| OVERVIEW
After being teased for the last month with “signs of spring,” this week produced irrefutable evidence: Baltimore orioles, ruby-throated hummingbirds, and enormous numbers of wood warblers had arrived! While some Hudson Valley bald eagle nests failed to produce nestlings this season, at least five had two nestlings each.
HIGHLIGHT OF THE WEEK
 5/4 – Poughkeepsie, HRM 76: We had students from Elm Drive Elementary in Millbrook on the Walkway Over the Hudson State Historic Park. For many, this was their first view of the river, especially from 212 feet above the water. The Walkway, a reconstruction of the original railroad bridge built in 1889, reminds us of more than 400 years of human history and more than a thousand years of prehistoric occupation by indigenous Algonquian Indians. We watched the Hudson River sloop Clearwater, with 5th graders from Alden Place Elementary, tack its way upriver toward Crum Elbow, angling its mainsail to catch the south wind. Our first bird was a raven croaking overhead, and then a blur cruised past, a peregrine falcon, causing excitement among the pigeons on the bridge. A pigeon (rock dove) pirouetted up from underneath, and the chase was on. Despite the peregrine’s deserved reputation for speed, a pigeon with a bit of a head start can prove to be an elusive target. They are far faster than they look. Within seconds they both disappeared from sight. (Photo of peregrine falcon courtesy of NJ DEP)
– Tom Lake, T.R. Jackson, B.J. Jackson
[This encounter brought back a story told to me fifteen years ago by Cal Rankin, a member of the climbing team that attended navigation lights on the old railroad bridge. He told me of an October visit he made several years before to replace a burned-out light. On that occasion, he did not see the falcons, but he knew they had been there by the collection of pink pigeon feet that were piled on the top of a bridge support. He concluded that peregrines loved pigeons but took a pass on their feet. – Tom Lake]
NATURAL HISTORY ENTRIES
4/28 – Hudson Valley: Earlier in the year, we suggested using caution when approaching bald eagle nests, especially when they were incubating. That plea for temperance of enthusiasm becomes even more important now that nestlings are present – they frighten easily with human intrusion. We should extend that caution to include all nesting birds and their nestlings. If it is possible, stay in your vehicle; that is best, especially for bald eagles. We must let the power of our optics get us as close as we need to be.
– Tom Lake
4/28 – Warren County, HRM 230: Fort William Henry on Lake George was a Colonial fortification that helped guard the Hudson and Mohawk valleys, known as “the frontier,” during the French and Indian War. For those of us who are curious about old accounts of unfamiliar fish names, reading the journal of Caleb Rea, the regimental surgeon for the English garrison at Fort William Henry (1755-1757), is intriguing. The surgeon wrote how he “enjoyed fishing on Lake George.” After one successful trip he noted he had “… caught Oswego bass, perch, roach, trout, etc. … but ye bass is ye biggest and counted ye best.” The “perch” were likely yellow perch; “roach” may have been golden shiners; and “trout” could have been either brook trout or lake trout. All of these are native to Lake George and to our Hudson River watershed.
The “Oswego” bass was the odd fish. Oswego bass has long been a regionally colloquial name for largemouth bass, and conventional thinking has been that they were introduced into New York State from the Midwest in the mid19th century. Therefore, they could not have been Caleb’s “ye biggest and counted ye best.”
But, with the help of Bob Schmidt and Scott Wells, we investigated the local origin of largemouth bass and discovered, in the 1896 Annual Report of the New York Fisheries, Game and Forest Commission, this statement: “Lake George is believed to be the natural habitat of black bass [largemouth bass], and the fish probably found their way at an early period from the St. Lawrence through Lake Champlain into Lake George.” Apparently, they were here in 1755. This gives us yet another story to tell our students about the lives and legends of our fishes.
– Tom Lake
4/28 – Town of Poughkeepsie: The two nestlings in bald eagle nest NY62 were 37 days old and growing up fast. They were already chicken-size if not larger, the result of a diet of Hudson River fishes.
