Brooklyn
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Walking Tour
“To a person uninstructed in natural history, his country or sea-side stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with fine art works, nine tenths of which have their faces turned to the wall. Teach him something of natural history, and you place in his hands a catalogue of those which are worth turning around.”…
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Trio of Bird Projects
If you don’t hear crows in Brooklyn almost every day, you haven’t been listening carefully enough. This project, Birds of Brooklyn wants you to listen closely, too. Look up at Myrtle & St. Edwards and Myrtle & Carleton for Myrtle Avenue Bird Town. Compared to the butt-ugly highrises recently erected on Myrtle, these bird houses…
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Through the window
That hearty urban mammal, the gray squirrel, Sciurus carolinensis, makes its way across the Back 40 Bypass between the abandoned house to the south and the half-abandoned house to the north. (It’s a bit of a slum corner, I’m afraid.) The squirrels have a condo in the upper stories of the half-abandoned house to the…
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An Ancient Enemy
Last week, I killed a mosquito with gorgeous emerald green eyes in my girlfriend’s apartment. It was 3:30 in the morning, and for perhaps obvious reasons I did not think to photograph the remains. I did, however, think it would be the last of the pestilent blood-suckers for the year. But alas, no; last night,…
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In Green-Wood
I have a confession to make: I’ve been cheating on Prospect Park. Yes, yes, I know, I know — how could I? Olmsted & Vaux & Stranahan’s great park, which beats the knickers off Central, is so lovely and sweet, but I guess Man isn’t made to be park-monogamous. It’s not like I feel good…
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All Creatures Great and Small
Mostly small. And mostly slimy (cue Monty Python). More tidying up in the Back 40 in preparation for winter. My backyard is a Brutalist expanse of poured concrete, so I use numerous pots for planters. All were salvaged from the street. There’s also a found-on-the-sidewalk wooden box, festively decorated with painted balloons. While moving this…
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Tiny disk
Tidying up the Back 40 (inches) this time of year inevitably unearths some signs of life settling in for the winter. This is one of several very small disk snails I’ve found attached to brick or metal outside. I’ve seen these critters before and think they are probably Discus rotundatus, immigrants from Europe like many…
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Prospect Park Colors
The other day, I went looking for the Vesper sparrows that had been reported in the park. Fenced-in sections in the southern end of the Long Meadow, the area converted into the Ball Fields by Robert Moses, are providing excellent habitat for sparrows these days. The grasses are going to seed and there are still…
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Columbus Day Weekend
The primary color amid the pine trees of Cape Cod was the flaming autumn red of Virginia creeper, surrounding the tree trunks like red tights. On Nantucket, we found a leaf-green bobble-headed praying mantis on the wood-pile as we hung up some clothes to dry. She slowly moved her head to and fro, as her…
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Confusing Fall Warbler
Roger Tory Peterson, the Bronx’s great contribution to ornithology, has a couple of famous-in-the-field pages in his field guide called “Confusing Fall Warblers, etc.” On their way south, the warblers have left their breeding plumage behind them, so they are not nearly as dramatic as in the spring. Juvenile birds, born this spring and summer,…
Backyard and Beyond 