Goodbye, Andrew Miller! Goodbye, Yankees!

This morning the Yankees announced that they've traded closer Andrew Miller to Cleveland.

With that trade, they also lost a full-season ticket holder for next year (and I've put up for resale most of my tickets for the rest of this year). Andrew Miller was the last Yankees player I could cheer for unabashedly. I like a few of the players who are left, but none enough to buy a T-shirt with their number or chant their names. I do like Carlos Beltran, but he won't be a Yankee much longer, nor will some of the other players I've rooted for in the past.

As I wrote in Andrew Miller Is Still the Closer on May 26, Aroldis Chapman was a disgrace to the Yankees uniform. I was thrilled when he was traded to the Cubs last week. I thought that meant that I could now stay for full games and not leave after the eighth inning.

But now I have no reason to even go to the games. The Yankees have no outstanding players left, and they are playing mediocre baseball — they're not even bad enough to be a joke.

If my tickets sell, I will happily be in Central Park or some other outdoor location to photograph nature. If my tickets don't sell, I will drag myself reluctantly to Yankee Stadium and cheer the players on the opposing teams who used to be my favorite Yankees. It's one thing to get my money back, it's another to just throw it away altogether.

On June 26, I went to the Canon Photo Day at Yankee Stadium (one of the perks of being a full-season ticket holder) and had my photo taken with Andrew Miller. It was one of the highlights of my year.

Andrew Miller on June 26, at the Canon Photo Day at Yankee Stadium. The highlight of my year.

I wasn't going to watch today's game, but turned it one while I wrote this. I just heard one of the announcers saying that it's hard to imagine the Yankees making it to the playoffs this year. Yes, indeed. Or next year, or any other year, as long as Yankees management signs players who are abusers and trades players who are worth cheering for.

Goodbye, Yankees. As I've learned from dropping other season tickets and subscriptions, after a while, I won't miss them. As long as Brian Cashman is general manager, and the Yankees are more concerned about making money than in playing good baseball, I'll spend my money elsewhere.

Oh, Rats! Let's Hope the Dry Ice Works

Following up on my posting of July 5, The Rat Patrol in Tompkins Square Park, there has been some recent publicity about the use of dry ice in the city parks to control the rats.

A Tompkins Square Park "baby" hanging out on a fence, July 27, 2016.

A story on July 25 by The New York Daily News, New York City Hopes to Solve Rat Problem With Dry Ice, quotes the wonderful Laura Goggin, who does such brilliant work chronicling the Tompkins Square Park red-tailed hawks on her blog. The article notes that the city is experimenting with dry ice in the parks.

City Health Dept. Hopes Dry Ice Can Eliminate Its Rodent Problem, on the NY1.com Web site on July 27, notes that the dry ice has reduced the rats in Columbus Park in Chinatown. I was interviewed for the video, but was cut out (no problem!), but you can see a little snippet of me in my pink top and Yankees cap. The interview with Sharron Crocker made it into the report, and she cogently adds the hawk-chaser perspective. 

As I noted in my blog posting, rat poison is a less-than-effective way of controlling rodents, but is so terribly lethal to our red-tailed hawks, pets and other wildlife. I commend the New York City Department of Health for trying a different solution, and the New York City Parks Department for trying to keep poison out of the parks. According to the NY1 report, the dry ice seems to be working.

When I was in Tompkins Square Park on July 26, Christo (the male red-tailed hawk parent) caught and ate a rat. I'll be posting video soon, but here's a still photo. This is what scares us so much — that the hawks will eat a poisoned rat and we will lose these magnificent birds.

Christo eating a rat in Tompkins Square Park, July 26, 2016.

Tompkins Square Park, July 27, 2016.

Tompkins Square Park, July 27, 2016.

I'll be posting more Tompkins Square Park videos soon. In the meantime, here's Part V of the July With the Tompkins Square Hawks series. It covers the afternoon I spent there on July 14. It's long (of course), but just skip around and enjoy these awesome animals.

Splish, Splash! in Tompkins Square Park

Chasing hawks has many, many rewards. One of the most exciting experiences is to see young red-tailed hawks cooling off in the water. I've done a couple of videos already, and here's another. This is Part VIII of the July With the Tompkins Square Park Hawks series. I'm jumping from Part IV to Part VIII, because July 22 was such a great day for watching the babies and a parent. I'll give you Parts V, VI and VII soon.

July 22, in the sprayer area north of the bathrooms in Tompkins Square Park.

The afternoon started out with one baby hawk finding some leftover pigeon on a branch on the east side of the park. We watched the kid for a while, until the youngster flew north. We then found two youngsters (not sure if one was the same one we just had, or the two other kids) in the play area north of the bathrooms. At first they were in trees looking down on the spray, but the day was very, very hot, and the water way too enticing. Down they came! The people were really great, allowing the hawks their time in the water without disturbing them.

Lest you think the kids had no adult supervision, Christo was sitting in the bird bath nearby, keeping an eye on the children. (I think it was Christo. If Dora, let me know!) When the kids flew to a nearby fence, Christo flew to a tree over the water. One of the kids flew over and dislodged him, and he flew south (maybe to another water park?). The kids stayed for a while, drying off.

Children in the water need supervision, and Christo is keeping an eye on them.

I hope you enjoy the video of this wonderful time in Tompkins Square Park. It was such a thrill to be a part of their little hawky lives on one very hot afternoon.