Nature Notes

My big news is that I submitted my bird book,  Birds Up Close: An Engineer Explores their Hidden Wonders, to MIT Press this week. Very exciting!! Saturday June 1 The original 7 cygnets at Ward's Pond are now down to 5. Someone Susan ran into at the pond said that she saw one go under and not come up. The word on the footpath is that snapping turtles are pulling them under. Wednesday June 5 Boston has had a cloud of pollen hanging over the city the last couple of days. In the news outlets' photos you can see the huge yellowish-green cloud hanging below the blue sky. The pollen was just everywhere - covering cars, in streaks around catch basins, up my nose. Susan took this photo on a walk along the Charles River. You get the idea. Yikes. Susan Brand Monday June 10 I went to National Audubon's Hog Island bird camp off the coast of Maine, near Damariscotta, to give my feather talk. Two bird groups there this week: one adults and one teenagers (13-17). After my talk, some of...

Friday May 3 When we went to see the lambs at Drumlin Farm a few weeks ago, they said that the goats were due to give birth at the end of April. So today, off we went to see the goat kids. Two of the moms gave birth last week - one set of twins and one set of triplets. The triplets were just sleeping in a big furry pile, but one of the twins was frolicking around, doing little leaps, then nuzzling up to its mom. Monday May 6 Goslings have appeared at the pond, always sticking close to their parents. Here you can see a couple of gosling butts under the parent's wing. I continue to see the wood ducks swimming at the pond or perched up on a tree branch by the water.  I still think they must have a nest somewhere around there. I went to a talk on feather color at Harvard's biology department this evening.  I love their building, with the pair of rhinos guarding either side of the main doors and the frieze of animals going all the way around the building. You don't see this so...