– Bob Rightmyer
4/28 – Bedford, HRM 35: The great blue heron rookery had three nests with a single heron standing. The timing is about right, so it is possible that some eggs were beginning to hatch. The rest were still incubating. The nestlings will be small, and they will not be visible for a while. When they make their appearance, they will be about the size of a robin.
– Jim Steck
4/28 – Manhattan, New York City: Eighteen enthusiastic high school students from across NYC’s five boroughs gathered at Randall’s Island for training for the World Science Festival’s 4th annual Great Fish Count on June 2. We sampled the Harlem River with our seine and had to make do with a meager but interesting catch, including two Atlantic silversides, a small striped bass, and several handfuls of shrimp. But the highlight was a dozen palm-sized and larger lion’s mane jellyfish (Cyanea capillata). We measured the Harlem River at 10.0 parts-per-thousand (ppt) salinity, a little less than 10% seawater.
– Margie Turrin, Laurel Zaima, Chris Bowser, Rebecca Houser, Chris Girgenti
4/29 – Ulster County, HRM 91.5: An adult common loon in breeding plumage was alternating between Sleightsburgh Spit and the mouth of Rondout Creek. I watched it dive and catch a large pumpkinseed sunfish. Swallowing the fish, however, was an ordeal. The loon positioned the fish head-first in its bill, extended its head and neck skyward, and then slowing worked the fish down its throat. By positioning the fish head-first, the fish’s spiny dorsal fin would be flattened and would not get caught on the way down.
– Jim Yates
4/29 – Hunter’s Brook, HRM 67.5: Despite the cold and dreariness of the day, it was a good afternoon at Hunter’s Brook with Jennifer Hansen and her Wappinger Junior High students. We counted 98 glass eels and 14 elvers in our fyke net. The students spotted both alewives and white suckers out in the fast water – the brook is only 30 feet-wide at this point – and at least one student felt the river herring bumping off her legs in knee-deep water. The water temperature was warming a bit to 55 degrees Fahrenheit (F).
– Jennifer Hansen, Tom McDowell, Cathy MacKenzie, Tom Lake
 4/30 – Wappinger Creek, HRM 67.5: I watched a great blue heron successfully fish in the tidewater of Wappinger Creek today. Its successful catch rate was amazing. Among the fish it caught were a couple of alewives migrating in from the sea to spawn, and at least one yellow perch, in from the river to spawn. (Photo of great blue heron with an alewife courtesy of Terry Hardy)
– Terry Hardy
4/30 – Town of Poughkeepsie: Bald eagle nest NY62 sits precariously near the crown of a tall tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera). The tree’s flowers were blooming – orange and white – and they were nothing short of gorgeous. Their genus (Liriodendron) translates from Greek as “lily tree.” This tulip tree was struck by lightning a decade ago and was scheduled to be taken down (safety hazard over a roadway). Then, in 2011, an adult pair of bald eagles built a nest in the tree and Dutchess County Parks reconsidered. The tree leans and has heart rot, but it still stands. Eight years later, the eagles have produced 12 nestlings.
– Tom Lake
4/30 – Manhattan, HRM 1: We checked our research sampling gear in the Hudson River Park at The River Project’s sampling station on the lighthouse tender Lilac at Pier 25 and found a handsome northern pipefish, 120 millimeters (mm) in one of our killifish traps.
– Siddhartha Hayes, Michele Jacobs, Krishna Talukdar
[Note: one inch = 25.4 millimeters (mm)]
 5/1 – Town of Rosendale, HRM 84: I wasn’t the only one enjoying the sunny afternoon, which at 79 degrees F, was nearly 30 degrees warmer than yesterday – several gray tree frogs were vocalizing in my backyard in mid-afternoon. I’m always surprised (and delighted) to hear them in the neighborhood during the breeding season, since I live on a dry sand plain with no marshy breeding habitat nearby. (Photo of gray tree frog courtesy of Laura Heady)
– Laura Heady
5/1 – Northeast Dutchess County: A new bald eagle nest (new for 2018) that we have named The Pine Tree Family (NY487), had two nestlings. This made at least four bald eagle nests in our area (NY62, NY459A, NY487, and NY488) with two nestlings each this spring.
