 Watch out Fire Island deer! The Parks Service wants you out of the way of their holly plants. And tourists, if you like seeing deer, too bad. The parks service wants to cut down on “negative human-deer interactions,” which it seems to define as anything that isn’t hunting. Keep reading Parks Service Wants to Hunt Fire Island Deer Again  Guide to Troubled Birds is the rare funny bird book that illustrates what any birder secretly knows: a lot of birds are jerks. Keep reading Guide to Troubled Birds: showing birds as the jerks they sometimes are  Humongous Polyphemus Moth hatches–sorry, ecloses–from one of two mystery cocoons downed from oak trees during the harsh winter. Keep reading Mystery cocoon revealed: giant Polyphemus Moth  Wood duck mother and duckling Something is going on with nests in Prospect Park this season. They’re everywhere. You can’t walk 50 feet in the park bumping into some adorable tableau of chirping baby birds. Half the trees in the park seem to be brimming with exhibitionist robin families. The big unusual nests this year are green herons and wood ducks (which are living somewhere near dog beach–but where they nested, I don’t know.)
Green herons are nesting on the lullwater and near the less-fancy bridge by the boathouse. Green heron on nest by the boathouse. Babies are tucked under her wing. Green heron feeds her creepy-looking babies.
Swans in the park, as if in defiance of a potential plan to wipe them out, are multiplying. They have two nests, one helpfully placed on an island by the ice rink to make for easy viewing. The father swan normally spends his days chasing off other waterfowl, but he came and sat on the eggs with his wife. Apparently he was alarmed by a mommy mallard and her ducklings nearby. Baby Swans
I havent’ seen barn swallows build nests on the boathouse yet, just in the tunnels. Barn swallow nest
These robins are so desperate for attention they build nests at eye level, sometimes Keep reading Nest Quest in Prospect Park  Baby cardinals, so hard to find, have a weird red tint to their bodies. After years of looking I finally found a nest. The babies left before I thought they could make it. I’ll never know if they did. Keep reading The Elusive Cardinal Nest  Birders harass dog people in Prospect Park saying they disturb ground-nesting birds. But only six species nest on the ground here, none exclusively. Some aren’t even in the park in the summer. Keep reading Dogs Don’t Eat Warblers–in Prospect Park or Anywhere  Bill Gates’ popular chart on World’s Deadliest Animals tries to visualize shows mosquitoes as the most despicable creature on earth. But it makes hippos, wolves and sharks look worse than they are and lets off humans (the true villains) way too easy. Keep reading Bill Gates’ Mosquito Chart Too Harsh on Wolves, Sharks, Hippos; Too Easy on Humans  How easy is it to see a snowy owl in Brooklyn this winter? Your odds are pretty good–if you’re willing to haul yourself out to Floyd Bennett Field, an old timey airport on Brooklyn’s shore. I got to see one today after looking on eBird and figuring it was the most likely spot. Keep reading Owling in Brooklyn  When you peel back the outer paper of a wasp nest, you find layers of hive, some dead larvae, some zombie wasps springing to life and not much honey. Also a faint odor. Keep reading What’s inside that wasp nest?  Our beagle Huckleberry has invented the sport of chasing pumpkins down a hill in Brooklyn’s Prospect Park. His reward is he gets to eat the pumpkin, which he’s able to break into after several rolls. Keep reading Beagles Run for Rolling Pumpkins in Prospect Park |
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