A Brooklyn Life

In search of the Brooklyn parrots, we set off for Greenwood Cemetery. I was imagining some expedition of gigantic bird-watching proportions. Nope, turns out if you go to the park’s main entrance off the 25th Street "R" train and look up into the spires of the building that serves as the gate, you can see them quite easily (click on the photo at left for an enlarged view). The small green birds have built lofty, sprawling nests in the spires, and, being rather active animals, they swoop in and out of the nests often enough to make catching a glimpse easy work. The earlier you go, the more vocal they seem to be, as we were treated to a cacophonous squawking when we arrived around 10:45 a.m. (Our plans to attract them to our backyard were reconsidered in light of the birds’ amazing ability to project vocally.)

Tropical birds who have invaded our area’s ecosystem aside, the cemetery is well worth a trip. We spent almost two hours wandering the northwest side of the park, admiring gravestones, marveling at fancy tombs and spotting famous and locally famous names (we never did find Leonard Bernstein)–and we barely scratched the surface. For every big road we walked down there were tiny paths passed by. For every hundred-year-old grave topped with a strange carving or inscription we studied, there were another 100 left unseen.

Regular tours and bird-watching tours are offered on the weekends and listed on the website. Big Onion  also sponsors tours that start at the entrance. Also see many more engaging photos on Flickr.