What The Hack: Nature in NYC

Summary

Podcast Summary: All Of It – "What The Hack: Nature in NYC"

Episode Information

• Title: What The Hack: Nature in NYC
• Host: David Fuerst (filling in for Alison Stewart)
• Guest: Ryan Mandelbaum, Brooklyn-based science writer, nature educator, wildlife photographer, and co-author of Wild NYC: Experience the Amazing Nature in and Around New York City
• Release Date: April 25, 2025
• Description: This episode explores the vibrant and surprising presence of wildlife within New York City’s urban landscape, highlighting the interplay between nature and the built environment.

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Introduction

[00:25] David Fuerst: David introduces the episode by challenging the common perception of New York City as a concrete jungle. He emphasizes that beneath the urban sprawl lies a thriving natural ecosystem, shaped by centuries of interaction between humans and wildlife.

[01:49] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan expresses his excitement to discuss his new book, which serves as both a guidebook and a celebration of the natural world thriving within the city.

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Motivation and Vision for Wild NYC

[02:00] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan shares his personal journey into naturalism, sparked by an early experience attempting to observe an egret in the city. Despite initial setbacks, witnessing a great blue heron in a city park transformed his understanding and appreciation of urban wildlife.

[03:07] Ryan Mandelbaum: He asserts that New York City has always been biodiverse, with wildlife adapting alongside human development. Ryan advocates for a harmonious coexistence, suggesting that humans and wildlife can thrive together more than commonly believed.

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Collaborative Creation and Illustrations

[04:05] David Fuerst: David explores Ryan’s collaboration with Chelsea Beck, highlighting the book’s unique illustrations that bring the city’s wildlife to life with personality and humor.

[05:08] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan praises Chelsea’s work, mentioning illustrations like a great blue heron donning an “I Love New York” plastic bag, which encapsulate the quirky interactions between wildlife and urban elements.

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Favorite Wildlife Hotspots in NYC

[06:21] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan highlights key locations for wildlife observation:

• Greenwood Cemetery, Brooklyn: A historical site that serves as a haven for insects, migrating birds, and mammals.
• Staten Island: Praised for its diverse ecosystems and abundant wildlife.

[07:07] Ryan Mandelbaum: He explains the presence of Italian wall lizards in NYC cemeteries, attributing their survival to intentional and accidental releases by humans. These lizards coexist with predators like the American kestrel, showcasing the city’s dynamic ecosystem.

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Human Influence on Urban Wildlife

[08:09] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan discusses how human activities inadvertently shape urban ecosystems. For example, the Metro North viaduct on Park Avenue harbors uncommon cliff ferns brought by train spores, illustrating nature’s resilience and adaptability.

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Listener Interactions and Wildlife Stories

[09:00] Marissa (Staten Island): Marissa shares sightings of harbor seals and a juvenile gray seal, highlighting the presence of marine life even in urban settings.

[10:14] Ann (Brooklyn): Ann talks about aquatic wildlife in WNYC Transmitter Park, including skilletfish, mud crabs, and blackfish, emphasizing the rich biodiversity above and below water.

[13:29] Lucy (Brooklyn): Lucy discusses her use of the Merlin app for bird identification during her runs in Brower Park, showcasing how technology aids in engaging with urban wildlife.

[15:16] Madeline (Brooklyn): Madeline recounts a close encounter with an American kestrel on her fire escape, illustrating the bold presence of birds of prey in high-rise environments.

[17:47] Ron (Rivervale, NJ): Ron shares his discovery of the native eastern prickly pear cactus near the George Washington Bridge, emphasizing the hidden native flora within the city.

[19:32] Evelyn (Manhattan): Evelyn tells a story about a raccoon visiting her eighth-floor fire escape, highlighting the adaptability of raccoons in urban settings.

[20:37] Bob (Manhattan): Bob describes an intense encounter with a male peregrine falcon near the Chrysler Building, demonstrating the territorial nature of urban wildlife.

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Rewilding and Reintroduction of Native Wildlife

[16:53] Isaac (Brooklyn): Isaac, founder of Rewild Brooklyn, asks about the reintroduction of native wildlife to the city.

[16:53] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan supports rewilding efforts, stressing that successful reintroduction requires creating suitable habitats. He cautions against releasing animals without ensuring their environment can support them.

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Unique Wildlife Phenomena in NYC

[12:18] David Fuerst: David introduces the topic of dog vomit slime molds, prompting Ryan to explain these fascinating organisms.

