Early spring

Pine Warbler - Spring 2007
Photo by David Speiser

A somewhat disorganized round-up of early spring happenings in Central Park:

Birds:
Central Park's first Eastern Phoebe was seen on March 17. Among the early migrants seen by numbers of birdwatchers during the week that followed:

Great Blue Heron
Black-crowned Night-heron
American Woodcock
Winter Wren
Rufous-sided Towhee
Swamp Sparrow
Fox Sparrow [singing!]
Song Sparrow

Birds that might show up during this coming week, according to my records:

Wilson's Snipe
American Bittern
Spotted Sandpiper
Golden-crowned and Ruby-crowned Kinglets
Pine Warbler
Palm Warbler
Black-and-white Warbler
Yellow-rumped Warbler
Louisiana Waterthrush
Belted Kingfisher
Rusty Blackbird
Field Sparrow

Mammals:
Usually seen around this time, so keep your eye out for them: Little Brown Bats
Seen everywhere: many big raccoon babies--almost teen-agers

Trees and Flowers:
Red Maples flowering
many trees budding
Daffodils everywhere
Cornus Mas in full bloom
Forsythia about to bloom
Andromeda blooming at the Model-Boat Pond
Lesser Celandine [a rampant invasive] coming up everywhere
Japanese Knotweed -- Ditto

Butterflies:
any minute now--Mourning Cloaks and Cabbage Whites