Interested in nature with a focus on birding and astronomy. Current project is a visual hunt for novae or exploding stars in the Galaxy from New York City. Got hooked on discovering things while birding and found that the hunt for novae in NYC is right up my alley.
Standard abbr. used for the U.S. (Calif. = California).
2-letter postal codes used for countries (CA = Canada).
Standard abbr. used for the U.S. (Calif. = California).
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2-letter postal code used for the U.S. (MO = Missouri) & for countries (NL = Netherlands).
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Central Park Report: 18-Aug-2007 |
DATE: Saturday, 18 August 2007 (3:45p-7:20p)
LOCATION: Central Park - reservoir & north end
REPORTED BY: Ben Cacace
It's easy to see Central Park is not a nature sanctuary. While counting the Mallards on the Meer I spotted one with a huge fishing lure lodged in its lower bill. Last week the same was seen with a Canada Goose.
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Adult Red-tailed Hawk in Pale Male's Space |
Tonight this adult Red-tailed Hawk was spotted near the north edge of Pale Male's territory. The hawk has a red tail. It was just inside the 85th St. & 5th Ave. entrance. Blue Jays and Robins were making a racket.
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Central Park Reservoir: 5 Common Loons 18-Apr |
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Three of Five Common Loons CENTRAL PARK — RESERVOIR Image by B. Cacace (click either image for a combined view) 420mm | ISO: 200 | Shutter: 1/160s | Aperture: f/5.6 |
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The number of Common Loons in breeding plumage on Central Park's reservoir has increased to five. All were seen on the surface simultaneously.
Two were feeding in close proximity to each other.
To read the full report of the birds seen in the park after work click here.
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History of 5th Ave. Red-tailed Hawks |
Attached is the document ‘History of the Fifth Avenue Red-tailed Hawks as of 4/21/06’ produced by Jim Lewis and supplied to me by Marie Winn. I've uploaded the document to my site in order to make it available to the public.
Click on the title in quotes to view the chart ... Enjoy!
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Bald Eagle on Reservoir 24-Feb-2007 |
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DATE: Saturday, 24 February 2007 (7:50a-2:20p)
Even though the reservoir was almost completely frozen over we decided to take a trip around the running track. The only open water on the reservoir continues around the 'fountain' in the SW quadrant. In this opening were ~50 Canada Geese, 6 American Coots & several Ring-billed Gulls. It's unfortunate I didn't make an exact count of the gulls.
As we made our way along the east side of the reservoir heading north I noticed the gulls had just lifted off the reservoir. I always look for raptors in the sky when this happens since this is sometimes the reason for the scare. This time the reward was a juvenile Bald Eagle carrying one of the Ring-billed Gulls. The eagle started climbing a bit but then started settling into descending loops and finally landed out in the middle of the reservoir on the ice.
It was almost immediately joined by 3 crows waiting on scraps.
We didn't spot the eagle arriving but saw it shortly after the gulls lifted. It already had the Ring-billed in its talons.
Also seen were 6 Red-tailed Hawks. Both sets of adults from the 5th Ave. nest and the Trump Parc nest. A Red-tailed was seen north of the reservoir. On my way to the south end there was a juvenile RT feasting on a pigeon just east of the Falconer's statue.
The male Northern Pintail continues on The Pond at the south end of the park.
** Total species - 33 **
'Infrequent' migrants [1 spp]:| [+/-] |
Central Park Reservoir: 16-Feb-2007 |
Last night I made my first trip to the reservoir after work seeing that sunset is starting to fit in with quitting time.
I arrived at 5:26pm, roughly 5 minutes before sunset. I left the reservoir a few minutes before 6pm. I didn't know what shape the reservoir would be in but I wasn't too surprised that the ice coverage is close to 100%.
The only sizeable open water exists just south and east of the ‘fountain’ near the reservoir's south edge.
The waterfowl in this small open area has been filtered down to American Coots. These were the only ducks on the reservoir.
‘Birds of North America’ on-line says this about their flight:
“An extended period of Splattering along water’s surface required to become airborne …”
I wonder if this is the reason only coots remain.
Before leaving the reservoir a single White-throated Sparrow landed in a leafless bush. It called for a time while looking for a place to rest. It finally perched on the downwind side of a branch and appeared to have settled in for the night.
Before exiting the park at 81st St. & Central Park West a Red-tailed Hawk was seen roosting on the window frame of the Beresford Building's south-east tower. With westerly winds this appeared to be a very comfortable perch.
