may 13
Coachwhip, iteration number one. The drawing is ink on gray paper, 30 x 44.” Oh, and I played hooky this afternoon and birded Central Park; it turned into a pretty nice afternoon for migrants and recent arrivals (in caps, below). I spent two hours walking from the E. 86th Street entrance down through the Ramble:
Mallard
Red-tailed Hawk
Ring-billed Gull
Herring Gull
Rock Pigeon
Mourning Dove
Red-bellied Woodpecker
Downy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
CHIMNEY SWIFT (flock of 20+)
RUBY-THROATED HUMMINGBIRD (1 male)
Blue Jay
NORTHERN ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOW (2)
VEERY
WOOD THRUSH
American Robin
GRAY CATBIRD (everywhere now)
Northern Mockingbird
BROWN THRASHER (1)
European Starling
NASHVILLE WARBLER (2+)
NORTHERN PARULA (several)
CHESTNUT-SIDED WARBLER
MAGNOLIA WARBLER (3)
BLACK-THROATED BLUE WARBLER (many males, one female)
Yellow-rumped Warbler (prevalent)
BLACK & WHITE WARBLER (many, males and females, singing throughout the park)
AMERICAN REDSTART (males and females)
OVENBIRD (3)
NORTHERN WATERTHRUSH (1)
Chipping Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow
Northern Cardinal
INDIGO BUNTING (1 male)
Red-winged Blackbird
Common Grackle
BALTIMORE ORIOLE (practically everywhere)
House Sparrow
Just about everything I saw today was singing, which was great. It is astonishing how tuned in you can be to high-pitched or faint bird songs even when surrounded by an urban din of helicopters, chainsaws, construction noises, and constant traffic.
This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 13th, 2008 at 6:21 pm and is filed under Birds, Central Park, Drawings, Fauna, Lists |
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May 13th, 2008 at 8:07 pm
That is super impressive. The fact that you can tune into the birds over the ‘noise.’ My neighbor loves his loud horrible machines, leaf blower, chain saw et al. I personally find it drives me to the edge. So I am muy impressed by your ears’ ability to focus out the other sounds.
Your snake rocks. Gorgeous. Powerful and luminous.
May 14th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Just out of curiousity, do you compare yearly lists to years past? Do you always know when you haven’t seen something this year as opposed to previous years?
Thanks. From a non-birder who likes the fact that some people bird.
May 15th, 2008 at 5:52 am
sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssillyserpentinesnakessnugglesanssnow.
Jed: Lists. One of the great advantages to the birder has been various PC programs that manage lists and therefore allow you to compare and contrast past lists with relative ease. Since most birders start out keeping year lists, life lists, lists of birds, state lists, country lists seen at Fenway Park, you are keenly aware of what is and what is not on your list. For me, because I am involved in so many monitoring projects, I have an overall idea of what I have seen in one place or another. We are coordinators of a massive Breeding Bird Atlas project run by Mass Audubon and the USGS. Everything is broken down into blocks that need 20+hours of field work. Thank ye gods everything is computerized cuz I am finding I am losing tracks of what I have seen doing what in which block (we have complex breeding protocols to track too). But amazingly, I still know I have yet to see American Oystercatcher this year in MA, and that Catherine (so far) has not seen anything in CA RECENTLY that I don’t have on my (computerized) “life list”. Listing can ruin birding when you get too obsessive about it, but I have used an aggregation of records seen in a location over decades to help save parcels of land too, as in the IMPORTANT BIRD AREA international program.
Mark L.
May 15th, 2008 at 4:21 pm
Catherine:
Today I interviewed TED FLOYD, Editor of Birding and author of a brand new (oh, god, yet another one, when will they stop?) field guide done for the Smithsonian. This guide uses photos. PERSONALLY and overall, do you like/find useful photos or drawing/paintings in field guides?
Mark