Happy Memorial Day!

A white-throated sparrow enjoying spring in Central Park. Click on the photo to enlarge.

Detail from a bronze plaque in the Brooklyn Federal Building and Post Office, remembering postal workers who served as soldiers. 

Twig-Mimic Caterpillar

I was walking on the path that circles Pakim Pond in the Brendan T. Byrne State Forest in New Jersey last week. I walked into a gossamer thread that I thought was a spider web. I turned out to be a caterpillar's silken support line. I looked down and saw a "twig" sticking out of my shirt. I was fooled into thinking it was a piece of wood. I tried to brush it off, but it stayed put. I looked more closely. It was a caterpillar!

A twig-mimic caterpillar in the genus Lytrosis. Click to enlarge.

The caterpillar in the photo above is standing on four pro-legs (leg-like stumps with grippy hooks) that are firmly latched to my white shirt. Its head end is sticking out. You can see three pairs of tiny legs just behind the head. If you look closely you can see a thread of silk dangling from the head; it's the caterpillar's belay line. The strand would normally help support the caterpillar's head end while it leaned away from a plant stem, allowing it to stay horizontal to the ground in a twiggish attitude.

Looking like a twig helps the caterpillar evade sight-hunting predators. It will eventually become a small brown bark-camoflaged geometrid moth. I took it off my shirt and put it on the plant below. Looks like a little piece of fallen wood, doesn't it?

Nothing to see here. Fallen twig. Move along. 

Happy Mother's Day!

Canada geese, Branta canadensis. Click to enlarge. 

A Walk in the Park

Central Park is full of pleasant spring sights right now. 

American robin, Turdus migratorius. Click on the photos to enlarge.

Raccoon, Procyon lotor. 

Red-eared slider turtles, Trachemys scripta.

Male wood duck, Aix sponsa. 

"It is spring again. The earth is like a child that knows poems by heart." Rainier Maria Rilke

Snapping Turtle!

A common snapping turtle, Chelydra serpentina. 

I saw this big snapping turtle sunning himself on the shore of  The Reservoir in Central Park on one of the first warm sunny days of the year last week.

The snapping turtle is New York's official state reptile. Big ones can grow to around 18 inches long and weigh about 35 pounds. Wild snappers like this one are estimated to live for about 30 years.

Click on the photos to enlarge. 

Dust Bath, Sun Bath

This group of European house sparrows, Passer domesticus, was dust bathing in a sandy patch of dirt in Central Park in New York City on Friday afternoon.

To take a dust bath, scratch a depression with the feet. Wiggle the belly down into it. Ruffle the feathers. Shake and flap furiously to fling dust in the air. Spread the wings and get dust all over them. Shake the dust through the feathers and down to the skin. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Then shake the dust off and preen until spiffy. Voila! Many kinds of birds take dust baths; it helps control parasites and absorbs excess oil.

 Click on the photos to enlarge. 

This American robin, Turdus migratorius, is taking a sun bath.

Sun bathing, too, helps keep the feather parasites down. To sun bathe, a bird spreads or droops the wings, ruffles feathers, and assumes various postures that expose different areas of its body to the sun. When a parasite moves to get away from the heat and light, the bird snacks it down.

A gray catbird, Dumatella carolinensis, catching some rays. 

An Unusual Sparrow

A leucistic house sparrow! 

A female house sparrow, Passer domesticus, with normal coloration.

European house sparrows are so common in New York City that they are easy to overlook.

But I saw a special one in Cadman Plaza Park in Brooklyn Heights last weekend -- a female with patches of white feathers on her back, sides, and tail. She has a genetic condition called leucism, which prevents the normal deposition of pigment in some of her feathers. (Another form of the condition can cause birds to be pale all over.)

Leucistic birds are pretty rare. The Feeder Watch Project run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, for instance, reported fewer than 1000 leucistic birds among five and a half million observed during one year at feeders across the US and Canada. That's less than one bird in 5500, or about 0.02%.

I hope this one stays in my neighborhood for a while. I'll report back if I see her again.

Click on the photos to enlarge.