Fieldnotes

A flock suddenly appeared the other day right outside the apartment. They stuck around for a couple of hours. Here are various members of the group. Yes, snacks were had. A malfunctioning gutter is a standby bathing and drinking spot for the local Starlings, House Sparrows, and Mourning Doves. The Grackles put it to use,…

Beckett says somewhere that we spend our life “trying to bring together in the same instant a ray of sunshine and a free bench.” For birds in winter, it’s an open bit of water. The sunshine is gravy. Back in October I spied on the birds bathing under the little weeping variety of bald cypress…

Three days of pair-bonding for the American Kestrels. No copulation seen; it’s a bit early for that. One morning a Cooper’s Hawk chased them from this chimney pot. I was alerted because of the kestrel screaming. The big orange boat is one the Staten Island Ferry fleet.

There is no silence in Brooklyn. Human noise is constant. Even late at night the nearby highway is a drone of grey noise, and the D train screeches as it rounds the corner. And that’s the quietest time of all. Inside Green-Wood, things are notably improved, buffered, dampened. Even there, though, the sounds of near…

Turkish hazel. Swamp white oak. Yew. Silver birch. Adding these to the Caucasian fir on my list of species tapped into by Yellow-bellied Sapsuckers. Here’s one more, but I haven’t figured out what kind of tree this is. None of the above. *** Republicans who are shocked, shocked, that their words and deeds have consequences…

I have been seeing, and hearing about other people seeing, members of the the Red-shouldered League all fall. This is unprecedented. Usually, Red-shouldered Hawks (Buteo lineatus) pass over during migration periods. I’ve never seen them consistently here in Brooklyn through the fall and now winter. This youngster was perched on Monday in Green-Wood. (Does this…

I didn’t get outside on New Year’s Day, but on Sunday I got to poke about a bit. Underneath a large piece of bark, deeply curled so its underside was not touching the ground, I found a whole universe of delights. Isopods, a spider, a centipede, two kinds of beetles, everything small and active, near…

Swamp white oak leaves clinging on, regardless.

Our smallest woodpecker, the Downy, (Picoides pubescens) is also the boldest in terms of its tolerance of people. Note how the inner eyelid closes on contact. The red patch marks this as a male. This is a Kentucky Coffee Tree. I’m usually long abed by midnight, so here’s a virtual “happy new year!” Anything better…