Prospect Park
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Katydids
The trees are alive with the sound of music. At night. Katydids and crickets stridulating away, rubbing the pegged “file” of one wing against the ridge-like scraper of the other to produce those clicks, tisps, buzzes, etc. Each species has a distinctive sound: it’s the males marking their territory and calling to the females. Bonus…
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Common Nighthawks
It’s been a difficult week. But one of the highlights was on Thursday, when a friend and I went into Prospect Park in the late afternoon. Just before sunset, we were in the Nethermead. Overhead, the chittering of many Chimney Swifts was heard as the little birds darted all over the sky taking their last…
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Great Crested Flycatcher
Always a nice surprise to get a good look at a Great Crested Flycatcher (Myiarchus crinitus), since they are usually at tree-top level. I thought this might be a migrant, and it may well be, but it should be noted that there are breeding records for the species in Prospect. They are the only cavity-nesting…
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Orange Is the New Bluet
A male Orange Bluet (Enallagma signatum) in the afternoon sun.
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Spotted (or Not) and Streaky
Spotted Sandpipers (Actitis macularius) — no spots once they’ve moved out of their breeding plumage — are patrolling the edges of fresh water bodies now during migration. Also along the watery edges these days are Northern Waterthrushes (Parkesia noveboracensis).
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Downy Heron
One of a trio of young Green Herons (Butorides virescens) on a snag in the Lullwater this week. This one was sitting: I’ve never seen a heron sit before. It was a month ago that I saw this fledgling Green Heron in Green-wood. That bird looked a little older. I wonder if this trio is…
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Flying Now
Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui). I’ve posted previously about separating these from the similar American Lady butterflies (Vanessa virginiensis); from this view, the four big wing spots mark the Painted; two big spots the American.Orange Bluet (Enallagma signatum) male. Small and slender, but striking when you see it: at Green-Wood’s Sylvan Water. At the nearby Valley…
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More Nesting News
I know of two Green Heron (Butorides virescens) nests in the park, one at eye-level and one way up in the canopy.The sloppy-looking pile of sticks precariously thrown about up there seems to work for them. Someone said there were at least four of pair of breeding Green Herons in the park.Didn’t see any activity…
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Wood Ducks
A birder named Ben mentioned he’d seen a Wood Duck with ducklings on the Upper Pool the day before, so we were on the lookout. A pair coasted on the water, but it was a single mom in the lily pads who emerged with seven ducklings (and, in fact, she gave the male of the…
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International Bird Migration Day
Magnolia Warbler male (Dendroica magnolia). An upstate NY and further north nester. Just passing through Brooklyn now … It’s International Bird Migration Day, which was developed to educate people about the transnational lives of birds. Right now, billions of individual birds are moving from Central and South America to North America, flowing from southern hemisphere…
Backyard and Beyond 