Brooklyn
-
Mourning Dove
Zenaida macroura.A bird probably taken too much for granted by bird-watchers.Note the pale blue eye-ring. Watch long enough and you’ll see that the nictating membrane is the same color.
-
The Temp is Too Damn High
It’s getting so that “unseasonable” is no longer an appropriate word for never-ending autumn. This is the new seasonableness. On Friday, which set records around the region for high temperatures in a year shaping up to be the hottest on record, two Red-eared Sliders were sunning themselves in Prospect Park.A couple of Chipmunks were out…
-
Rusty Blackbird
A male Rusty Blackbird (Euphagus carolinus) was working its way through a goopy edge of the Lower Pool in Prospect Park.It was tossing wet leaves around like a stevedore and plucking the goodness out of half-drowned Sweetgum balls.Gorgeous patterning here in the non-breeding plumage. Bright shadow seems to favor him more than direct sunlight: Rusty…
-
Flight Sluggish and Swift
On a blooming goldenrod, the only visible flower around, a single bumblebee. It was warm enough yesterday for invertebrates, but they have damn few places to feed. This bee did seem a little sluggish, but it was roused by the proximity of my phone camera, and buzzed a short distance away, and then returned as…
-
No Filter But The Leaves
The sun is behind the brown and purple leaves of this White Oak, making some magic.
-
Metasequoia Cone
Cone of the Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia glyptostroboides), which is more rectangular than the ball-shaped fruit of the similar looking tree, the Bald Cypress (Taxodium distichum). I bought one of the Baldy fruits home to photograph, too, but it fell into its constituent pieces in my bag, each heady with resin. They are put together like…
-
Tree Woods
An enormous weeping willow (Salix) on 6th Avenue in Park Slope.
-
Backyard and Beyond 