[nysbirds-l] Hudson Yards Habitat Loss
I discovered this week that my favorite birding spot in Hudson Yards, just north of 36th Street between 10th and 11th Avenues, was bulldozed. I guess it was inevitable that to most people this steep slope of overgrown weeds and trees between railroad tracks and an abandoned auto shop would be considered an eyesore, but it was favored by birds over the manicured high-tech “green spaces” of Bella Abzug Park and the Vessel Plaza. It’s that the swiftness of its demise is just a shock. A bulldozer sits in the vacant lot behind the chain-link fence festooned with new “active driveway” signs. The beautiful fan of ivy that covered the auto shop was cut at the roots and turning brown. All I could see was a pair of Gray Catbirds chasing each other through one of the last remaining trees, filled with its final season's bounty of black berries. On a better note - I spotted the first returning warbler, a Common Yellowthroat across the tracks in the bushes. On the south side of the street, in an abandoned parking lot where the grasses have been slowly taking over around a couple of stagnant pools, my first Northern Mockingbird for the area, a juvenile, doing its robotic shoulder shrug - bringing the count to 31 species. Alan Drogin -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
[nysbirds-l] Hudson Yards Habitat Loss
I discovered this week that my favorite birding spot in Hudson Yards, just north of 36th Street between 10th and 11th Avenues, was bulldozed. I guess it was inevitable that to most people this steep slope of overgrown weeds and trees between railroad tracks and an abandoned auto shop would be considered an eyesore, but it was favored by birds over the manicured high-tech “green spaces” of Bella Abzug Park and the Vessel Plaza. It’s that the swiftness of its demise is just a shock. A bulldozer sits in the vacant lot behind the chain-link fence festooned with new “active driveway” signs. The beautiful fan of ivy that covered the auto shop was cut at the roots and turning brown. All I could see was a pair of Gray Catbirds chasing each other through one of the last remaining trees, filled with its final season's bounty of black berries. On a better note - I spotted the first returning warbler, a Common Yellowthroat across the tracks in the bushes. On the south side of the street, in an abandoned parking lot where the grasses have been slowly taking over around a couple of stagnant pools, my first Northern Mockingbird for the area, a juvenile, doing its robotic shoulder shrug - bringing the count to 31 species. Alan Drogin -- NYSbirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsWELCOME.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsRULES.htm http://www.NortheastBirding.com/NYSbirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/nysbirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/NYSBirds-L 3) http://birding.aba.org/maillist/NY01 Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --