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Central Park: Pied-billed Grebe 3-Feb-2007 |
This Pied-billed Grebe is possibly the same bird that appeared on the reservoir for the 2006/2007 ‘winter season’ the day I was out birding with Omar Morales on 30-Sep-2006. It arrived in juvenile plumage and has recently begun to acquire its adult plumage as noted by Jack Meyer in a recent post to eBirds NYC.
Here's a link to a photo by Cal Vornberger taken of the juvenile on the reservoir on 11-Dec-2006.
Scroll down a bit at the following link for 2 photos from 9-Dec-2006 taken by Bruce Yolton.
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Central Park Reservoir: Brant 28-Jan-2007 |
A flock of 22 Brant landed on the reservoir around 8:30a on Sunday 28-Jan-2007. The flock left by 8:50a.
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Scaup Identification Question: 28-Jan-2007 |
This scaup was on the reservoir this morning (Sun, 28 Jan 2007) briefly from at least 9:30a after I completed a loop of the reservoir. I left the area around 9:45a. The bird was not seen again by other birders I mentioned the sighting to.
Are there enough details in the two photos to ID this as Lesser Scaup (Aythya affinis)? The images are cropped from the original without any additional compression other than the normal in-camera JPEG compression.
Thanks in advance and feel free to comment here or via email. See contact information in left sidebar.
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Central Park: Juv. Pied-billed Grebe 7-Dec |
This image taken on December 7th at 12:38pm EST at the south end of the reservoir. Focal length in 35mm film equivalent is 420mm, exposure time 1/100s, hand held with image stabilization at f/5.6.
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Central Park: Looking South 9-Nov |
Southern View from TotL (detail) Click the picture above for a wide-angle view of Central Park South taken from our observing site.
The image is from the ‘Top of the Lawn’ where we do most of our Central Park observing. It was taken shortly before Charlie arrived and was inspired by the handheld panorama he took of the same scene.
Fomalhaut, the brightest star in the constellation Piscis Austrinus (Southern Fish), is visible in the photo in the extreme upper left hand corner. The view is looking south southwest down the spine of Manhattan. The center of the photo is roughly 210 degrees in azimuth.
The left edge of the image is just east of 180 degrees and the right is close to 240 degrees making the width of the image nearly 60 degrees.
The photo was taken at 7:49pm EST on the 9th of November. The exposure was 6 seconds at f/2.8. The focal length in 35mm equivalent was 38mm. The camera used is a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ30.
At the time of the photo Fomalhaut was at azimuth 182.6 degrees and 19.6 degrees above the horizon. The brightest building in the center of the skyline is ‘30 Rockefeller Plaza’ home of ‘Saturday Night Live’ and is also known as the ‘G.E. Building’.
The star in the upper left corner, Fomalhaut (magnitude 1.2 — alpha Pisces Austrini), is in the Southern Fish constellation. When I look closely at the original 5.3 megapixel image I can see stars down to mag. 5.9 in the area around Fomalhaut including delta (m4.2), gamma (m4.5) & epsilon (4.2) Piscis Austrini plus the 5.9 mag star HIP 114366 (not shown).
The image above is a slightly compressed from the original showing the stars visible around Fomalhaut. The wide-angle view is one third the size of the original.
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Central Park: 1st Night Observing 9-Nov |
The astronomy season has just begun! At soon as ‘Daylight Saving Time’ ends my ability to go birding after work ends also.
The astronomy season seems to kick in as the ‘Cheshire Cat’ asterism is seen rising face up in Auriga. Since Central Park is where I do most of my observing this is where I wound up on Thursday night.
All of ‘team’ TotL eventually arrived at the ‘Top of the Lawn’. I arrived a bit early at 7:30p followed by Charlie, Peter and then Kin. We were fortunate enough to have clear skies for the entire session.
The air was a bit moist but not too saturated. Objects sitting out in the open didn't moisten up too badly. On a bad night an unpacked book will expand like a wet sponge.
A number of objects were observed over the course of the night. One of the first was an asteroid Charlie picked up with his tripod mounted 15x50 Canon IS binoculars. I didn't sketch the field but did display the object and the surrounding stars on the PDA program ‘Planetarium’.
An almost straight line was formed by two stars (HIP 15552 & HIP 15380) below the asteroid with a dimmer star (HIP 15181) just above Iris. Iris was bright at mag. 6.9 and I will definitely check it out next time I'm out with the Televue-76. The time of the observation was around 9pm.
I get a kick out of spotting and confirming minor planets. So far I've seen and confirmed 6 asteroids. If you have the time after finishing this post here's a write-up of these observations which doesn't include 7 Iris yet.
