happy blizzard day

Dog owners don't get to stay in bed all day during the blizzard. For evidence of this, please click here.

Rhododendron

I have to accept that no Rhododendron species is going to make it to the 365 Urban Species project. If it was "365 Urban Genera" or "365 Urban Life Forms" or something, I could pull it off, but I just can't (won't) identify the shrub to species. I suspect that there is some kind of popular hybrid that is industrially cultivated--it's practically an obligatory front yard plant around here--but I haven't been able to figure it out. But I took a whole mess of pictures of it, and I'd hate for them to go to waste.



Today's blizzard rhododendron.

( more )

365 Urban Species. Urban Species #043: White-throated Sparrow

Photo by cottonmanifesto.
Urban Species #043: White-throated sparrow Zonotrichia albicollis

The white-throated sparrow, like the junco, lives in the northern third of North America during the summer, but migrates through and into Boston and points south in the winter. The southernmost part of their summer range is just north and west of Boston, so we may have some year-round presence of these birds. Over the twentieth century their range has spread south, and from high elevations to lower ones. Their most conspicuous habitat requirement is low thick brush. Suburban shrubbery, brush piles, and Phragmites reeds (as pictured above) suit them well. In summer they eat insects, while in winter they survive on the seeds of weeds and other herbaceous plants. Like other seed-eating birds, they are occasional visitors to birdfeeders.

I encounter them while walking along the Riverway; groups of 5 to 10 birds flitting about the reeds. When I stop to watch or photograph them, they freeze for a moment, and then disappear. Early and late in the season I hear them sing. The guides transcribe the rhythm of their mournful song as "Old Sam Peabody Peabody Peabody."

A couple from the sanctuary

( a closer look )