Turkey Vulture/Cathartes aura at the beginning of a Torrey Botanical Society walk in Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. We looped, and two and a half hours later: Bald Eagle/Haliaeetus leucocephalus. Both birds were seen over the valley of the Bronx River, which is also the course of the Bronx River Parkway and the Metro North…

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From the Brooklyn Raptor Observatory, also known as our apartment, the car service antenna at 40th and 5th is a landmark. American Kestrels perch atop one of the two parts regularly. Merlins, Red-tailed Hawks, Coopers Hawks, and Peregrines have also been known to perch on it, the larger birds preferring the horizontal superstructure (unseen here).…

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Stalking the wild raptor… .. certainly is easier when it comes to Merlins. These small falcons (Falco columbarius) characteristically perch for long periods of time in prominent locations. I had time to close in on the odd shape in a distant tree and get around to have the sun behind me. The bird was unperturbed.…

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A dawn flurry of Feral Pigeons can mean… A Coopers Hawk fox-in-the-hen-house situation. Meanwhile… To fly from the lordly perch atop the giant smokestack on 2nd Avenue to Green-Wood Cemetery at 5th Avenue, Red-tail Hawks have to pass through a gauntlet of American Kestrels. There’s a Kestrel nest site on 4th Avenue, which is not…

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November 6th, a big Isabella Tiger Moth/Pyrrharctia isabella caterpillar. November 11: Clouded Sulphur/Colias philodice. Was surprised by this one. It was about 50F out, though brightly sunny. November 12:Cabbage White/Pieris rapae. What a season for this ubiquitous butterfly! This is often the first butterfly species seen in the spring, barring the Mourning Cloaks. They probably…

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Female dragonflies and damselflies tend to hunt away from waterbodies, where mating and ovipositing take place. For instance, I rarely see female Autumn Meadowhawks/Sympetrum vicinum on their own. They’re obviously out there, but I generally only see them when they’re mating. Here a pair form the Odonata mating wheel: the male grasps the female behind…

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An Eastern White Pine/Pinus strobes aflock with Red-winged Blackbirds/Agelaius phoeniceus. This was the first of two White Pines I found full of Red-wings this day. It might very well have been the same flock. I got better pictures at the second White Pine. But then: The locally perching Merlin/Falco columbarius took off and flushed them.…

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American Winter Ants/Prenolepis imparis herding Oleander Aphids/Aphis nerii on underside of Common Milkweed/Asclepias syriaca. The ants harvest the aphids’ excretions, or honeydew, and protect the aphids from photographer’s fingers and the like.

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A female Downy Woodpecker/Dryobates pubescens on a Tuliptree/Liriodendron tulipifera. I heard a Red-bellied Woodpecker/Melanerpes carolinus above her… And caught a glimpse. A wee Brown Creeper/Certhia americana on a neighboring pine (above), flew to the woodpeckery Tuliptree to make it three foragers on the same tree at the same time.

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