was cut off from the tides when salt-evaporation ponds were built to the north. There is no sign it was ever used for salt production itself, though it may have been used for hunting and grazing. Leslie Salt gave the land to the Peninsula Regional Open Space Trust, and Midpen bought it using a matching grant built on the value of its gift parcel at Foothills Open Space Preserve. The preserve connects to the San Francisco Bay Trail.

Dogs and horses are not allowed, and swimming or wading is prohibited. To get there, take Shoreline Boulevard east from Highway 101 into Shoreline Park, then turn right past the entrance kiosk into the Kite Area parking lot. The preserve is open from a half hour before sunrise to a half hour after sunset.