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Scolopax minor
It was an unusually cold Saturday night, but damn it, it was spring, and the timberdoodles were in town. We went out to Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge to listen for them. The American woodcock, Scolopax minor, as it is more formally known, is a shorebird that isn’t. It is related to the sandpipers, and looks…
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Living with wildlife
I found this fine website on living with urban wildlife set up by Portland OR’s Audubon. It’s on the other coast, so they have some different species, but the ideas are the same. The border between nature and city has always been permeable, and as cities expand the border grows even less sure. It behooves…
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In the archives
Foot- and end- notes are like the underbrush: it’s crowded down there, and you have to wade through a mess of grass or leaves to find something juicy. I was on the trail of a book recently, sent there I do not remember why, and found a copy at the NYPL. This was William Beebe’s…
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Field Notes: In Prospect (plus haiku)
Willow, weep. Grackle, advance. Cocoon, open…. This is somewhat similar to the one I saw last week, but attached to a lamp post instead of suspended from a twig. Also, it’s darker. This one is just as big, though, just over an inch long, half or more wide. A big fat moth? What do you…
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Field Notes: Turtle ID help requested
Most of the turtles in our local fresh waters are eastern red eared sliders (Trachemys scripta elegans). I posted a picture of two of them last week in Green-Wood; note the distinctive red stripe behind the eye; note also that rough carapace. This is an invasive species, now pretty naturalized, that was, and I suppose…
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Field Notes: JBWR Beetles UPDATED
Photographs by N. Arnzen. There are something like 350,000 described species of beetles, order Coleoptera, and presumably many more that are not described. I once read that there are more species of beetles than all other species of animals combined, which may not be right, but it does give you some sense of their dominance…
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Field Notes: Honey Bees
Gerry at Global Swarming has some wonderful shots of honey bees working the red-gold pussy willow (Salix gracilistyla) at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. I spent some time there on Saturday. (My camera battery passed away before I got any “action” shots.) This species of pussy willow, native to Japan & Korea, was one of the…
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Natural Object: Cones
I have trouble distinguishing the baldycypress (T. distichum) and dawn redwood (M. glyptostroboides) trees, but the cones are quite different. Above, the baldycypress cones are to the left, the dawn redwood to the right. I have a house full of pods, seeds, and cones, I’ve never found very many baldycypress cones before. They break up…
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Field Notes: Prospect
With spring here — bursting, budding, crawling, squawking — the changes seen out there will be daily, impossible to keep up with. For there isn’t only the seeing, there’s the recording, and there are only so many hours in the day. On Friday, I walked through Prospect Park. The highlights were two species of butterflies,…
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In the Back 40
A little proto-spring cleaning in the Back 40 reveals some early signs of life. Just in time! Some greenery, mostly tenacious sunflowers just popping up, and a little patch of moss. But there were some creepy-crawlies in the mix: Earth worm. Found under a pot, moved into the compost bin. I think these are spider…
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Backyard and Beyond 