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Twiggy
I saw this and the shape and size instantly put me in mind of a pupa. Then I had doubts. It is so incredibly twig-like! Yet the concentric rings, the firm binding at the top to the stone, and the secondary binding on the side, just a thin, flexible thread, were all there to convince…
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Mammal Monday
Wait, what?This gruesome sight greeted me recently not very far from where a roosting Great Horned Owl was being yelled at by Blue Jays. Suspicion isn’t evidence, but caching of prey is something these big owls do. Especially in nesting season. The male has to hunt more than usual since the female spends so much…
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Raptor Notes
From all over, but mostly from the window. Here’s a Cooper.Kestrel on the same fire escape, with prey.Cooper again, another day.A Kestrel several blocks away, atop Sunset Park HS. I always glance up here when entering or exiting the 36th Street subway station.Red-tailed Hawk with full crop. In #BrooklynKestrel news, a male was seen regularly…
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Mimus polyglottos
Northern Mockingbirds are always interested in who’s in their space. Because it all belongs to them.The original side-eye.
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Downy WP
Our smallest woodpecker is the least concerned with us. I walked underneath this one, which was a couple feet above me, before noticing it. They’ll range into the streets and backyards of the city more commonly than the Red-bellied, Yellow-bellied, Hairy, and Northern Flicker, the other species found around here.The red feathers mark a male.
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Red-tailed Hawk…
Continuing from yesterday… This yearling Red-tailed Hawk, which I’m pretty sure is the same one I’ve seen in this area of Green-Wood repeatedly, had recently eaten something.Swallowed the portion stored in the crop,and excreted.Then it started looking around the neighborhood.Next to this tombstone was an evergreen bush.Hawk just waded into it.And pulled out a dead…
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Raptor Wednesday — Birthday Edition
I almost walked into this Red-tailed Hawk before seeing it. I backed up and went around a handy mausoleum, used another mausoleum for cover, and ended up within ten feet. For nearly fifteen minutes, I got to watch.That’s food bulging in the bird’s crop. You can also see the stuffed crop pushing the feathers out…
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Goldfinch and Pods
A detail from a feeding frenzy. Half a dozen sweetgum trees, with pods all over the ground and road they bordered. Many of the pods were still hanging from the trees, too. They attracted several dozen American Goldfinches, on the ground and acrobatically hanging from the pods overhead. I don’t recall ever seeing so many…
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Mammal Monday
In which we attempt to glide your way into the working week with something mammiferous. Twice I passed this hole-in-the-bole recently and the Blue Jays were screaming and the Red-breasted Nuthatches were wailing and one or two jays actually got on the lip of the hole and peeked in. “By Jove, there’s something in there,…
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Weekend Update
Two and a half hours in Green-Wood this morning, and not a single raptor sighting. That’s unusual for a winter day. As I was walking home, a block away from the southern edge of the cemetery, I heard a Raven croaking. I turned to see it heading towards Green-Wood. Because I’d turned around, I saw…
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Backyard and Beyond 