Fall birding

Northern parula, Parula americana, a species typically found at the top of trees. But this south-bound migrant was hungry, and was flitting around at eye-level in Prospect Park before it descended to wrangle with a caterpillar on the ground. An unleashed dog chased it away. The green mantle on the back is an excellent field mark.

I haven’t made it into the Prospect Park as much as I would have like this migration season, but the last two Thursdays, I joined Tom Stephenson on Brooklyn Bird Club excursions. Last week we had 20 warblers, in addition to over 40 other species. The fall migration isn’t as famous as the spring (birds have lost their breeding plumage by now), but still has very many treasures to offer. Stephenson is writing a book about warblers that I’m very much looking forward to. The man has a vast library of bird sounds in his brain, which he insists we can all learn. But most of us, and I speak only for myself here, do not have the patience.

Last week, one particular warbler was interrupted on its south-bound flight by a kestrel. The little bird’s feathers scattered in the wind as it was plucked.

This is an American herring gull, Larus smithsonianus, photographed last month in Massachusetts. We see them in Brooklyn year-around.