– Deborah Tracy-Kral
5/2 – Battenkill, HRM 193: I woke up in my home in Salem this morning to the songs of Baltimore orioles and ovenbirds. I went outside and found them both, singing as loudly as they could, apparently eager to announce their arrival.
– Scott Varney (Hudson-Mohawk Bird Club)
 5/2 – Delmar, HRM 143: Favorable conditions for migration brought in a slew of new arrivals at Five Rivers Environmental Education Center. Among them were 15 warblers, including Louisiana waterthrush, northern waterthrush, ovenbird, blue-winged, black-and-white, common yellowthroat, Cape May, northern parula, palm (western variety), pine, yellow-rumped, Nashville, yellow, black-throated green, and prairie warbler. (Photo of Cape May warbler courtesy of Denise Stoner)
– Tom Williams, Scott Stoner, Denise Stoner, John Kent (Hudson-Mohawk Bird Club)
5/2 – Town of Saugerties, HRM 102: Arriving home this morning, it was apparent that there had been a significant influx of migrant birds overnight. Many personal first-of-season birds included scarlet tanager, wood thrush, rose-breasted grosbeaks, American redstart, Blackburnian warbler, and my first ruby-throated hummingbirds (two males).
– Steve M. Chorvas
5/2 – Town of Poughkeepsie: Fish, fish, fish! The list of Hudson River fishes being delivered to bald eagle nest NY62 for the two nestlings continued to grow. In midday, the male arrived with his second fish of the day, a striped bass. He took the fish to the nest where he fed the two 41-day-old nestlings.
– Kathleen Courtney, Bob Rightmyer
5/2 – Beacon, HRM 61: I shared Long Dock and the Hudson River with striped bass anglers today. The spring frenzy to catch trophy-sized bass was underway. A small striped bass was caught and released from the pier as I was carp fishing and offshore, anywhere from 12 to 20 boats were trolling lures or drifting cut bait. I managed to catch and release two carp, the largest of which was 10.0 pounds. However, the channel catfish failed to show.
– Bill Greene
5/2 – Newburgh, HRM 61: As with a few of the other new-for-2018 bald eagle nests along the Hudson River, NY488 had produced two nestlings. This has been surprising since it is common for new pairs to not have much luck their first year until they learn from experience.
– Thomas Saros
 5/2 – Yonkers, HRM 18: On a steamy 90-degree day, our Scarsdale and Bronx Collaborative interns went seining for practice at the Sarah Lawrence Center for the Urban River at Beczak. They caught a nearly 20-inch-long white sucker! Also in their seine was a juvenile striped bass (80 mm) as well as many bay anchovies. The salinity was very low at 1.25 ppt. (Photo of white sucker courtesy of Elisa Caref)
– Elisa Caref, Jason Muller
5/3 – Accord, HRM 83: The Town of Rochester held a public hearing tonight for its Natural Heritage Plan that lays out a strategy for conservation of important lands and waters in the community. We were reminded of the amphibian beneficiaries of conservation planning as we walked out of the town hall in late evening and heard the breeding songs of American toads and gray tree frogs. Both of their trills were quite audible as we enjoyed the view of the Catskills.
– Laura Heady
5/3 – Greene County: On my first canoe check of bald eagle nest NY203 this spring, I saw one adult sitting low in the nest. There was no sign of nestlings, and I did not see a second adult. While paddling from NY203 down to Duck Cove, I happened upon an adult eagle having a fish breakfast on the shoreline of Duck Cove Island. My eye was drawn to the bird when it hopped ashore, fish in foot, having been in the shallows. As I was leaving the area, the bird flew in my direction and perched in a shoreline tree, soaking wet. The eagle was double-banded, blue on its left leg and silver on its right. However, the bands were impossible to read.
