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Inside The New York Botanical Garden

Around the Garden

This Week at the Greenmarket: The Root of the Matter

Posted in Around the Garden on November 5 2013, by Ann Rafalko

greenmarket1While it has warmed up a bit, those two days of chilly weather were a good reminder that winter is on its way. Some areas of the city are yet to record their first hard frost, but the areas that provide New Yorkers with fresh produce at our myriad weekly greenmarkets certainly have seen glittering mornings and wilted leaves.

Many of the greenmarket farmers use frost-protective measures to extend the growing season, but they can’t evade mother nature forever, so it’s best to get ready for the season of root cellar crops–cabbages, potatoes, squash, beets, turnips, carrots, apples and pears, onions and garlic, and more. I would expect that you might still find a few farmers selling the last of the season’s tomatoes and other tender vegetables, but you better grab them while you can! And if you’re so inclined, you’re welcome to can them for wintery days ahead. Or, you can just embrace the season and start indulging in hearty soups, stews, pies, tarts, quiches, and mashes.

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Fall Forest Weekends: Raptors on the Wing

Posted in Around the Garden on November 4 2013, by Matt Newman

Great-horned OwlBig, small, fierce, or cute, the birds of prey that live out their lives in the northeast are an uncommon cadre of sharp-eyed hunters, though seldom seen by your average park wanderer. Here in the New York Botanical Garden, our most popular visitors are definitely the Red-tailed Hawks that patrol the skies around our grounds, as well as the occasional Great-horned Owl, but the many local species that you might not always see are equally fascinating! And I admit they’re also pretty adorable if you’re not a squirrel or a chipmunk.

As part of our Fall Forest Weekends events and activities, which kicked off this past weekend and run through the next, our friends from the Theodore Roosevelt Sanctuary & Audubon Center stopped off at the Garden with a few clever companions in tow, among them an American Kestrel, an Eastern Screech Owl, and a Barred Owl—some of which you can see hunting around our grounds if you’re lucky. Many of the birds in the Audubon Center’s care are rescues, brought in to be rehabilitated after sustaining injuries that won’t allow them to survive back in the wild. But they do plenty of good in their downtime, educating people about the importance of raptors for a healthy, diverse ecosystem.

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Morning Eye Candy: Unedited

Posted in Around the Garden, Photography on November 2 2013, by Patricia Gonzalez

I shot this on Tuesday, October 30th. As my shift ended early, I decided to take advantage of the daylight and photograph the continuing explosion of fall colors. The Forest is especially wonderful this time of year. Reds, yellows, oranges, and great shades of violet cover its 50 acres. According to the Garden’s fall foliage tracker, we are now about halfway to peak color. And it can only get better. I didn’t edit this photo in the least—mother nature provided excellent colors!

Fall in the Forest with Pat Gonzalez

Photo by Patricia Gonzalez

Popping Palette

Posted in Around the Garden on October 31 2013, by Matt Newman

Fall in the GardenFor everyone who’s been cooped up in an office cubicle for far too long to frolic in the changing fall palette, I thought I’d throw together some of the best and brightest shots from around the Garden this week. The autumnal leaves are really picking up the pace! We’re actually heading into the coming weekend at about the halfway mark on our Fall Foliage Tracker, with reds, oranges, and yellows popping all over our 250 acres. Some of the gradients—trees starting green at their lower branches and graduating to red at the tip-top—are downright majestic.

Whether or not you decide to come and join us for Fall Forest Weekends over the next two Saturdays and Sundays (you really should!), here’s to enjoying every last minute of this colorful middle ground before winter’s snows set in.

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Photos by Ivo M. Vermeulen