WHO do you have to lose?

Jackson Park along with Montrose Beach are premier nature areas in Chicago.  Adding pro-golf courses, music venues or making the area into a Millennial Park South is going to disrupt our natural  area and we will lose many of the beautiful creatures that inhabit Hyde Park along with us.  I am not against the Obama Library.  I just would love to have it built on an area that is currently concrete so we can have BOTH a Millennial Park South and a wonderful, beautiful natural site used by many humans and other creatures I have photographed wildlife in  Hyde Park for a number of years.  I started making calendars in 2012.  Here are the photos from the 2012 calendar.  I will post another calendar next week. You can leave comments about how you use Jackson Park on the website:  http://www.savethisspace.com or tag a photo you take of yourself and friends @jacksonparkusers.

This red-tailed hawk photo was taken in Jackson Park on 12/21/10

This beaver photo was taken in Jackson Park on 12/29/10

This hooded merganser photo was taken in Jackson Park on 3/3/10

The coyote photo on the left was taken in Jackson Park on 12/3/11

This raccoon photo was taken in Jackson Park on 5/11/09

This black-crowned heron in a mulberry tree was taken in Jackson Park on 6/4/10.

This indigo bunting photo was taken in Burnham Nature Sanctuary on 7/13/09

Clockwise from bottom left:  Tiger swallowtail on milkweed, Red-spotted purples on coneflower, Black swallowtail on clover and Buckeye. 

Ramp used to rescue animals stuck in a human-made concrete basin:  beaver, turtle and ducklings. 

These great blue heron photos were taken in Jackson Park in September and October 2009

Cardinal in burning bush photo was taken in Jackson Park on 11/12/11

This monk parakeet (quaker parrot) photo was taken in Jackson Park on 12/8/10

The great blue heron photo was taken in Jackson Park on 9/20/11.

 

Fall 2019

female blue-winged teal

male blue-winged teal

female red-breasted merganser

male wood duck

ruddy duck

male and female ruddy duck

ruddy ducks

female red-breasted merganser

female red-breasted merganser with male and female mallard

scaup

female golden-eye

male hooded merganser

northern flicker

northern flicker peeking out of  wood duck box

northern cardinal

flycatcher

carp

caspian terns and ring-billed gulls

raccoon

great blue heron in Osaka Garden

kestrel

moon rise

tree fungus

murmuration of starlings

starlings

coyote in Oak Woods cemetery

coyote in Oak Woods cemetery

Canada Goose and greater white-fronted goose in Oak Woods cemetery

greater white-fronted goose in Oak Woods cemetery

Summer 2019

turtles

carp in lagoon

indigo bunting

front view of indigo bunting

baltimore oriole

baltimore oriole

great crested flycatcher

dragonfly

red-spotted purple

american lady butterfly

black-crowned night heron

black-crowned night heron

green heron

mallard ducklings and mom

mallard ducklings and mom

Canada Goose and goslings

Migrating monarchs and other fall wildlife in Hyde Park (Chicago)

Migrating monarchs in a roost (or bivouac) on 63rd Street near the Lake

monarchs in silver maple

monarch on michaelmas daisy at 47th and Cornell

monarch on Mexican sunflower in lovely garden at 65th and Cornell

two skipper butterflies mating in garden by the golf driving range

Snowberry clearwing hummingbird moth on zinnia. Other common names include sphinx moth or hawk moth.  In the UK they are known as bee-hawk moths.  Photo taken at garden around 65th and Cornell

Clearwing hummingbird moth on butterfly bush in garden around 59th and Cornell

An actual hummingbird which I first thought was another hummingbird moth!

crayfish on 63rd Street beach

An itchy great blue heron near the golf driving range

a juvenile black-crowned night heron in the Osaka Garden

Lots of white-crowned sparrows are migrating through Wooded Island

brown creeper at 47th and Cornell

flycatcher from Bobolink Meadow

coyote near 63rd Street not happy to see me

It’s a girl!

It’s a boy! A photo from around 5 years ago

Mostly photos of great garden at 65th and Cornell

Thanks for your help identifying the garden flowers in these photos.   Want to visit this garden?: park on 63rd and Cornell and walk south two blocks.  Watch out for golf balls.

Cosmos

Zinnias

 

goldfinch eating sunflower seeds

tiger swallowtail on sunflower

goldfinch eating sunflower seeds

painted lady butterfly

bumblebee

tiger swallowtail

male black swallowtail

female black swallowtail

silver spotted skipper and beetle

hackberry emperor

pearl crescent on black-eyed susan

 

monarchs

hummingbird moth

male monarch butterfly on Tithonia (Mexican sunflower)

 

common buckeye butterfly

cabbage whites

 

crab apple in circle garden at midway and stony island

green heron

last batch of ducklings this year?

cooper’s hawk

 

Summer herons, beach birds and butterflies

All photos taken in the Hyde Park Area during July and August 2018.

 

water lily in Columbia Basin in back of MSI building

green heron near Osaka Garden

black-crowned night heron in Osaka Garden

black crowned night heron with waterfall and mulberry tree

great egret in Columbia Basin behind the MSI building

western painted turtle in Oakwoods Cemetery

spotted sandpiper on 63rd Street Beach

One of this year’s hatchlings–spotted sandpiper

Ring-billed gull and Caspian tern on 63rd Street Beach . You usually see Caspian terns diving beak first into the lagoons.

