Monthly Archives: October 2014

Ridgefield Park Bald Eagle Update

IMG_4320Jill Homcy writes:

When I stopped at the Ridgefield Park nest over the weekend, Al & Alice weren’t there yet, but there were a ton of cormorants and gulls.

About 5 minutes later Al flew in and perched to the lower right on the nest tree. A few minutes later Alice came soaring in, landed by Al and greeted him beak-to-beak.

They then proceeded to alert on and off while I was there. There was a Red-tailed Hawk circling on my side of the creek, and then a little while later an immature  eagle flew in and landed in the upper left back side of the nest tree. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to photograph the younger eagle.

(Thanks, Jill!)

Now’s the Time to Help 2015 Monarchs

IMG_4504Don Torino of the BCAS writes a weekly column for wildnewjersey.tv.

His latest is on how we all can help Monarch butterflies, which have been in decline in recent years.

Here’s a sample:

This winter would be a great time to plan our strategy for getting more milkweed into our local environment.

We can start by attending County and local community meetings asking that our parks dept., schools, libraries, town halls, local businesses and where ever there is extra soil that milkweed be planted.

Many communities do spring plantings to spruce up government building with annual flowers. For not much more money they can have beautiful flowers that will help the Monarch butterflies survive.

And since milkweeds are perennials,  they will come back free of charge every year — a point that ahould make any politician’s ears perk up.

The link is here.

Recent (Beautiful) Sunsets

IMG_4707_filteredRon Shields writes:

Please find attached sunset images from Friday and Sunday.

Breathtaking as usual!

Roy and “Sunset” Mike were in the area as well so you might get different perspectives.

Hopefully, they’ve submitted some images.  (Paging Roy and Mike….)

 

 

Peregrine by Raven’s Nest at Laurel Hill

IMG_9901
We stopped by the raven’s nesting site in Laurel Hill County Park and Friday and — consistent with reports we’d been getting — saw a Peregrine in and around the nest.

We suspect that this is the same Peregrine who drove the Common Ravens away and then nested on the swing bridge by Laurel Hill last summer.

(Curiously, the Ospreys that had been using the swing bridge nest moved over to a nearby antenna — at the Peregrines’ insistence — and nested there last summer.)

Will be curious to see what birds nest where next summer.

Kearny Mystery ‘Rocks’

imageJoe Pereira writes:

I’ve been finding these kind of rocks for years in West Hudson Park in Kearny, and I was just curious if anyone knew anything about them.

I thought they were man-made but I’m not exactly sure.

(Thanks, Joe. Can anyone shed some light?)

Losen Slote (Creek) Park Upgrade!

Eagle Project 2014 427Thanks to Eagle Scout candidates Patrick Carney and Thomas Holland, Losen Slote Creek Park just got a nice upgrade.

Patrick replaced the rotted wood on the benches, repainted the entrance sign (originally created back when the Meadowlands Commission was called the Hackensack Meadowlands Development Commission) and built a new bridge over the little creek by the entrance.

Thomas did the new butterfly garden, which we wrote about here.

Congrats to both Thomas and Patrick for jobs very well done.

 

Vesper Sparrow, Disposal Road

Roy Sparrow
Roy Woodford writes:

I ran into Muhammad Faizan on Sunday … and told me he saw a Vesper Sparrow down by the eternal flame.

I only had to sit in the dirt for half an hour before a two of them made an appearance.  They were mixed in with a bunch of Song, Savannah, and Swamp Sparrows.

(Thanks, Roy!)