Backyard and Beyond

Starting out from Brooklyn, an amateur naturalist explores our world.

As John Burroughs said, “The place to observe nature is where you are.”

  • 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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  • Frozen

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  • Surprising Teal

    I couldn’t determine what this was from a distance, where it was dwarfed by a herd of Canada Geese.Even close by, I was running through the names of the ducks in a bird ID app.That moire pattern! The stripe! That head!Of course, “wigeon” and “gadwall,” among others, don’t come up if you type in “duck”….…

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  • Branta bernicla

    Or, just plain Brant. A winter visitor to our waters. This one was spotted off the coast of Brooklyn recently. (Those on the west coast have black bellies and are known as Black Brant. They were once considered a separate species from these east coasters.)

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  • More Cooper

    Of late, the Cooper Hawks I’ve seen have been in the air, as yesterday’s post, or huddling in the yews and arbor vitae. But this one was perching as bold as brass… or is that rusty iron? With nary a Blue Jay in sight… The Jays have been abundant in Green-Wood this winter. They let…

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