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Breakaway Scaup
May I present to you with a male Greater Scaup (Aythya marila)? These birds are found off Brooklyn’s shore, particularly in Gravesend and Dead Horse Bays, during winter. Over seventeen thousand were counted in DHB last Monday during a coastal survey. Now, that is a raft of ducks. But this male was all by himself,…
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Some Names
I was surprised to see, on a large banner on Smith St., which pictured what was there before industrialization, the nearby body of water referred to as “Hudson Bay.” This would be the water ground water flowed to from the Gowanus creek and swamp and the “Woody Heights of Guana,” as the British called the…
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White-throat
One of those indefatigable winter warriors, a White-throated Sparrow (Zonotrichia albicollis), in the life-giving Sumac. This is one of the easiest birds to identify by voice, since its call, transcribed as “Oh-sweet-Canada Canada Canada” or “Old-Sam-Peabody Peabody Peabody” (I have duel allegiances) is distinctive and frequent. These birds will head to Canada to breed, their…
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Belted Kingfisher
A Belted Kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon) was patrolling some of the un-iced water in Stranahan-Olmsted-Vaux’s park over the long weekend.This is a male. Male birds are typically more colorful than females, but this isn’t the case with this species. M. alcyon females have a rusty band below the blue collar-like markings, the “belt” of their common…
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Meanwhile, in the Wedding Venue Garden
In the last week, two employees of what many are still calling, for sentimental reasons, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, confided in me about the low level of morale there since the purge of its research program in August. In September, the Garden’s Board of Trustees approved a new mission statement; the old one had proved…
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A City Park in Bloom
Something for winter-winter: A City Park, by William Merritt Chase (1849-1916), c. 1887. This was originally thought to be painted in Prospect Park, but it is now believed that Chase was in Tompkins Park, around the corner from where his father lived. Chase was an advocate of en plein-air painting — it shows the distance…
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Bills V
The Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus) is a woodpecker who often forages on the ground, digging and poking for ants and beetles and those ever gooey larvae. This particular bill appears to have some dirt on it from poking into Green-Wood last fall. This species is found across the U.S., but western birds have red-shafted feathers,…
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Ring-billed Gull
Last year, I posted a picture of a Ring-billed Gull (Larus delawarensis) on a lamp between Pier 5 & 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park. This year, with a better-lensed camera, I offer another shot of a Ring-billed on the fence in the same area. Could it be the same bird? It’s very tolerant of people,…
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The Age of Wonder Is Perpetual
An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump, by Joseph Wright “of Derby,” 1768. The painting is in the National Gallery, London, where I saw it in the oil this summer. Dramatically lit by a single candle, this tableau shows a scientist conducting the eponymous experiment and freaking out the children. Actually, in 1768,…
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Bills IV
Get a load of the schnoze on this Northern Shoveler (Anas clypeata). This is one of the dabbling duck species, straining tiny crustaceans, plankton, and seeds from the surface of the water. These long bills have comb-like filters on them. This is a male, but not yet in full breeding plumage, which, like the large…
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Backyard and Beyond 