A couple from New Zealand were walking a dog and stopped by to talk and to take a look through the telescopes. They enjoyed the three standard showpieces of the night — the Double Cluster in Perseus, the Pleiades and the Moon.
During their visit Peter was observing a distant open cluster in the Tak-102. I didn't note down which one he had but the New Zealander's noted the hazy appearance of the grouping. It was a nice view in the 4" refractor.
I didn't catch the names of the Kiwi's but the woman had just run the N.Y.C. Marathon. This was the reason they came to the U.S. Because of this I was surprised to see they were walking a dog. Was it their dog? No! Dog sitting was part of the deal while renting the apartment. Luckily it was a good one, the dog that is. It didn't treat our equipment rudely.
Shortly after this we had a first time visit from ‘Tammy with the Lights in her Hair’. She stuck around for a bit. She arrived via bicycle and had passed team TotL many times in the past but never stopped to take a peek through the optics. She thoroughly enjoyed the views of the standard three and she and Peter got to witness the lone meteor of the night moving away from M45 heading north.
I noticed that the heat from the lights in Tammy's hair created a warm cloud of aroma that temporarily engulfed Peter. All I could remember after this encounter was that he kept talking about mountains and flowers. Go figure! ;-D
You can read Peter's full report on his blog.
During the flowers and mountains discussion I was deep into locating a multiple star in Auriga. I made nice use of a black towel that's used to protect the Televue-76. The towel blocked out the surrounding lights and also allowed me to keep my left eye open while viewing with the right one. This was a tremendous help.
The star in question was omega Aurigae a.k.a. 4 ω Aurigae or STF 616. Locating it was easy enough since it is close to the short side of ‘The Kids’ in Auriga. A short hop to a 21 arc minute wide ‘double’ (6 & 5 Aur) points the way to 4 Aur which is the apex of a 2° long isosceles triangle. Check out this chart for a quick star hop to omega Aurigae.
I spent some time on the surrounding field to test how deep I could see with the 22mm and the 12mm eyepieces. Both are Nagler Type IVs with a generous 82° apparent field of view — 3.7° & 2.0° true FOV respectively. The magnifications are 22x and 40x. After spending a few minutes viewing with these eyepieces I was able to see stars down to mag. 9.9 with the 22mm. With the 12mm stars to mag. 10.8 were visible.
While studying the star field I noticed a group of people gathering around. The double star field couldn't be that exciting for first timers so I interrupted the session to show the Moon to this group of four young girls. They truly enjoyed the view of the nearly 19 day old Moon at 40x.
After this I returned to omega Aurigae viewing it with the 6mm Radian. At 80x the dimmer companion was sitting practically on the lone diffraction ring created by the primary. The secondary appeared blue to me and Peter saw it the same way. I've read that some see the secondary as red but this wasn't apparent in the TV-76 at 80x. I'm sure we'll get to see this star in the Tak-102 in the future. The separation of the components is 4.7 arc seconds (WDS 2004) and the magnitudes are 5.0 and 8.2.
Overall it was a satisfying night out with a great group of amateur astronomers at the ‘Top of the Lawn’. Sharing conversation and views with the public is a highly recommended way to spend a Fall evening.
LINKS:
• Here's a photo of the group taken by Kin and posted on Peter's blog.| [+/-] |
Central Park: Northern Pintail 17-Sep |
This image taken on September 17th at 5:42pm EDT under low light conditions. Focal length in 35mm film equivalent was 420mm, exposure time was 1/80s, hand held with image stabilization at f/2.8.
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Central Park: Reservoir 30-Aug-2006 |
The skies starting clearing while birding the reservoir tonight. No new migrants seen. Gadwall and Laughing Gull continue.
Photo taken around 6:45pm EDT from the running track on the reservoir's west edge — shutter speed 1/100s, f/4.5 with a focal length in 35mm equivalent of 38mm. Sunset was at 7:31pm EDT.
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Juvenile Barn Swallows 18-Aug-2006 |
Above are Barn Swallow fledglings from a nesting at the north end of Central Park's reservoir. This nest produced two broods this summer as did the nest at the reservoir's south end. Two swallows appear in the detail and four are in the wide angle view.
The image was taken on August 18th at 4:15pm EDT. Focal length in 35mm film equivalent is 420mm, exposure time is 1/160s, hand held with image stabilization at f/2.8.
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Central Park: Prelude to a Storm 10-Aug |
Tonight a storm roared through New York City shortly after I finished a tour of the reservoir. Seventeen species and nothing new seen.
The lightening was close by and it felt a bit dangerous being out there in the middle of it all.
For times like these I carry a dry bag to protect the camera. It's big enough to hold everything that can be damaged in a downpour inside my backpack.
