A nod to Halloween, Woodpeckers, and HKNA

As the nod to Halloween photo refuses to load, we'll just go to Woodpeckers.


First find the Woodpecker, then guess which species it is.

Not easy through the fence, is it?

Which brings up the Hell's Kitchen Neighborhood Association, the holder of the lease to the Bird Park, and the response to a reader's comment that I wrote and then was eaten by blogger. I'll give it another try.

By the way guys, come on, how about some names, even some fake names, so I can get to know you and call you something besides Anonymous. How hard can it be to get a name on the comment form? Actually now that I think about it, it took Eleanor weeks to make it work. At any rate, one of the Anonymouses or Anonymoi wrote,

Who runs the neighborhood association? Sounds like they need to be booted out at an election. Tell me they are elected...

Well, yes and no. According to my understanding, anyone who lives within the boundaries of Hell's Kitchen may join the newly made non-profit, Hell's Kitchen Neighborhood Association. They may come to the general meetings and speak about any concerns they have...In theory.

At the last meeting, the timing of which was unfortunate as I had to be in Wisconsin putting my Mom in a nursing home, my 15 year-old daughter, who is very sweet, if I do say so myself, attempted to speak about the progress the Bird Park had been making within the community and ask about the mystery of the locked gate. According to report, she was interrupted, talked over, and lectured at, to the point that she sat down and wept for the rest of the meeting. So much for the power of the general membership and the community.

Now I'm sure the organization has done some good things. They fought the Westside Stadium and they're trying to get some relief for the neighborhood's intense traffic problems. Those are good things.

But when it comes down to it, decisions by the Association are made by The Board, in board meetings behind closed doors.

And sometimes the community doesn't even know what the issues are that the board is making decisions about or exactly why. The locked gate is a case in point.

As to being elected, yes, board members are elected to the board...By the other members of the already existing board. Which I would tend to think that as we're all human we elect people who we like and tend to agree with us or at the very least that such a structure may cause a certain feeling of insulation from the consequences of their decision making. Hence, no feeling that it was a duty or even a courtesy to give an official reason as to why the Bird Park was suddenly .......closed.

Now certain people have let out a rumor now and again about the big WHY. The first was that the neighbor who owns the adjacent building needed the bird park to be locked up because he was doing some construction on his building. When asked if that was the reason it was closed, he replied, "NO, I've always said the park could be cared for even if I did have construction to do. Hey. I'm locked out too."

Hmm.

Then a volunteer was told that the park needed to be "redesigned" into a community garden and if anyone would like to present a design to the board they were welcome to do so. When the volunteer said, "Aren't we from the community? Isn't it ALREADY a garden." The answer was receding footsteps.

Which is what brought up the question as to why nature might need a "redesign". Hasn't this gotten us in trouble in the past? Why the urge to whack great branches off a mature tree? Why the need to have tight control, to manicure, to cordon off little plots, when all the things nature does are there for a reason- for the good of the ecosystem.

Okay, people would like a path to walk on and a place to sit, fine. That's a good thing. People should have the opportunity to be part of the ecosystem But common place flower beds and mowing a lawn, at least for me , are a giant bore. And pretty much a bore for the birds except pigeons and Robins. And hey, there is provision for them. They can fly across the street to the Port Authority's traffic circle and use their lawn as we've yet to convince them to make that green space another bit of deciduous Forest in the city.

So if anyone out there is a Deciduous Woodland Garden Designer with a bent towards the nurturance of birds, which is the kind of green space the Bird Park actually is already how about helping out. Sure it could use some work on structural things such as an automatic watering system, a bird friendly fountain or water feature, a conversion of the wooden terraces that keep the topsoil from running down hill into those of stone, perhaps some more seating, we'd be more than glad to hear from you.

Hey, even if you aren't a Deciduous Woodland Garden Designer but feel a designing urge for native plants, as we need to work next (if and when we get in again) on the herbaceous level, let us hear from you. Just think, how about-Jack-in-the-Pulpit, Trillium, Dutchmans Breeches, Shooting Star and as we've Dogwoods surviving we might just have enough myocozial fungi to get Lady Slipper's going. Now wouldn't that be a coup?

By the way, the Bird Park has had many, many to date unseen species in the site these last few weeks, it's life list is growing by leaps and bounds, so something is working even if it has to do it under less than optimum circumstances. Thank goodness, we're not having all the drought of last season. And pray for rain, coming up.

Now back to the Woodpeckers-


Find the Downy Woodpecker.


There's a woodpecker. I know it doesn't really look all that much like a Downy, but I did see one fly from the bird park over to the trunk of that tree in the traffic circle. (See, wouldn't that make a great extention of woods...maybe a pedestrian walkway OVER the ramp...)

Now you might ask why I'm taking photos with a tiny digital camera instead of something with a real LENSES or even digiscoping. The answer, I have to be furtive. When necessary it's quick to go in a pocket. Remember that this traffic circle right across the ramp from the Bird Park is owned by the Port Authority too. as is the Bird Park. The ramp leads to a parking facility also owned by the Port Authority and the Port Authority is rather tense about terrorists photographing their stuff. Keep in mind that any one of the dozens and dozens of people who drive around the traffic circle daily could snap a whole roll while traversing the ramp without anyone being the wiser.

WELL, awhile back during the Monarch migration I thought I was going to be arrested for digiscoping butterflies. I'm standing on 40th St., scope pointed straight up into the air, frantic parrot on my shoulder, buses have begun to freak him out, and if I remember correctly wearing a white shirt in which one of the children who'd dropped by, and I'd lifted up for a look in the scope, had spilled a copious amount of grape soda on, when suddenly a police car screeches to a halt at the curb right in front of us.

I freeze, Quicksilver throws himself off my shoulder and starts hot footing it towards Ninth Ave. The Officer says in a scary voice,"What are you doing?" Then in the most buoyant enthusiastic nature lover voice I can muster, I say,"The Monarchs are migrating." While nearly dancing with "excitement", pointing at the sky, and attempting to retrieve Silver who's realized I'm not following him, there isn't anything handy to climb, so he'd better come back to where he started and climb me if necessary in order to get to higher ground.

The policeman says, "Monarchs", in a very dry way. I keeping up the enthusiasm, "Yes, yes, butterflies, Monarch Butterflies." He says, "Let's see the camera."

I'm thinking great, I've had this camera for a week and the cops are going to confiscate it because I'm suspected of being a terrorist. Yeah, right, get the little woman wearing the grape soda with the crazy bird, who's begun saying, "Wanna watch TV", wanna watch TV, repeatedly., because it's one of his ways of communicating that he really wants to go home. I suddenly think, I really wouldn't mind going home and watching a litte TV myself.

Eventually I extricate the camera from the digiscoping attachment. Pick up the tripod, my bag, and the bird, cuz hey, you never know when someone is going to do a run by and grab something. Take it over to the police car and attempt to push the correct buttons to show them, that truly, all I have are expanses of sky with a teeny dot in them here or there. They look at it, they look at me, they look at the parrot who is now resorting to stage three wanting-to-go-home behavior-biting the hand that's holding his toes so he can't leap off it and start in the homeward direction on his own.

After a little lecture on the feelings of the Port about people photographing in their area, and a request to get lost. I do. Well, we do. And we go home and do what a lot of America does to feel different then they are feeling, lock the door and turn something mindless on the TV. Not that we prefer mindless, Silver and I, you understand, but often that's just all that's on.

I mean REALLY considering all this, whoever said birdwatching was for sissies?