[12:25] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan describes slime molds as almost sentient slimes found in urban wood chips and altered environments. Their fruiting bodies resemble dog vomit, adding a quirky element to urban nature walks.

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Seasonal Changes and Wildlife Watching Tips

[21:38] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan outlines the seasonal shifts in NYC’s wildlife:

• Spring: Peak migratory bird season.
• Summer: Breeding birds and abundant insects like dragonflies and butterflies.
• Fall: Continued bird migration.
• Winter: Marine life such as whales and harbor seals.

He encourages listeners to engage with nature year-round, equipped with binoculars and birding apps.

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Conclusion

[22:22] David Fuerst: David wraps up by thanking Ryan Mandelbaum for his insights and highlights the ongoing fascination with NYC’s urban wildlife. He encourages listeners to explore and appreciate the natural wonders within the city.

[22:36] Ryan Mandelbaum: Ryan expresses his gratitude and enthusiasm for fostering a deeper connection between New Yorkers and their local wildlife.

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Notable Quotes

• Ryan Mandelbaum [02:20]: “I couldn’t believe that some of this incredible nature was actually right among us.”
• Ryan Mandelbaum [03:07]: “We could actually live together with the wildlife here, more harmoniously than you'd expect for New York City.”
• Ryan Mandelbaum [05:08]: “Chelsea has captured the personality of the wildlife... quirky weirdness that the way wildlife interact with New York City.”

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Key Takeaways

• Urban Biodiversity: New York City hosts a surprising variety of wildlife, thriving alongside its dense urban environment.
• Human-Wildlife Interaction: Human activities, both intentional and accidental, significantly influence urban ecosystems and wildlife adaptation.
• Engagement Tools: Technology, such as wildlife identification apps, enhances engagement and education about urban nature.
• Rewilding Efforts: Thoughtful reintroduction of native species can bolster biodiversity, provided habitats are adequately prepared.
• Seasonal Dynamics: Different seasons bring unique wildlife phenomena, encouraging year-round exploration and observation.

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This episode of "All Of It" illuminates the hidden natural landscapes of New York City, celebrating the resilience and adaptability of wildlife cohabiting with one of the world's most iconic urban centers. Through Ryan Mandelbaum's expertise and engaging listener stories, the podcast fosters a deeper appreciation for the intricate balance between nature and urban life.

Transcript

[Progressive Insurance]

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[David Fuerst]

Listener supported WNYC Studios. This is all of it from wnyc. I'm David Fuerst in for Alison Stewart. Today. New York has a reputation as a concrete jungle. But if you know where to look and what to look for, you can see a very different kind of urban jungle. Not concrete, a jungle populated by actual wildlife, the product of centuries of interplay between one of the world's biggest cities that humans built up from the bedrock and the wildlife that was here long before any skyscrapers were urban. Naturalism is an incredibly popular hobby, but often it's seen as an escape from our urban landscape. But a new book called Wild NYC Experience the Amazing Nature in and Around New York City aims to help people get out there to see how the natural world and the human built environment feed off each other and change each other. And here with us in the studio, please welcome Ryan Mandelbaum, Brooklyn based science writer, nature educator, wildlife photographer, and now co author of the new book, Wild Experience the Amazing Nature in and Around New York City. It's a long title. Welcome.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Well, it's great to be here. I'm excited to talk about this one.

[David Fuerst]

It's a long title because you're trying to do a lot in this book, right? It's partly a guidebook. It explains also the lives of our plant and animal neighbors and where you can go to observe them in their natural habitats. But the book also makes this argument for a naturalism that blurs the line between the city and the natural world that it's embedded in. Can you talk about your motivation for writing this?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Sure. So I'm from New York. My parents are Brooklyn Born and R.A. and you know, I've always been excited about learning about the world. But when I first started writing, I was told that the New York City Bird alliance was painting lawn flamingos white in order to help attract egrets back to breeding areas. So I went out and I wanted to try and see an egret for myself, and I failed. But then I called up one of my friends who worked in New York for the Parks Department, and she took me to see a great blue heron nest where it was just kind of in a regular city park. And, you know, I just couldn't believe that some of this incredible nature was actually right among us. And it blew my mind and I've been a different person ever since.

