Staten Island on the fly fishing

 The subway tunnels which were damaged during the Sandy storm of two years ago
have been repaired and subway service to the Staten Island Ferry have been restored.

It is always a pleasant ferry ride to Staten Island.  On the starboard side of the ferry you can see
the new Freedom Tower in lower Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty as well as the harbor.  Brooklyn is on the port side and you can see a spectacular view of the Verrazano Bridge linking Brooklyn and Staten Island.

I was able to visit two new lakes on Staten Island's north shore today and an old favorite, Clove Lake.
Silver Lake, Clove Lake and Willowbrook lake can all be reached by taking the same bus,  S61 from the ferry terminal in St. George, Staten Island.

The new place I visited

Looking north

Chinese Scholars Garden

I believe this is a blue heron.  I saw no fish here but I will return again.

Looking north east ( Chinese Scholars Garden in the upper right hand corner).

A tiny pond looking south.

 

Another heron but this time It was in Clove Lake

Whenever you see this bird, you can be sure that there are fish in the water. 

Second lake at Clove Lake Park , Martling lake.

Clove Lake Park consists of three lakes, Clove, Martling and Brook Lakes.  I saw no fish
activity until 4:00 pm.  The lake was calm .  There was no wind.  Carp began to feed on the surface
about ten meters from shore.  They continued to feed for about an hour never coming closer to shore.

Clove Lakes Park derives its name from the Dutch word “kloven,” meaning cleft. The particular cleft is the valley and brook betweenEmerson Hill and Grymes Hill. This valley was deepened by the glacier 20,000 years ago. The brook which ran through the valley originated in Clove Swamp and ran to the Kill Van Kull. The damming of this brook over the years created the different lakes and ponds in the area.

Clove Lakes Park has outcroppings of Serpentine group rock at the crest of the hills. The spine of Staten Island is a broad ridge of serpentine, which was formed during the Ordovician period (435-500 million years ago) when heat and pressure altered rocks rich in magnesium and iron. Ash green in color, serpentine is named after the patterns in the rock that resemble snake skin. Its mineral composition includes fibrous chrysotile (known commercially as asbestos), talc, olivine (green lava grains) as well as ferromanganese, a mineral containing magnesium and iron.
Clove Lakes Park is home to many species of indigenous wildlife. Visitors can see fish such as Brown Bullhead, Bluegill, Pumpkinseed, Largemouth Bass, and Carp, birds, such as Red Tailed Hawk, Kingfisher, Cormorant, Red-Winged Blackbird, Canada Geese, and Mallard, as well as reptiles and amphibians, like the Common Snapping Turtle, Eastern Painted Turtle, Red Eared Slider, and occasionally even the Red Back Salamander. The park is also home to mammals, like Gray Squirrels, Muskrat, Eastern Cottontail and the Eastern Chipmunk.