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Central Park: Sub-adult Red-tailed Hawk |
A young Red-tailed Hawk showed up in Central Park this summer. On the 4th of July this hawk was photographed by Lincoln Karim. Lincoln has posted 10 photos of this one year old hawk which has just started to grow in its adult red tail feathers.
A Red-tailed's juvenile feathers drop out as the adult ones grow in after its first year. Lincoln's photos demonstrate this is a first year hawk and is considered a sub-adult. According to the books, adult plumage is acquired in a hawk's second year. A sub-adult may retain some juvenile wing and tail feathers before its second year molt.
The tail feathers (retrices) of a Red-tailed Hawk are numbered 1 through 6 starting from the center making up a total of 12 feathers. Each feather is paired symmetrically and preceded with the letter ‘r’. The r1 tail feathers are the centermost ones. When the tail is folded these feathers are visible when viewing a hawk from behind. The r6 tail feathers are the outermost ones and are visible on the folded tail when viewing a hawk from the front.
The tail feathers on this hawk, from the 4th of July photos, appears to have only adult r1s & r2s.
A few weeks after Lincoln's photos I spotted this hawk on the 18th, 19th & 23rd of July. At the time of these observations the r1, r2 & r6 tail feathers were red. The r6s were much shorter than the r1s & r2s.
I spotted this hawk again on August 4th which is when I took these photos near Winterdale Arch east of ‘Locust Grove’. In these images both the r3 & r4 feathers have grown in since the 23rd of July. The only juvenile tail feathers appear to be the r5s. Even with binoculars I wasn't able to pick up other juvenile feathers.
Will these r5 feathers remain until this hawk molts again next summer?
Click images for an uncompressed view of the tail
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Central Park: Eastern Screech-Owl 4-Aug |
The photo above, taken on 4-Aug-2006 at 4:40p, shows an Eastern Screech-Owl with a reddish colored item hanging down the middle of its breast.
Click here to see an uncompressed view of the image.
In the past some of these reintroduced Eastern Screech-Owls were fitted with harnesses. The harness held a transmitter used to track their movements. The red feature in the photos may be a remnant of this system.
On 29-Apr-2006 Cal Vornberger took a photo of an Eastern Screech-Owl with a similar item hanging down its breast. Visit Cal's site to read about & view images of a similarly appointed owl.
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Central Park: Juv. Laughing Gull 25-Jul |
The photo was taken on Tuesday, 25-Jul-2006 around 6:50pm at the reservoir. The gulls are both juveniles. The left one is Herring Gull. The right one is Laughing Gull. Both are local breeders around New York City.
The distance to the gulls was around 600 feet based on measurements using Google Earth. The details seen with the 17x doubler through the binoculars (8.5 times 2) exceeds the details in the photos by a hugh margin. The camera's focal length was 420mm (35mm equiv.).
The photo shows the size difference nicely along with the white belly and shape/length of the bill. The scaly appearance of the wings was obvious in the binoculars. This is the first juvenile Laughing Gull I've spotted on the reservoir. Could be I'm trying harder with the gulls this year.
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Central Park: 30-June-2006 Anhinga |
Click image for a view of the notes
This afternoon I spotted an Anhinga over the reservoir in New York City's Central Park. This is a fairly rare bird to see in the northeast. It was circling very low when I first spotted it and was less than half the width of the reservoir from where I was standing.
This post contains:This observation was submitted to various Internet sites / email lists in order to get the word out so this rare New York State visitor may be seen again and hopefully photographed. My camera, unfortunately, was left at home due to the forecasted thunderstorm.
Here's a copy of my submission sent to various email lists:
Date: Friday, 30 June 2006 (3:25p-10:10p)
Location: Central Park - reservoir & Turtle Pond
Reported by: Ben Cacace
The Anhinga was seen between 4:20p-4:23p along the north edge of the reservoir. The Sun was at my back and the Anhinga was fairly low over the reservoir just east of me. It was gaining height - circling & flapping. The flapping came in bursts from 3 to 5 wingbeats. When the bird held its wings out to glide the wings were just about perfectly level. This effect was more hawk-like than cormorant-like.
From the neck to the bill there was a taper. The bill was thin and there were no bulges from the neck towards the bill. Very elegantly built. Much lighter and more aerodynamic than a cormorant.
The bird was all black. No white was noticed anywhere. No yellow was noticed anywhere.
After circling a few times it headed NE or 'Manhattan North'. Please keep an eye out for this bird. My camera, of course, was at home.
