Video Off to bed, on a raft of feathers. Central Park

As the sun sets over the Central Park reservoir, female Buffleheads, a Pied-bill Grebe, Mallards, a raft of feeding Shoveler (filtering the water) and sleeping Ruddy Ducks… prepare for a night of feeding interspersed with rest. Scaup and Canvasback, too, used to winter in rafts of hundreds of birds, in the Sound, East River, Harbor and Hudson River. No more. Were they adversely affected by some pollutant on their breeding grounds, further north and to the west ? Protecting the environment cannot be a local phenomenon; things as diverse as water and migratory birds and the atmosphere tend to move around and stitch the different ecosystems, habitats, regions, continents of our world together. In the words of Rachel Carson: 'Seldom if ever does nature operate in closed and separate compartments.' Similarly, to nurture the nature of New York without helping to nurture every part of the planet to which we are connected would make no sense. To protect nature everywhere is to protect it at home.