“I see you, but do you see me?”

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Patricia Gonzalez is an NYBG volunteer and avid wildlife photographer. She can often be found taking photographs around the Garden.

It was a little after noon on February 26 of 2009 that I enjoyed one of the most amazing experiences of my life. By that time, I had already been shooting photographs at The New York Botanical Garden for a year, and it seemed like every creature living in the Garden had cooperated with my camera except for one species: the Red-tailed Hawks which often hunt throughout the NYBG. I had been able to get a few shots, but always from a distance and far overhead.

Other times, I couldn’t ready my camera fast enough and my subject matter would disappear into the sky.
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When you’re home to more than 250 acres of flora, you don’t have to stray far to uncover a virtual menagerie of fauna within it. Cormorants and wood ducks draw zig-zags in the duckweed of Twin Lakes, while Red-tailed Hawks hunt skinks and black squirrels from far overhead. There’s even a cranky snapping turtle or two. But for every rabbit or warbler out to make itself seen in the NYBG, there’s another species living out its life away from our cameras! As Director of the Forest, Jessica A. Schuler has turned some of her focus toward the elusive creatures living in our woodland.

Through a collaboration with Jason Munshi-South of CUNY Baruch College and Mark Weckel of Mianus River Gorge Preserve, Jessica is doing her part to help the pair document the many animals living throughout the city and Westchester county, as well as the effects of the urban environment on evolutionary biology. In the case of the NYBG, this is done by arranging four motion-activated, all-weather cameras in locations throughout the Garden’s 50-acre Forest, ready to capture the movements of any and all woodland wanderers that might amble by. And after only a month on site, capture they did! Calibrated to go off at even the slightest hint of a passing animal, these cameras accurately snapped shots of several familiar species lurking in our woods.
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The smallest prince presides over his domain. But aren’t all frogs a little snooty with their noses in the air like that?

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Peahen sighted! The subdued colors of the female aren’t so easily recognizable as the flamboyant frill of the male peacock, but the slight tinges of blue-green color (not to mention those Dr. Seuss-esque head feathers) should give her away.

What few realize is that these birds really can fly, though they’re often kept in open-air aviaries–it’s just easier to stay put than leave a reliable food source. Another fact, somewhat more hilarious: peacocks are used as “guard dogs” by some, as they have a tendency to let out deafening squawks at the approach of strangers. Just don’t expect them to tackle an intruder with any efficacy.

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Finally Friday. If you couldn’t find the time to get outside on the Fourth, be sure to prepare for this weekend: sunglasses, sunscreen, a few bottles of water. And do they still make parasols? Maybe one of those, too. Not everyone has the benefit of built-in shades, butterflies excluded.

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

Look to have a bird-brained afternoon as we set aside this beautiful Thursday to celebrate the treetop tweeters of The New York Botanical Garden! We’re flora people, yes, but there’s a majesty (and, at times, comedy) to the diverse fauna of the Garden. Nothing speaks of elegance and grace quite like a juvenile Red-tailed Hawk fumbling its lunch all over Tulip Tree Allée.

If you’re looking to get better acquainted with our feathered friends, stop by on Saturday mornings for the weekly Bird Walk with resident expert Debbie Becker! Binoculars, cameras, and gasps of awe welcome.

Photo by Pat Gonzalez

The disapproving waterfowl of the NYBG, ever ready and willing to shame you into putting down that camera.

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen

They’re a curious lot, these dusky squirrels, with their furry ears and black cat sensibilities. You might almost think them bad luck, though even the most superstitious among us would be hard-pressed to toss salt over our shoulders after crossing paths with this forest rodent. And I’m not even sure that’s the right protocol for countering such a thing. Still, these little shadows are worth investigating.

I noticed the black squirrels for the first time while riding shotgun in one of the Garden’s staff golf carts (though the Mosholu course is close, I imagine we only have these because management didn’t take the suggestion of supplying us with go-karts in good humor.) The fellow in the driver’s seat pointed them out as an idle fascination, then asked me if I’d ever seen such a thing. But while a funny sight, there’s initially nothing about their behavior to differentiate them from the eastern gray squirrels you find stuffing capped acorns into their cheeks or, in my case, infiltrating the attic and chewing my home’s wiring threadbare. They breed with the grays, eat the same foods, and in urban areas of the Bronx are just as prone to hassle you for snacks, having grown too accustomed to people.
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Is that you Tiffany Turkey?

Photo by Ivo M. Vermeulen