birds
-
Fevers
A couple of the eight Fox Sparrows (Passerella iliaca) I ran into recently. That’s a lot for me. Usually I just seen one or two or a time. These birds nest in the north, that north so radically changing now, in Newfoundland, and upper Quebec, and further west right into Alaska. This is the south…
-
Frozen
An early form of writing or waterfowl prints in the ice? “Amazingly, we take for granted that instinct for survival, fear of death, must separate us from the happiness of pure and uninterpreted experience, in which body, mind, and nature are the same. And this debasement of our vision, the retreat from wonder, the backing…
-
Larus
Small and large: Ring-Billed and Herring Gulls, both members of the Larus genus, down at 58th St Pier off the Brooklyn Army Terminal. In case you missed Charles M. Blow’s column on the anti-inauguration celebrations, it’s very much worth reading and acting upon. We plan to protest on the 20th (good practice for the years…
-
Raptor Wednesday
New Year’s Day dawned with a falcon alighting on top of the antenna perch a long block away. I assumed it was our old friend the male American Kestrel (Falco sparverius) who hangs out there a lot. But it was a Merlin (Falco columbarius), which are not as common here in the city. A Merlin…
-
Oak Wilt
Damn it! I really wanted to start on a positive note, but the bad news just keeps coming. Oak wilt has been discovered in Brooklyn. This is a lethal fungal infection of oaks and other species, its spores spread by beetles. When I was in Green-Wood on Friday, I heard a chipper hard at work.…
-
One More Time
Because awesome and delightful. When last we saw this Pied-billed Grebe on the Valley Water, ice covered more than half of the pond. The next time, ice covered it all and no grebe was to be seen. The bird presumably took off looking for open water. The water was completely free of ice yesterday, with…
-
Preen
Northern Shoveler (Anas clypeata) male working on feather maintenance. There’s preening, and then there’s overweening preening. Did you see the Tiny-Fisted One’s Christmas “card” tweet? Cheeto Mussolini couldn’t even be bothered to gather together his klan o’ grifters for a bogus family picture. Sad.
-
Raptor Wednesday
Always note the anomalies, the bumps.Red-tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis) on railing. Showing the “belly band” nicely. Way down in the flatlands, 1st & 40th, Raven country.Another day, another sighting. Big shoulders, relatively short, squared-off tail. The mottled white patches on the back, sometimes a little more clearly in a V pattern, are another good sign…
-
Cedar Waxwings Bathing
Day two of winter. Can spring be far behind? (No shadows of the waxwing slain here.) Yes, a little bit of last spring and perhaps a forecast of the next. Now, Cedar Waxwings are not unknown this time of year, but they are irregular, meaning you never know. I’ll be presenting a slide-show lecture on…
-
Snow Geese
Amidst perhaps 200 Canada Geese (Branta canadensis) on the Upper Pool, a trio of Snow Geese (Chen caerulescens).The all-white with black wingtips bird (spectacular in flight) in the background is an adult. The varying-degrees-of-gray are youngsters.This is actually one of the most abundant species of waterfowl on the continent, but since we don’t have any…
Backyard and Beyond 