mthew
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Boat-tailed Grackle
The Common Grackle (Quiscalus quiscula) is no stranger in our midst, but you really need to be along the coast to spot a Boat-tailed Grackle (Quiscalus major). Marine Park had a few of them foraging in the reed stubble recently. Here’s one of these spectacular “blackbirds.” They are bigger than the Commons, with longer tails…
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Sunset Park Elm
The chartreuse edition.And on the micro level, a single seed from the rich crop the tree is now laden with. Remember, elms are wind-pollinated, so the early flowering resulting in early fruiting. On average, it takes 70,900 of these little winged seeds to make up a pound, according to this USFS site. But wait, a…
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Redbudding
The Redbuds (Cercis canadensis) are coming, the Redbuds are coming! Another day, another tree.
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Monkish Meditation?
In fact, this Monk Parakeet (Myiopsitta monachus) is busy as any other bird foraging in the grass.
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Coney Island’s Endemic Species
Originally posted on Backyard and Beyond: You have to be a certain age to remember when Coney Island Whitefish teemed off of Brooklyn’s shores in such massive schools that beach-goers wouldn’t dare go into the water. Today, however, they’re a rare sight. Although sometimes mistaken for the pallid Manhattan eel, Mentula brevus, the Coney Island…
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Dire Ox
Originally posted on Backyard and Beyond: By now, a lot of you know about the abandoned brick-arched train tunnel underneath Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. But I’m guessing far fewer of you are aware of the caves honeycombing what the geologists call the “Heartland Formation” “Ravenswood Granodiorite” under Brooklyn Heights. I had a rare opportunity to…
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Natural Object: Paleontological Find
Originally posted on Backyard and Beyond: ? Brooklyn, which is located at the mouth of what Walt Whitman called “fish-shaped Paumanok,” using a Native American word for what we now call Long Island, is, geologically speaking, loosey-goosey. We are sitting on glacial till, the rubble (sands, clays, gravels, erratics, etc.) pushed down here during the…
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Duck!
It was an absurd thing to say, I admit, but it’s all I could think of this morning at the Battery just before I fell to the ground. This was no duck, it was an enormous eagle passing right over our heads as we kissed the concrete, so close we could hear the rush of…
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Wild Thing: You Make My Heart Sing
The woodland floor, even in a microscopic sample, is a wonderland. The little bit of wonderland at Pier 1 at Brooklyn Bridge Park is currently aflutter with wildflowers, spring’s advance guard, taking advantage of the sun before the trees shade the ground. Some are already abloom, others are readying to bloom, yet others are just…
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Pandion haliaetus Redux
About that binomial: Pandion was a mythical king of Athens who had two daughters, Philomel and Procne. The latter married Tereus, king of Thrace, even though he wanted Philomel. To get Philomel, the Thracian cut out Procne’s tongue and pretended she was dead. Unable to speak her woe, Procne informed her sister of her fate by…