[David Fuerst]

Has it been important to you to treat naturalism as something that we participate in ourselves and not something that can be separated from us?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

I mean, New York City has been a place where humans have lived for its history. I mean, for millennia, really, there have been humans living here. And since then there's been colonization and different groups of people have lived here. But the wildlife has always been here. I mean, it's always been an incredibly biodiverse place. And now that there's humans here, the kinds of wildl that lives here has changed. But you know, I posit that we could actually live together with the wildlife here, you know, in a more harmoniously than you'd expect for New York City.

[David Fuerst]

Should we think about an opportunity to connect with nature on an everyday basis, almost an every minute basis, instead of something that we have to, you know, schedule and make an appointment for in the calendar and go on a special trip for?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Oh, yes, of course. I mean, I actually have my binoculars here in the studio. On my walk over, I spotted a northern parula, which is a migratory songbird in a tree. You know, these are the kinds of moments that the folks who are really attuned with New York City's nature have. Yeah, basically every day.

[David Fuerst]

You worked on this book with a former colleague, Chelsea Beck, who, let's talk about. I think she's responsible for most of the illustrations and infographics in the book. And you put a wildlife zine together while you were both working at Gizmodo. Can you talk about that and how that was a precursor to this book?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Sure. So I did something a little weird when I worked at Gizmodo. I was hired to write about, you know, physics and tech. And then I caught the birding bug right when I started and decided to start a birding bug.

[David Fuerst]

It's a natural progression.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

That's right. And I started bird Moto and I wrote bird articles almost every day. And Chelsea is somebody who, you know, I joke that Chelsea's as weird as I am and caught the bug with me and you know, we put together this zen and event about birdwatching in New York City. And you know, when we decided, you know, it was a great success, it was really fun. And then, you know, we decided to put together this book and write a proposal for it. So it's been a long time in the making.

[David Fuerst]

Well, it's a beautiful book and the illustrations are Remarkable. Are there any of them in particular you want to call out?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

I think that the way that Chelsea has captured the personality of the wildlife, if you flip through the book, there's a lot of these doodles of personified animals, right? There's a mourning dove in sort of mourning wear and, you know, a squirrel with a briefcase or, you know, even on the COVID the great blue heron wearing the I love New York plastic bag as a dress. You know, she's really captured that kind of the quirky weirdness that the way that wildlife interact with New York City and the way that I see New York City as well.

[David Fuerst]

I'm David Furst, by the way, in for Alison Stewart. We're speaking with writer and naturalist Ryan Mandelbaum. And if you would like to join this conversation and talk about the wildlife in our area, maybe you want to hear about the wildlife that makes let us know about the wildlife that makes your corner of the city special. Or maybe you have a question about wildlife in the urban landscape. 212-433-9692. That's 212-433-WNYC. And can you highlight a couple of your favorite spots in the city that really illustrate what you're talking about here? Where do you like to go to experience wild nyc?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

So I this is an interesting thing in the book is that a lot of the history of New York City's parks actually started with cemeteries kind of being a place of repose. And, you know, Brooklyn's Greenwood Cemetery, sort of inspired by Mount Auburn Cemetery in Boston. Now I had to move recently. Prospect park was my favorite place to go. And now I live across the street from Greenwood Cemetery. And so I'm at Greenwood Cemetery almost every day looking for insects on the wildflower garden, looking for migrating birds. Great selection of mammals there. So that's one of my favorites. And then shout out to Staten Island. Azerburo has just some of the most incredibly diverse nature and wildlife. It's, it's fabulous.

[David Fuerst]

And so there's a question here we have about cemeteries. Why are there lizards in New York City cemeteries? This is coming from our very own Kate Hines.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Hello, Kate. Well, it is humans living in a place. We often bring things with us, right? So both intentionally and not, humans will travel. You know, we bring plants around the world, we bring animals around the world. And what likely happened was these Italian fence lizards, a pet would have been released. And sometimes they get out on, sometimes they don't, and they find a place that they can survive. And so there's fence lizards that Live, Sorry. Italian wall lizards. Italian wall lizards, which live throughout parts of the city. But Greenwood Cemetery is a great place to see them. You can often find them just crawling up on the mausoleums and on the graves. And then there's a bird called the American kestrel, which you'll see perched on the, you know, the main chapel there, which will come in and feed on the lizards.

