Just past the edge of the runway of Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport, there’s a series of hedges and ditches laid out like interlocking diamonds. The 80-acre green space is the Buitenschot Land Art Park. Its trenches and ridges hold bike paths and sports fields, but  its main purpose is to deflect ground noise, the low-frequency drone that planes make when they take off and land.

H+N+S Landscape Architects and artist Paul De Kort designed the maze-like park, drawing 17th-century experiments in acoustics by German scientist Ernst Chladni, known as the “father of acoustics”.

Airport noise is a contentious issue. There have been noise-related protests at both LaGuardia and JFK, and the FAA is undertaking its first airport noise study in 25 years. The National Parks Service studied 600 different wilderness sites and found they were all impacted by ambient noise. NPS estimates that noise pollution is doubling every 20 years.

Measures like the one taken at Schiphol Airport may slow that rate down.

Read more at Smithsonian here.

“In the hours around dawn, individual birds announce their ownership of territory to rivals and advertise to attract mates”, said Greg Budney, curator for collections development at the Macaulay Library of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

“In many species”, Mr. Budney said, “the predawn chorus is specifically about territoriality or male-male rivalry; at dawn, male birds switch to a song aimed at attracting a mate.”

Read the story in the NY Times here.

The restrooms at River Barge Park will be closed for about a week while repairs to the entrance are completed.

Portable toilets are available in the meanwhile.

Thank you for your patience.

Blue is a relatively rare color for birds. It is not a result of pigmentation, like some other colors. Instead it is an example of what scientists call a structural color because it’s generated by light interacting with a feather’s 3-D arrangement. Different shapes and sizes of air pockets and keratin in the feathers make different shades of blue.”

Read more on Mother Nature Network here.

This sad reminder comes from Eastern Shore of VA and Fisherman Island NWR. This dead Kemp’s ridley sea turtle, a critically endangered species, was found on Fisherman Island with the string of a balloon protruding from the mouth. Please spread the word, “Don’t release balloons into nature!”

US Fish and Wildlife Service – Northeast Region

Things are moving along at Mill Creek Marsh. The contractor is still working on the trail, and we hope to open the gates next month. Still…no promises.

In addition to the trail work, new woody and herbaceous native plants are being installed near the entrance, thanks to a Song Bird and Butterfly Habitat grant from the Bergen County Audubon Society, which provided $3,580  to purchase the plants. Timing for planting is great given the recent rains.

Katy Weidel, the Project Representative, says, “Once complete, we’ll have planted close to 4,000 plugs of seven herbaceous species & 62 containers of four woody species.   We chose plants loved by pollinators… who play a critical role in keeping our ecosystems healthy and diverse. ” 

The trees and shrubs planted are Shadblow Serviceberry, Red-twig Dogwood, Witchhazel and Elderberry. The herbaceous plants are Common Milkweed, Butterfly Weed, Wild Bergamot, Switchgrass, Black-eyed Susan, Gray Goldenrod, and New York Aster.

A chimpanzee in the Abidjan zoo in the Ivory Coast. Credit Sia Kambou/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images