Fieldnotes
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Raptor Wednesday
Other (?) Kestrels:This one swooped across our path in Green-Wood, shot across 5th Avenue and disappeared behind the buildings there. It soon emerged with prey in talon. House Sparrow, I guess.We know there are at least two males in the area, because we’ve seen them either together or simultaneously. This shot, from earlier this month,…
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Sappy
A Blue Atlas Cedar (Cedrus atlantica)A line of sapsucker holes. About 3/4″ deep, through the bark.These holes are chiseled out by, in our parts, the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker (Sphyrapicus varius), who drinks the sugary sap and snaps up any insects also attracted to the sweet stuff.
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Mammal Monday
Procyon lotor being diurnal? Questionable but not unheard of (other than being rabid, I mean). Still, a good rule of thumb with all wild animals is to keep your distance. I let my telephoto get close. Underneath two hickory trees, and getting some of the last of the nuts I think.
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Kestrel Check-In
Check. Check. Check.All these shots are from this week. The last two were on Thursday afternoon. I saw the female feed on small birds, presumably House Sparrows, twice within an hour. She’s packing in the food for egg-laying: remember, an American Kestrel egg represents 11% of the female’s body weight.For raptor friends, the scrape cam…
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Even More Sharp-shinned
As I was preparing to head out the door last Sunday, the dawn of DST, I glanced out the window occasionally to see if the Kestrels would show up at the crack of dawn. They don’t set their clocks forward, after all. A bird whooshed into the London Plain across the street and hop-skipped-flew up…
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Raptor Wednesday
Sharpie! The little Accipiter, Sharp-shinned Hawk, Accipiter striatus.This was the bird who did not like our male American Kestrel back in the middle of February.But it wasn’t all sortie after sortie.This is a juvenile female. The males are substantially smaller: on average just a midge smaller than an American Kestrel, in fact. The one time…
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Thryothorus ludovicianus
A pair of Carolina Wrens were exploring a slope in Green-Wood.No crevice went unexplored in the search for insects, eggs, and cocoons..
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Mammal Monday
I haven’t seen one of these people in far too long. Marmota monax: groundhog, woodchuck, whistlepig, chuckling (when young).Oh, yeah, Rodentia: all in the teeth.
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Make Your Own Metaphors
Turtle with a leech latched onto its…brain? Some people say the Senator from Oligarchy, Mitch McConnell, whose career is based on an infusion of foreign cash, looks like a turtle. I wouldn’t want to insult a turtle with that comparison. But the miserable old cynic sure acts like a leech on democracy… so there’s that.
Backyard and Beyond 