'Bull's Birds of New York State' has the status for Anhinga as 'Casual vagrant':
- Casual: 2 to 6 records
- Vagrant: a species that appears on an irregular basis and whose normal migratory and breeding range does not include New York State
The following was submitted to NYSBirds-L by Angus Wilson (Chair NYSARC) in reference to the Anhinga sighting:
From: Angus Wilson
Subject: [NYSBIRDS-L:3766] RE: NYC, Central Park, Fri. 30-Jun-2006: Anhinga
To: NYSBIRDS-L@cornell.edu
Date: Sat, 01 Jul 2006 17:46:25 -0400
To follow up on Ben Cacace's posting, only two NYS records of Anhinga (Anhinga anhinga) have been accepted by NYSARC.
NYSARC#1992-40-A: one over Central Park, Manhattan, New York Co., 28 April (submitted by Joseph DiCostanzo). This is the first record of the species for New York.
NYSARC#1996-45-A: one at Cornell University Ponds, Unit 2, Town of Dryden, Tompkins Co., 10 June (submitted by Dennis Hasselquist). This is the second record for the state.
This has been a difficult species because most claims have involved birds seen in flight only. Several additional reports may well have been valid but suffered from minimal details and lack of photographic or multi-observer corroboration. I strongly encourage Ben to submit full details of his sighting and if there were any other observers, for them to do likewise. As with any rare bird report, it is imperative to carefully explain how other candidates species (in this case: cormorants, herons and so on) were ruled out.
Obviously, everyone in the metro area should keep a sharp lookout and perhaps check local bodies of fresh or brackish water, preferably with suitable trees and snags!
Cheers, Angus Wilson
New York City & Chair of NYSARC
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Optics: 8.5x42 binoculars
Distance: Approximately 1,200 feet (0.22 miles) away. Distance determined by Google Earth's distance tool.
Height: when the bird was first seen it was rather low. Probably no more than the height of a 5 or 6 story building. It didn't climb very high before heading in a north-east direction. Only the ventral portion of the bird was clearly seen.
Color: the feathered parts of this bird appeared black from bill to tail. A Double-crested Cormorant always appears to me to be some variation of dark brown — never black. I was looking for patches of other colors on this bird but none were seen. No white was seen anywhere. No yellow patches, like a Double-crested Cormorant, were seen on the face.
Feather condition: since the bird was seen in flight & gliding at times the molt pattern was obvious. No feathers were missing from the trailing edge of the wings or from the tail.
Head & neck: there was a bend in the neck where the neck meets the body. Looking from the neck to the bill the neck became thinner until the bill was reached. I didn't note any color on the bill. Just that the bill appeared long & thin.
Flight: the bird was seen in flight only. It was circling up — flapping & gliding. When the bird set its wings after a short burst of flapping the wings were level like you would see on a Peregrine Falcon.
I stayed awhile after seeing the Anhinga to watch the Double-crested Cormorants in flight. The cormorants overall looked heavy and the cormorants never exhibited level wings when the cormorants occasionally glided. Whenever I've watched D-c Cormorants circling, after taking off from a body of water, the flapping was continous. I've never seen an easy gliding pattern in cormorants like I saw on the Anhinga.
The gliding in the Anhinga was easy and lasted longer than the flapping did. This flight pattern in the cormorants was completely reversed when viewing the cormorants after spotting the Anhinga.
The Anhinga's wingbeats came in bursts of 3—4 flaps with one lasting 5. I counted less than half a dozen flapping sequences. The Anhinga's gliding was effortless which is something I haven't noticed in a cormorant.
Tail: the tail was long. Probably as long as the length of the head & neck. A crude outline of the tail appears on my blog in the image of the field notes which were written down just after viewing the Anhinga.
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• Anhinga: very small head
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NYC Area RBA: May 31, 2001: Mon. 28-May-2001, In Central Park [...] certainly the most unexpected report was of a female-type plumaged ANHINGA soaring over the park, going north on Monday.
NYC Area RBA: Sept. 22, 2000: Mon. 18-Sep-2000, Good hawk flights last Monday in the morning along the Westchester coast produced a nice surprise - a female-type ANHINGA, identified as it soared overhead for several minutes in a thermal with a BALD EAGLE and an OSPREY over Playland Park in Rye.
NYC Area RBA: Oct. 2, 1998: Mon. 28-Sep-1998, Certainly startling was the report of a bird believed to be an ANHINGA seen late Monday afternoon by a single observer as it circled over Prospect Park Lake, the bird eventually moving off in a northerly direction.
Standard abbr. used for the U.S. (Del. = Delaware). 2-letter postal codes used for countries (DE = Germany).