A few pink ring-billed gulls showed up at 63rd Street beach.  Juvenile ring-billed gull on the right

A blue Swedish duck or maybe a manky mallard (mix of mallard and domestic ducks) showed up with 2 mallards

chipmunks have moved into Wooded Isle

chipmunk checking out white mulberry fruit

squirrel in white mulberry tree

adult cliff swallow hanging out in nest

cliff swallow nest on 63rd Street beach house wall

young cliff swallow nestlings with white feathers that perhaps fool potential predators into thinking they are bird poop

an older cliff swallow nestling

female or juvenile red-winged blackbird with snack

female monarch on joe pye weed

monarch caterpillar

black swallowtail on butterfly bush

silver-spotted skipper– another candidate for bird poop camoflague

female white form– clouded sulfur–looks blue when wings are open

red-spotted purple butterfly

eastern comma on milkweed

Underside of this butterfly’s wing has a very faint comma. Again, nice camouflage

tiger lily in wooded isle

 

 

 

 

Happy 4th of July (summer in the city)

 

single gosling

bullfrog

Osaka Garden irises

male purple martin and fledgling

spotted sandpiper

lots of monarchs this year

pioneer spiderwort (snotweed) on 63rd Street beach

mallard duckling with cottonwood seeds

older mallard ducklings

wood duck ducklings

older wood duck ducklings

older goslings

why goslings can’t fly- look at the size of their wings

starling nestlings

starlings bathing on golden lady statue

nest in Osaka Garden

house wren parent

house wren fledgling

western painted turtle

great blue heron

great blue heron with 3 juvenile black-crowned night herons

adult black-crowned night heron

great egret

fledgling barn swallows

fledgling barn swallows

monarch on milkweed in mini-garden near parking lot at 53rd and Dorchester

moon watch and new groups (natural areas and dogs) meeting this weekend

New groups forming for people concerned about protecting our natural areas and/or the proliferation of “no dogs allowed” areas

The weather is supposed to be reasonable both nights so we’ll meet at The Point in time to see the moon rise.  Meeting will occur even if it is cloudy.

Saturday February 11 at 6:18   natural areas

Sunday February 12 at 7:23     dogs

Courting ducks and night camera videos

Most of these photos and videos were taken in Hyde Park (Chicago) during the last couple of weeks.

Even though the groundhog saw his shadow, I’ve seen and heard some signs of spring during the last couple of weeks: chickadees and cardinals singing their spring songs, squirrels mating, and ducks courting in the inner and outer harbor.

Field trip idea:  Go to inner or outer harbor to scout for courting ducks and look for signs of beavers.  To walk around inner harbor:  park on the street just west of Lake Shore Drive at 63rd Street (Hayes) or in the parking lot on the north side of the street.   You can walk over to the outer harbor if you park in the 63rd Street beach parking lot and walk south.

Male and female red-breasted mergansers.  Just the males are doing courting displays in this video.  Females have red heads and more white on their chests.

This is the first video I have where both male and female common goldeneyes are displaying.  After the brown female on the left hand side starts displaying, you can hear some of the beeps that the males make when they throw their heads back

At the beginning you can see this hooded merganser raise his crest and make his white patch bigger.  He then displays to a female mallard who already has a male mallard mate.

Common goldeneye male courting female common goldeneye.   You couldn’t hear it very well in the video but there is also a beep with this move.    Male and female red-breasted merganser in the background

I’ve never seen this version of the common goldeneye display before

male and female hooded merganser– male’s white patch is relatively small when his crest is lowered

female is sleeping, male’s white patch is still small

male in sleeping position but he has raised his crest, why?

because a female common goldeneye has hopped up next to him?

canvasback duck

diving

front view

female mallard on ice

herring gull on ice

american goldfinch

coyote on ice at 63rd Street Beach

winter is a good time to see nests in trees and find them on the ground

This northern oriole who nested near the inner harbor used ribbon and fishing line in her nest

I like how beaver nonchalantly steps out of the way of the truck. This video taken in 2011.

beaver with female mallard duck for scale (this photo not taken in last two weeks)

chicken wire wrap stopped beavers from taking down this tree

The saved tree

I’m pro tree and pro beaver.  If you remove beavers from an area, other beavers move in. Wrapping some trees with wire and planting other trees for the beaver is one partial solution.  I think newly cut down healthy trees from all over Chicago should be brought to places where the beavers live to see if they will use them.  Above quote is from the beaversolutions.com website.

Meeting tonight about proposed PGA champion golf course in Hyde Park

ANOTHER IMPORTANT MEETING ABOUT GOLF COURSE PROPOSAL with Chicago Park District CEO, Michael Kelly, at Alderman Leslie Hairston’s monthly meeting– January 24 at South Shore Fine Arts Academy, 1415 E 70th, 6-8 pm

Don’t want a PGA tournament golf course or a big music venue in your back yard?  Write your alderman or come to the 5th ward meeting tonight!

If our neighborhood decides that this PGA level golf course is a good idea, my personal opinion is that golf course should be organic (no pesticides).  Organic golf courses already exist!   This would  prevent contamination of our neighborhood and lake. And, the design should include wildlife habitat. Again, there are golf course that are wildlife friendly!   Finally, since habitat destruction threatens wildlife more than non-native species (many non-native species are benign or actually support native species*,  I think there should be a moratorium on tree destruction in all of Hyde Park. We have already lost 1300 trees/shrubs in Jackson Park through the work of the Army Corps of Engineers and Project 120. It will take years before the replacement young trees they have planted and will plant in the future will grow into mature trees.  An organic, wildlife-friendly course with no destruction of trees would be great and might attract more people to the game.    As was said in the JPAC meeting, many of the Chicago Park District golf courses in Chicago are under-utilized.

* “Where do camels belong?  Why invasive species aren’t all bad”  Ken Thompson 2014