Forest Hills Connection || News and Life in Our DC Neighborhood
Covering Forest Hills, Van Ness, North Cleveland Park and Wakefield
by Marjorie Rachlin In September I make a trip to Rock Creek Park to see how the Chinese chestnut trees are doing. These trees were planted nearly a hundred years ago, after the chestnut blight had decimated our native chestnuts. As you can see from the photo, they have a bountiful crop of prickly chestnut […]
by Marjorie Rachlin This is a great summer for mushrooms. A walk in the neighborhood or in the woods of Rock Creek will show you an amazing variety of shapes and colors. My recent article in Forest Hills Connection (“The wild and wonderful world of mushrooms”) sparked interest, and friends began to send me interesting […]
by Marlene Berlin The last thing I expected to see on my Rock Creek hike last Tuesday was two weird looking heads pop up above a guard rail alongside Broad Branch Road. I was crossing the road on my way to the Western Ridge Trail. They looked like birds, but with bald heads. Vultures, perhaps? […]
by Marlene Berlin Say hello to some of our newest neighbors. I had been seeing these two male mallards hanging out together, and wondered whether a family was nearby. I got my answer about a week ago, when I spotted Mom and Pop Mallard and the kids. They grow so fast. This is Mom and […]
by Marlene Berlin Many of us have been able to enjoy our yards, balconies and neighborhood walks these last couple of months without being pestered by mosquitoes. It’s been nice, but… Where are they? Ken Ferebee, a National Park Service ranger in Rock Creek Park, attributes their delay in harassing us to a dry May […]
by Marlene Berlin Something had caught the attention of the tree crew removing two dead oaks from my backyard. It was their lunch break, and Mark Reddinger, the arborist crew leader, was hunched over something. When he stood, I saw him holding a baby raccoon by the scruff of its neck. The crew found a […]
Text and photos by David Jonathan Cohen Two parks – one compact and the other sprawling – offer havens to wildlife in Forest Hills. Astonishing diversity is dense in Linnean Park. Pieces of four streets mark its perimeter: Broad Branch Terrace, 33rd Street, Linnean Avenue, and Fessenden Street. The park owes its resurgence to daylighting […]
by Marlene Berlin Early spring wildflowers are not the season’s only ephemeral beauties. The white-throated sparrow is visiting us for only a brief time. It arrives in the early spring from the southern states and leaves for New England and Canada when the weather here gets too hot for it. I have heard one at […]
by Marlene Berlin I know of one show that has not been postponed or cancelled. It’s free and open to the public. The outdoor temperature just has to be warm enough for its performers. The American toads take center stage, trilling along with the high pitches of the spring peepers and the leopard frog’s faint […]
by Marlene Berlin Some lessons of the bird feeder: Birds definitely have a pecking order. Never bet against a determined squirrel. And birds and squirrels aren’t the only creatures interested in its contents. A few nights ago, a mouse came to try its hand at getting seed out of the feeder. It did not hang […]
