Wildlife of Harvard Yard

1. Some of you have probably heard about the recent cow-grazing in Harvard Yard. The occasion was the retirement party for Harvey Cox, the Hollis Professor of Divinity. The Hollis Professorship of Divinity dates back to 1722 (apparently it's the oldest endowed chair in the country), and one of the official perks is the right to graze your cows in Harvard Yard. No one has done this since Edward Wigglesworth in the 1700s, but Prof. Cox thought his retirement party would be a good time to bring back the tradition.


(Sadly, I missed this because I had class that afternoon.)

2. There is a hawk living in Harvard Yard this fall. This actually doesn't seem as far-fetched to me as it does to some other people: I saw a red-tailed hawk swooping around in Tercentenary Theater once sophomore year. But it's new to actually have the hawk living in the Yard. Its favorite spot is a tree next to the Phillips Brooks House, but it likes to go all over the place, even up to the Law School, close to my dorm. On the campus tour they gave us, we walked past the hawk sitting in a tree and marking its territory by screaming. It wasn't identical to the clichéd sound effect from Westerns, but it was pretty close.

A few days ago I was walking past Matthews when I saw a bunch of little white feathers floating down from the sky. I was very confused until I looked up into the nearest tree. These feathers had once belonged to a seagull or something. But this particular seagull had wound up as dinner.

The Harvard Hawk strikes again.