– Kaare Christian
[In 2016, Kaare was able to read a blue band on an adult bald eagle at nest NY203. The band number was K96. We discovered that Pete Nye had banded K96 and its sibling in a nest (NY12) on May 17, 2000, at Pepacton Reservoir in the Catskill Mountains of Delaware County. Tom Lake]
5/3 – New Hamburg, HRM 67.5: I walked out of the front door of my home today and looked around to check on the leaf condition of the large deciduous trees on our Rabbit Island. In the process, I noticed what initially appeared to be a large squirrel nest lodged about 60 feet up in one of our basswood trees. That seemed odd to me as the visiting squirrels tend to nest in the hemlocks rather than in the deciduous trees. Upon closer inspection, I saw the dark shape move, and I realized that it was an adult bald eagle. I watched it for ten minutes as it remained relatively motionless surveying the river. Eventually, it flew off on an errand of its own. This was even more reason for us to be cautious about allowing our cat outside without parental supervision. I know eagles are primarily fish eaters, but we are not eager to have Miss Lulu be the one to tempt fate.
– David Cullen
[There is a new (for 2018) bald eagle nest (NY459A) just a few hundred yards from Rabbit Island that has two nestlings this year. Dave’s visitor was likely one of the adults from that nest. While NY459A is a new nest, we wonder if the adults are a transplant from a former territory (NY459) not more than a quarter-mile to the northeast. Tom Lake]
5/4 – Upper Hudson River: Severe thunderstorms moving west-to-east took down thousands of trees and power lines from the Utica area to the New York-Vermont border. The highest recorded gust this evening occurred at Glens Falls Airport at 61 miles-per-hour (mph). More than 200,000 customers across the Mohawk Valley and the Hudson Valley North Country lost power.
– National Weather Service
 5/4 – Norrie Point, HRM 85: It was a great day for seining with Marist College students. We caught more than 50 fish, including spottail shiners, pumpkinseed sunfish, channel catfish, tessellated darters, white perch, and a large “burnished-gold” goldfish. The river temperature was 54 F. (Photo of goldfish courtesy of Ashawna Abbott)
– Ashawna Abbott
5/4 – Hunter’s Brook, HRM 67.5: Students from Roy C. Ketcham High School helped us pick our fyke net this afternoon counting 93 glass eels and 10 elvers. The brook had warmed to 68 degrees F, rising more than thirteen degrees in a week. We found a dead foot-long male white sucker in a pool off the current. Such finds are not uncommon in spring tributaries; for white suckers, spawning is a strenuous and rough activity.
– Mark Delaney, Matt Colbert, Tom Lake
 5/4 – Tenafly, NJ, HRM 17: The highlights of our Friday bird walk at Greenbrook Sanctuary, from the Palisades’ cliff edge in the morning sun, were good looks at scarlet tanagers and Baltimore orioles. There wasn’t an overwhelming number of birds, but among the fourteen species were rose-breasted grosbeak, blue headed vireos, and Swainson’s thrush. (Photo of Baltimore oriole courtesy of Thomas Lebarr)
– Bob Rancan, Sandy Bonardi, Ken Haberman
5/4 – Manhattan, HRM 1: We checked our research sampling gear in the Hudson River Park at The River Project’s sampling station on the lighthouse tender Lilac at Pier 25 and were treated with a robust (305 mm) blackfish/tautog in one of our crab pots.
– Siri Dolce-Bengtsson, Omar Gabr, Krishna Talukdar
SPRING 2018 NATURAL HISTORY PROGRAMS
Wednesday, May 23, 5:00pm – 7:00pm
Fishing the Hudson River
Norrie Point Environmental Center, Staatsburg
Would you like to try your hand at fishing in the Hudson, a river that has 228 different kinds of fish? Join our family-friendly angling program, sponsored by the DEC Hudson River Research Reserve and I Fish NY.