[David Fuerst]

You share a really great example of how human activity plays an active role in shaping our natural environment. Trains that unintentionally bring plant life from the Appalachians and Catskills back with them and deposit them in East Harlem. Can you talk about that?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

This is one of my favorite and maybe unknown sort of nature things in New York City is the Metro north viaduct on Park Avenue. And 109th street uptown has this selection of uncommon cliff ferns that have managed to colonize it. And so you can just, you know, it's not like a park. You're just walking along the side of the road. But if you look closely, you can see a variety of just incredible ferns and stuff that you really wouldn't see unless you took a trip upstate. And, yeah, what's probably happening is spores are coming down along the trains and finding a habitat that in New York City looks much like the habitat where they came from.

[David Fuerst]

We. If you would like to join this conversation, let me give you that phone number once again. It's 212-433-9692. That's 212-433-WNYC. Let's hear from Marissa joining from Staten Island. Welcome.

[Marissa]

Hi, how are you today?

[David Fuerst]

Great. Do you have some wildlife you want to shout out here?

[Marissa]

Yeah, I just want to shout out the seals. We have harbor seals on Staten island, and earlier this month, we had a juvenile gray seal as well.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah, that's awesome. You know, New York City, especially in the wintertime, we definitely have a great population of seals. And there's actually a boat company that does whale watching cruises, and sometimes they'll do harbor cruises around the city. And, you know, both on the shore as well as some of the offshore islands of New York City, we see collections of harbor seals. And, yeah, they're amazing, and I'm glad people notice them.

[David Fuerst]

And we're hearing. Got a text about sea life as well. Someone saying, I grew up in Walkaway Beach. Love to go to Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge to see ospreys and other migratory birds. Great location for that.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah, it's actually, I mean, it's probably one of the best bird watching locations here in the city. You Know, it has these big pools of fresh water that attract waterfowl in the winter, but then in the springtime, you can get dozens of species of migratory songbird. I mean, it is really fantastic.

[David Fuerst]

And Ann from Brooklyn, welcome to the conversation. Some wildlife you want to talk about? Also aquatic.

[Progressive Insurance]

Yeah, thanks for taking my call. I'm so excited to hear about this book. And I just wanted to say that I work for Billy and Oyster Project, and just this morning I was in WNYC Transmitter park in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and along with our oyster cages, we pulled up skilletfish and mud crabs and even a blackfish. So lots of wildlife above and below the water.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah, that's. I mean, Billion Oyster Project is also just an incredible organization. They do get a feature in the book. I talk about them a bit. And, you know, New York would have once had sort of extensive oyster reefs that, you know, through pollution and things like that have. Many of them have died out. And so they're trying to restock New York's harbor with oysters. And they're just doing incredible work.

[David Fuerst]

We are speaking, by the way, the name of the book. Let's get this out here one more time. Wild NYC Subtitle Experience the Amazing Nature in and Around New York City. We're speaking with author Ryan Mandelbaum, and it's great to have you here. We have a lot of questions coming in for you right now, so get ready. Someone also wants to say they also see dolphins and whales right off the shore of Rockaway. Oh, here's a question. Tell us about the turkeys on Staten Island.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

So the turkeys, they're kind of like turbo turkeys. So what would have happened is, and I don't know if I write about this in the book, but turkeys are, you know, they live throughout the United States. They. They would have been hunted quite a lot, and their populations went down. And then I believe that the turkeys were restocked with hunting programs in the eastern United States, and they ended up in Staten Island. And they're more resilient and bigger and better than ever. And, you know, turkeys are not afraid of humans. And we end up having turkeys that fight their own reflection when they walk around the street in Staten island and guys will go, hey, I'm walking here. But it's to the turkey. So they're pretty incredible.

[David Fuerst]

Well, I was not prepared to talk about turbo turkeys today. That's a fantastic thing to hear about. And let's talk about some of the other wild and weird examples from your book. And I have to bring up this one. Dog vomit slime mold.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Ugh. Incredible. They're the best.

[David Fuerst]

It may have been a band that I saw one time in Asbury park, but. But tell me, please explain.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

So slime molds are kind of like almost sentient slimes that live in, you know, this one specifically you'll find in wood chips, but also sometimes highly altered urban environments. And then their fruiting bodies are these kind of big, yellow, spongy looking, almost mushroomy things that look like dog vomit. And, you know, slime molds just generally are extremely interesting. You know, sometimes they're single, giant single celled organisms like an amoeba. And then some they create spores and then they fuse together and it's just this, this wild and wonderful thing. And I've led bird walks in days where there's no birds sometimes. And we found a dog vomit slime mold. And that was just the highlight of everybody's day.

