Backyard and Beyond

Starting out from Brooklyn, an amateur naturalist explores our world.

As John Burroughs said, “The place to observe nature is where you are.”

Prospect Park

  • Abstract Specificity

    The side of a female mallard by the Upper Pool in Prospect Park. The patch of blue with white edge is called a speculum (that’s Latin for “mirror,” ladies). A number of our ducks have these, but I think this blue/white combo is unique to the mallards (of course, ducks are great hybridizers, so hybrids…

    mthew

  • Field Notes: B&W Warbler

    Warbler-mania continues. This is a black and white warbler, Mniotilta varia, one of the most common and easiest to see (and hence photograph). By ear, it’s the omnipresent “weesa weesa weesa weesa weetee weetee wettee” (Sibley’s transliteration) of the woods today. The lack of a black cheek tells me this a female. She has a…

    mthew

    , ,

  • Life Goatsucker!

    My first ever goatsucker, so called because of the wackily mistaken belief that the nighthawks and nightjars suckled goats. Actually, they are efficient nocturnal insect eaters. This handsome scamp was in the Midwood in Prospect Park, midway between Rick’s Place & the Boulder Bridge. I believe it is one of the nightjars, a whip-poor-will, Caprimulgus…

    mthew

    , , ,

  • Field Notes: Chipmunk

    The eastern chipmunk, Tamias striatus. They are now fully emerged from their winter torpor and found all over Prospect Park (another good reason to obey the city’s leash laws). I’ve always been partial to them and I love the “racing stripes” along their sides. This one was not meeting me eye-to-eye in the Vale of…

    mthew

    , , ,

  • Field Notes: Prospect

    I don’t have a telephoto lens, so my shots here on the blog are usually macro and non-avian. But I captured some not terribly bad shots of birds recently while walking around Prospect Park Lake. There is usually a cohort of feral domesticated ducks to be found around Prospect Park Lake. Ducks are birds that…

    mthew

    , , , ,

  • Worms

    Last year, on a night walk in Inwood Park, our guide said that earthworms were slowly transforming, indeed, destroying, our northern hardwood forests. Whoa! I’d never heard that before and wanted to look into it. After all, earthworms are the gardener’s and the composter’s friend, right? Hasn’t that been drummed into our heads for years?…

    mthew

    ,
    , ,

  • Field Notes: Blooming Brooklyn

    A walk around Brooklyn yesterday found these colors: Cherry in Green-Wood. Columbine in Prospect. Eastern redbud in Clinton Hill. Royal Paulownia in Clinton Hill.

    mthew

    , , ,

  • Birding Prospect

    As I won’t be getting to Prospect Park for the next several days, I decided I needed an early April census of birds to compare the coming weeks to. Yesterday, I entered the Park at 9th Street and walked down to the Pools and through the Ravine and across the Midwood and the Vale and…

    mthew

    , ,

  • Field Notes: In Prospect (plus haiku)

    Willow, weep. Grackle, advance. Cocoon, open…. This is somewhat similar to the one I saw last week, but attached to a lamp post instead of suspended from a twig. Also, it’s darker. This one is just as big, though, just over an inch long, half or more wide. A big fat moth? What do you…

    mthew

    , , ,

  • Field Notes: Prospect

    With spring here — bursting, budding, crawling, squawking — the changes seen out there will be daily, impossible to keep up with. For there isn’t only the seeing, there’s the recording, and there are only so many hours in the day. On Friday, I walked through Prospect Park. The highlights were two species of butterflies,…

    mthew

    ,