Free. All equipment provided. Angling is wheelchair accessible.
For more information contact James Herrington 845-889-4745 x109
Free Trees for Streamside Planting
The Hudson River Estuary Program’s Trees for Tribs program offers free native trees and shrubs for planting along the tributary streams in the Hudson River Estuary watershed. Our staff can help you with a planting plan and work with your volunteers. Since 2007, Trees for Tribs has provided more than 40,000 native trees and shrubs for planting along 20 miles of stream with the help of more than 9,000 local volunteers. We are now accepting applications for spring planting projects.
For more information about the program or to download an application, please visit the DEC website at: HudsonEstuaryTFT.
Hudson River: Striped Bass Cooperative Angler Program
Do you fish for striped bass in the Hudson River? You can share your fishing trip information and help biologists understand and manage our striped bass fishery.
– Here’s how it works: Fill out a logbook provided by us whenever you fish on the Hudson River (by boat or shore). Record general location, time, gear used, what you caught (or if you didn’t catch anything) and return the logbook when you are done fishing. You’ll receive an annual newsletter summarizing the information in addition to the latest news regarding regulations and the river.
– Whether you catch-and-release or take home a keeper, you can be part of the Cooperative Angler Program. Join today by contacting: Jessica Best 845-256-3009 jessica.best
HUDSON RIVER MILES
The Hudson is measured north from Hudson River Mile 0 at the Battery at the southern tip of Manhattan. The George Washington Bridge is at HRM 12, the Tappan Zee 28, Bear Mountain 47, Beacon-Newburgh 62, Mid-Hudson 75, Kingston-Rhinecliff 95, Rip Van Winkle 114, and the Federal Dam at Troy, the head of tidewater, at 153. The tidal section of the Hudson constitutes a bit less than half the total distance – 315 miles – from Lake Tear of the Clouds to the Battery. Entries from points east and west in the watershed reference the corresponding river mile on the mainstem.
TO CONTRIBUTE YOUR OBSERVATIONS OR TO SUBSCRIBE
The Hudson River Almanac is compiled and edited by Tom Lake and emailed weekly by DEC’s Hudson River Estuary Program. Share your observations by e-mailing them to trlake7.
To subscribe to the Almanac (or to unsubscribe), use the links on DEC’s Hudson River Almanac or DEC Delivers web pages.
Discover New York State Conservationist – the award-winning, advertisement-free magazine focusing on New York State’s great outdoors and natural resources. Conservationist features stunning photography, informative articles and around-the-state coverage. Visit the Conservationist webpage for more information.
USEFUL LINKS
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration online tide and tidal current predictions are invaluable when planning Hudson River field trips.
For real-time information on Hudson River tides, weather and water conditions from sixteen monitoring stations, visit the Hudson River Environmental Conditions Observing System website.
DEC’s Smartphone app for iPhone and Android is now available at: New York Fishing, Hunting & Wildlife App.
NY Open for Hunting and Fishing Initiative: Under Governor Cuomo’s Adventure NY initiative, DEC is making strategic investments to expand access to healthy, active outdoor recreation, connect more New Yorkers and visitors to nature and the outdoors, protect natural resources, and boost local economies. This initiative will support the completion of more than 75 projects over the next three years, ranging from improvements to youth camps and environmental education centers to new boat launches, duck blinds, and hiking trails. Read more about the Adventure NY initiative. For more information on planning an outdoor adventure in New York State, visit DEC’s website at http://www.dec.ny.gov/outdoor.
Information about the Hudson River Estuary Program is available on DEC’s website at http://www.dec.ny.gov/lands/4920.html.
Copies of past issues of the Hudson River Almanac, Volumes II-VIII, are available for purchase from the publisher, Purple Mountain Press, (800) 325-2665, or email purple |
Hudson River Almanac