[David Fuerst]

That's your plan B.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Exactly. Nobody's. Nobody's mad about a slime mold.

[David Fuerst]

Well, I mean, turbo turkeys and slime mold. We are really covering all the bases right now. A lot of calls coming through. If you want to join the conversation. 212-433-9692. Let's hear a question coming in right now. Lucy from Brooklyn, welcome to all of it.

[Lucy]

Thanks for taking my call. I just wanted to say that as a wannabe birder, but a useless birder, because I don't know birds calls or what they look like. The app that I have on my phone, which my sister Ann turned me onto, called Merlin, has changed my life. It's free and, you know, so when I'm running in Brower park in central Brooklyn and I hear a bunch of birds, I can just hit record and it tells me all the birds that I'm listening to. And I would have never known that there was a mockingbird there, a blue jay or a cardinal, or any number of different birds that it picks up. So it's just been a great help to me in my desire to be a birder.

[David Fuerst]

Ryan, what about that app Merlin? Maybe other apps as well to help us shift from being a wannabe birder to birder.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah, Lucy, I'm really glad you brought that up. I mean, one of the things is, of course, as you want to disconnect from nature, leave your phone home. But, you know, there's some incredible apps right now that really help you go from not knowing anything to becoming an amateur naturalist yourself. Merlin is a fantastic by the Cornell University Lab of Ornithology that is special exactly for that for artificial intelligence, identifying photos and sounds of birds. And it can also serve as a field guide with its own photos that it supplies. You can then document your sightings using Ebird, which is kind of like, I call it the Pokedex of birding, but there's plenty of others. Inaturalist is a fabulous app that is sort of like Merlin but for everything. And you know, all of these apps even for me, were extremely valuable when I was putting together this book. And every day I have either Merlin or Ebert or Inaturalist in order to enrich my New York City experience.

[David Fuerst]

We are talking about the new book Wild NYC with Ryan Mandelbaum and hearing your stories interacting with Wild nyc. Let's hear from Madeline calling in from Brooklyn. Welcome to all of it.

[Marissa]

Hi. Thank you. This is very exciting. I am a native New Yorker working on a documentary about the biodiversity of the Brazilian Amazon. And when my 21 year olds were still in my belly, they're twins, I was on the 25th floor of 3rd Avenue and 29th street and I heard rustling in the living room and I had some feeling it was wildlife. And I went out there and by the way, I was giant. So it was a little scary. And it was an American kestrel. It looked like one of the KISS members with the makeup because that type of kestrel has that long black line. So I had had a cockatiel in my life and I managed to get a broom and get it on the broom and get it to the window and when it flew away it was like a Clint Eastwood movie. It took a giant arc and you could hear in the background that sound. Anyway, it was incredible.

[David Fuerst]

Wow. Thank you for sharing that story, Madeline. Wild nyc. Truly wildlife all around us.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

And kestrels are a wonderful bird. Many New Yorkers have heard of the peregrine falcon, which is a falcon that can live in the city. But kestrels are another smaller falcon that does breed. And you know, I had them breeding in Park Slope. So, you know, really wonderful nature observation. And they're beautiful, blue, orange, white, awesome little bird.

[David Fuerst]

And we have a text question here. Writing in Hello, I'm Isaac From Brooklyn, the 15 year old founder of Rewild Brooklyn. I would like to shout out Marine park and Plum Beach. One question I have is about reintroducing native wildlife back into the city. What is your opinion on that?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

So it's interesting and I don't know how much I talk about this in the book, but I have talked about it on my newsletter, which is that the city has actually tried some rewilding or reintroductions. And the key thing is they work when the habitat is good enough for the animal to thrive. I mean, you can't just, for example, release a bunch of screech owls into Central park and hope that they're going to make it. But if you are doing the other bits, such as planting the appropriate plants and the prey is available and you're not using perhaps certain pesticides, anything like that, once you've actually created an ecosystem, then the reintroduction can work. So I'm for it as long as we're doing the whole thing.

[David Fuerst]

We're speaking with the author of Wild nyc, Ryan Mandelbaum here on all of it. A lot of calls coming through. We're going to try to get to another one or two here. 212-433-9692. Ron in Rivervale, New Jersey, welcome to all of it.

