May 2011
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Yard Snapper
Glancing up from a book I was reading while on Nantucket two weeks ago, I noticed something dark in the grass. A snapping turtle, Chelydra serpentina. And not the first time, either. Snappers can go some distance to lay their eggs. They are on the lookout for sandy soil to dig out for a nest.…
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Perfectly Said
We make our lives in a world not of our making. We feel in a world that does not feel. Yet it’s become a world in which our presence is felt. What attitude might confront such a world? An attitude of curiosity, for the complex world? An attitude of admiration, for the beautiful world? An…
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City Kestrels
Or: The Importance of Falling Apart. An intriguing passage in Bernd Heinrich’s The Nesting Season about German architects incorporating nesting spaces for such cavity nesters as Eurasian kestrels, jackdaws, and swifts, in new buildings got me thinking about Bob DeCandido’s project of tracking American kestrel nest sites in old buildings in New York City. In…
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Natural Object: Moon Snail
Detail of the spire of a shell of an Atlantic moon snail, also known as a shark’s eye. Polinices duplicatus is found from Cape Cod to Texas. This one was found on the beach at Breezy Point, Queens, NYC.
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Natural Object: Water Chestnut
This is the fruit of the European water chestnut, Trapa natans. Also known commonly as devil pods, they float and can be found up and down the Hudson and less frequently on area beaches. The plant is a fast spreading invasive. They have been used for food and medicinal purpose in Europe for 5000 years…
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On Walton Ford
A few years ago when the Brooklyn Museum had its big Walton Ford show, The Tigers of Wrath, I was simply gob-stopped. The big canvases, which are both homage to and critique of John James Audubon and Western ways of looking at, and killing, nature, were amazing, filling me with awe. The paintings are epic,…
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Painted
A painted turtle on a rock in the Upper Pool in Prospect Park stands out from its red-eared slider companions.
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Whelk egg cases
Telling your whelk egg case strings apart, Southern New England to Mid-Atlantic division: This is the egg case of the channeled whelk, Busycotypus canaliculatus. Note how the edges of each individual capsule comes together as if pinched, giving each capsule a sharp edge. This is the egg case string of the knobbed whelk, Busycon carica.…
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Expeditionary
Well, we were rained, or, more specifically, thunderstorm-precautioned, out of our exploration of the threatened Four Sparrow Marsh, part of New York City Wildflower Week. We hope to re-schedule sometime later this spring or summer. In the meantime… The great Patrick Leigh Fermor (l’escargot des Carpathes) writes that his father, who was Director of the…
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Salt Marsh, Silk Stockings
Marine Park is the largest park in Brooklyn, but most people think it ends at the NW end of Avenue U. Across the street, however, is the Salt Marsh Nature Center, which overlooks Marine Park Creek, which connects to Gerritsen Creek and flows into the Atlantic. This part of the park is a large, U-shaped…
Backyard and Beyond 