Debbie Becker has been The New York Botanical Garden’s resident bird expert for over 25 years, and continues to lead her popular Bird Walks on Saturday mornings throughout much of the year. She maintains Birding Around NYC, where readers can find photo galleries of recent NYBG bird walks and up-to-date lists of species seen during each outing.
Dr. Oliver Sacks loved The New York Botanical Garden. I know this because I walked the Garden’s paths with him.
In the early to mid 1980s, Dr. Sacks would enter the garden early in the morning, before the public would arrive, to take in the sights. I would also arrive at NYBG early—to bird watch before my first class at Fordham University—and we would be the only two people walking about.
It was inevitable that one day we would bump into each other. I had no idea who he was, at first, but he was very gracious when he asked me what I was doing, peering up into the trees with my binoculars. His curiosity piqued when I explained that I was bird watching and the Garden was a perfect oasis for finding birds. He launched into a speech on the behavior of birds and their pollination habits along with the symbiotic relationship they shared with specific trees and shrubs. I was an environmental science major and was truly fascinated with all the knowledge he had to share.
Debbie Becker has been The New York Botanical Garden’s resident bird expert for over 25 years, and continues to lead her popular Bird Walks on Saturday mornings throughout much of the year. She maintains Birding Around NYC, where readers can find photo galleries of recent NYBG bird walks and up-to-date lists of species seen during each outing.
An Osprey makes off with lunch
As the end of summer draws near, deep sighs can be heard from school children and cries of delight from parents. The pleasures of the warmer months are shared by many in different ways. For those of us who are naturalists and birders, we endure the summer months dreaming about the end of August, because it signals the most exciting seasonal change: the great fall bird migration.
Our plants and trees—it is their time to shine—have spent the summer producing berries and seeds to nourish the migrating birds. The fruit of the crabapple, dogwood, and viburnum become ripe with juicy berries for Scarlet Tanagers, Baltimore Orioles, and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, while the sweet gum tree offers nestled seeds—in sticky balls—to American Goldfinch, Pine Siskins, Red-winged Blackbirds and Purple Finch. Cedar Waxwings will also partake in harvesting berries for sustenance. Eastern Kingbirds use the ripe berries as lures to catch insects attracted to the sweet nectar. Birders and photographers fancy themselves capturing these scenes over and over again and flock to NYBG to enjoy the fall bird migration.
Debbie Becker has been The New York Botanical Garden’s resident bird expert for over 25 years, and continues to lead her popular Bird Walks on Saturday mornings throughout much of the year.
Least flycatcher
The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) is the best place to bird during the fall migration. With its diverse habitats it offers birders unique and spectacular views of migrating birds.
The great fall migration begins with the movement of shore birds in late July. The shores of the Bronx River and Twin Lakes often become a good stopover point for spotted and solitary sandpipers. They bob along the shoreline grabbing small insects and crustaceans. In the wetlands, Wilson’s Snipes stop to search for food and temporary shelter.
Warblers, ruby-throated hummingbirds, tanagers, and grosbeaks begin to arrive in late August and remain through early October.
The warblers are headed south with their immature offspring and many are no longer in breeding colors. Some are brown or olive green with one or two wing bars. This gives credence to the phrase “confusing fall warblers.” It is often a challenge to identify some warblers which adds a bit of mystery to birding.
Debbie Becker has been The New York Botanical Garden’s resident bird expert for over 25 years, and continues to lead her popular Bird Walks on Saturday mornings throughout much of the year.
Northern Saw-whet Owl
Each year, The Audubon Society holds a Christmas Bird Count (CBC) in which bird watchers throughout the country volunteer to count birds in a specified area, setting out at dawn and closing their notebooks at dusk. This year in the Bronx, birders will bring their binoculars to The New York Botanical Garden, Van Cortlandt Park, Pelham Bay Park, City Island, Bronx Park East and other local parks and coastal areas. Based on the counts they come up with for each bird species seen, tallies will be pooled to represent each of the five boroughs.
The purpose of the final count determines the climate of the bird population, as species representation can fluctuate due to disease, weather, habitat destruction, and food supply. At the NYBG in particular, there have been some remarkable numbers observed in the last 10 years. For example, the population of American Crows at the Garden was once counted at over 500. Today, we are lucky to see just one or two. This is owed to the arrival of the West Nile Virus, which has decimated crow populations in our area.
Tufted Titmouse
Likewise, declines among the Tufted Titmouse, Chickadees, and the House Finch have struck hard. Populations of these small visitors were explosive in the 1990s, but conjunctivitis–an inflammatory eye disease–has caused them to dwindle since the late 2000s. In this case, however, the cause is more easily tackled; dirty bird feeders quickly pass the disease from bird to bird, so cleaning your feeders with soapy water each week can prevent the epidemic from spreading. Already, numbers of these bird species are slowly rebounding.
Then there are the new species which have been observed, those we hope will stick around long enough to be counted. Red- and White-winged Crossbills, rarities to the NYC area, have been observed around the NYBG and throughout many other locations in the city. Weather and food-related problems further north have driven these pine cone feeders south and into our vicinity.
Debbie Becker has been leading weekly Bird Walks at the NYBG for over 25 years. You can often find her on Saturday mornings, guiding new and veteran “birders” alike through the Garden’s 250 acres with binoculars in tow.
While leading my weekly Bird Walk at The New York Botanical Garden I observed a large woodpecker flying by me. I was able to see its wings with their black feathers and white markings. My first and only thought was that I had just seen a Pileated Woodpecker.
After leading birdwatching tours at NYBG for 27 years, the one bird that has always remained elusive is the Pileated Woopecker. Although they are common just miles north of the Garden, not many of these birds have ever been spotted south of Westchester County. But after careful research, I discovered that males wander during the month of April, presumably seeking new territory. It was on May 5 that I had what I hoped was a Pileated–the first for NYBG in decades.
Debbie Becker leads a free bird walk at the Garden every saturday from 11 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., beginning at the Reflecting Pool at the Leon Levy Visitor Center.
Long-eared Owl (Asio otus)
Winter brings many different things to New York City, but for a birder, the one special gift winter delivers is the owl. With the leaves off the trees, these cryptic, wise, and almost magical birds become easier to locate and observe. The New York Botanical Garden hosted a number of species this past year, including the Barred, two Saw-whet, two Long-eared and two Great Horned Owls. As a matter of fact, there were more owls in the Garden than in Pelham Bay Park, which has always been considered the area’s owl hub.
Birders on the NYBG’s Saturday morning bird walks are now hopeful these mystical creatures will return and grace us with their alluring presence.
Dr. Oliver Sacks loved The New York Botanical Garden. I know this because I walked the Garden’s paths with him.