[Ron]

Hi, how are you? I just want to mention that, Ryan, what you say really resonates with me. I'm a huge native plant nerd and I used to live right over the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee and started studying out about native plants. And at the time I was thinking, wow, you know, where I am, you're not going to see anything. Everything is introduced. And I read about this, basically the only cactus that is native to our area, eastern prickly pear cactus. And sure enough, just while wandering around right by the base of the George Washington Bridge on the Jersey side with all these cars, I see just big, you know, huge, huge swatches of eastern prickly pear cactus growing there. I took a couple of pads and now I have it growing natively in my yard. So what you said about, you know, kind of keeping your eyes open and watching out, there's all kinds of stuff here. And that really resonates. Thank you so much.

[David Fuerst]

And Ryan, you're really smiling listening to that.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah, I love the prickly pear cactus and I often lead nature tours here in New York City. And, you know, I love the birds. Often that's what people want the focus to be on. But there's especially at the Jamaica Bay Wildlife Refuge, you'll be walking and looking around and then just showing people that there's a native cactus that just grows here in New York City is often the highlight of the day. So I totally understand, Ron. That is, it is so cool finding prickly pear cactus here.

[David Fuerst]

Producer Kate Hines piping in to say you can see eastern prickly pear cacti at Jamaica Bay National Wildlife Refuge as well.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yep, you sure can. And in a couple of surprising places in the city, too. A place I go often is Floyd Bennett Field, and they have tons and tons of prickly pear growing there.

[David Fuerst]

As we're talking about the wildlife all around us, let's hear from Evelyn in Manhattan. Welcome to all of it.

[Evelyn]

Hi.

[David Fuerst]

Hello. Do you have a wildlife story?

[Evelyn]

I do. I was living on West End Avenue, and one night in the middle of the night, my husband was awakened by a neighbor who said, oh, my God, there's someone on my fire escape. So he went down with a baseball bat, and he called the police, and the police came, and it was a giant raccoon. And his eyes glowed in the dark on the fire escape on the eighth floor of our building.

[David Fuerst]

They absolutely glow. I have seen that many times. I hope the baseball bat wasn't utilized.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah. I mean, raccoons as well. I think that this is an interesting one. Right. Because people joke about how they are, you know, trash pandas, which I love that nickname. But what's really happening is that there are certain species that have figured out life among humans here in New York City. Raccoons are native to the area, and, you know, they can be successful sometimes to a fault in some of these areas. So we really, as humans, are ecosystem architects.

[David Fuerst]

One more quick call. Let's hear from Bob in Manhattan. Welcome to all of it.

[Bob]

Hi. You mentioned peregrine falcons. And some years ago, I was in the Chrysler Building up. Up in where the arches are, where you see the triangular windows. They were dentist office there at that time, and I was there at night to see a dentist late. Anyway, I realized while I was standing there that those windows are casement windows, and they simply have a latch and you can open them from the inside. And I opened one of these windows, and in a flash, I had this male peregrine falcon. Must have been defending its nest. Flying right at my face with its talons out.

[David Fuerst]

Whoa.

[Bob]

I don't think it came closer than three or four feet, but it was pretty startling.

[David Fuerst]

That is a close encounter.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah. And definitely some animals can get very territorial around their nests. So I'm glad you were okay. But, you know, an amazing experience. Of course.

[David Fuerst]

And just as we're wrapping up, Ryan, in our last minute, as spring continues and summer is on the horizon, what kinds of seasonal changes to our local wildlife do you think we should be watching for, keeping our eye on?

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah. So we are just entering the peak of the northbound migratory bird migration. So we are. All of the parks today are probably have some interesting birds and I encourage people to look at them. But then as the summer goes on, we're going to see breeding birds. We're going to see tons of insects. I love dragonflies and butterflies and moths. And, you know, summer, June, July, August is great for that. Fall is bird migration again. And winter we have, you know, of course, there's the whales and the wild and then the harbor seals. So every single day of the year there is something really exciting and interesting to look at here. And I hope you all enjoy it.

[David Fuerst]

And you are ready because you have your binoculars with you. You're ready for watching some stuff on your way out.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah. My friend Paul found a rare warbler in Central park today. I may go chase it.

[David Fuerst]

Okay. That's what's next. Ryan Mandelbaum, Brooklyn based science writer, nature educator, wildlife photographer, co author of the new book Wild Experience the Amazing Nature in and Around New York City. Thank you for joining us.

[Ryan Mandelbaum]

Yeah, thank you so much for having me.

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