What a lousy, cheap-trick title. I hope you like those "waves" ..... very "impressionistic." Yesterday I clocked a Common Tern swooping around the Marina. And the Marina is linked to the canal. And the canal goes right past my house. Rather strangely, both Common and Arctic Terns are on my house list. Back in the "good old days" Common Terns would swoop by my house on foraging missions... which was good. Tick-wise, anyway. There was a decent colony of them on the far side of the estuary salt-marsh. And then, over several years, Arctic terns sort of took over. So they got onto my house list as well. And then, a few years later, they went too. Hardly ever to be seen again in my little 3K patch. Bah. I still used to get them all + Black Terns, Sarnys, Little's during seawatches... but now the best place for that is a "Place I don't go to." See link below... it's a cracking read if you like that sort of thing .... 11-places-i-dont-go.html There's still quite a few species I want on my House List... Little Egret ought to be there, Waxwing ... I've tried, I've tried ..... bloody Osprey . Bah . Then there's all the ones I've only house-ticked once. Once !! Ouch !!! Not that I'm desperate or 'owt. Any road up, let's have some music. The Joy Formidable " A Heavy Abacus" This is full-on stuff !
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Well, I don't know about you, but my favourite bird report is the London one ... it's cleverly called the London Bird Report. Having "lived" in London for 2 years as a tender youth way back in the early 70's I can assure you that seeing any birds at all in central London is a wonderful thing. And the whole " London Bird Report" concept is based on that simple idea .. when you see stuff in London, it's a " Dancing on the Ceiling" moment. Wo ! Cripes ! Jings! Briwsion ! Wizard! .... and such like. [ Warning: don't actually try dancing on the ceiling.... it's not worth it. The view is crap.] Anything higher up the "rarity chain" than Pied Wag is scribbled down in your little notebook.... do people still do that? So I see the London Bird Report as something rather like those notebooks kept by the inmates of Prisoner of War camps in Germany who watched Black Redstarts obsessively .... making the best of a bad job. Triumph in Adversity, that sort of thing. Have a gander at this, from the 1992 report .... just imagine being that observer .. it's the 3rd of May 1992 ... the writer is A. Stride ....the place is Stocker's Lake...I'm not going to show you the title of this piece for dramatic reasons... hold on to your seat here .. "I noticed what appeared to be a flock of gulls flying high in the distance about one and a half miles away. Thinking that it was strange for a flock of gulls to be around at this time of year I kept watching them through my binoculars. As they came closer I could see that they were all white in appearance; the birds then changed direction and flew towards Garretts Wood, it was at this stage that I realised that all eight birds were egrets. I couldn't believe my eyes. The birds flew in a straight line with a rather roller-coaster flying action as the flock undulated along. All eight birds flew over the lake and disappeared out of sight behind some tall trees on the north west side., by the river Colne - the time was 08.05 hrs.I ran panic-stricken to Stocker's House to ask if I could use the phone and tell Richard Drew ( the warden at Stocker's) of this amazing spectacle, unfortunately his wife told me that he was out birdwatching at Portland Bill for the day. Not knowing what to do I sprinted round the lake to the area where I had last seen the birds disappear. I slowed down as I reached the north west corner and then got onto my hands and knees and crawled along the path alongside the river Colne looking through the gaps in the tall vegetation to see if I could see the birds in the field on the other side of the river; suddenly I glimpsed two egrets wandering around feeding quite close to two ponies. But once again my eyes seemed to be deceiving me - these were not Little Egrets, these were Cattle Egrets. After years of just seeing pictures of Cattle Egrets in field guides I had found some for myself. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ What about that ! ... for a start, back then ANY Egret was twitchable. No pagers of course.No mobiles. No dinky little cameras. no nothing! ... so he spent a good while trying to get somebody else to see them, and to contact almost anybody to come and see them. He wondered if there had been a mass break-out form some Zoo or other. Luckily a few local birders did turn up, and eventually he managed to get a message to Birdline South East ... it was a different world then folks. And maybe, a better one. My London bird list was absolute rubbish. No car, no money, no information, nowt. Not that I'm complaining or anything. Not me. But now, in a crunching clash of gears, here's the excellent Tranmere-Rovers-Supporter-Band Half Man Half Biscuit with the terrific and funny " Restless Legs" Here she lies in a fleecy gown
By my side in the eiderdown But she can't get a ticket to Morning Town Cause I've got restless legs Slumber still won't visit me So long as you stay next to me For I have restless legs Milky drink and Sudafed "That should sort you out" she said As I kicked myself clean out of the bed And raised my restless legs Call me a puppet. Cures I've sought All in all they've come to naught I wish it was some astronaut Who had these restless legs 4:06 and I'm wide awake Got an uncontrollable urge to take A 5-mile hike around the ? lake And stretch these restless legs No sympathy from Uncle Greg Nor indeed from Auntie Meg Well Thank God I'm not Jake the Peg With an extra restless leg So come the day when I don't exist And worms are flying through the graveyard mist Don't go calling the excorcist It's just my restless legs It's just my restless legs It's just my restless legs Blimey ... things were very different when I was young. One time I had agreed to drive my daughter to University, and shortly before we set off I found out that there was a White-tailed Eagle about 60 miles from her dropping-off point ... so I drove her the 250 or so miles ...dropped her off .....picked up a souvenir pebble off the beach at Southwold, slept in the car .... drove to the WTE site, got it ( bloody massive ..... when it flew off, pursued by about 30 corvids, they looked like sparrows next to it. ) ...... drove back home. No problem. I don't do that sort of thing anymore ... anyway, the next one I saw I actually found .... which was nice. I was really on the look-out for fly-by Ospreys at the time, and whilst scoping around I spotted this MASSIVE bird way way way away getting mobbed by about 200,000 gulls, corvids etc.... and then it went behind some hills. So I put that down to experience .... not really ID-able. Never-to-be-seen-again (?) But ... amazingly .... suddenly, it reappeared above me really high up ... it was bloody massive. There were two Marsh Harriers tailing it, and they looked tiny.... it was all most impressive. All the features were there in plain sight. White-tailed bloody Eagle. Whizzo. And I was only 10 miles from home. My home, that is. Not its.That's the way to do it. none of your blasted 600+ mile round trips. I'm hoping that the next one will be over my house. ... it's ages since I've had a house tick ...... my horizons are shrinking, like that Star Trek episode where the universe ( or something) got to be about the size of a cabin in the Enterprise. And if we draw a graph... 1st WTE ...... 300 miles away 2nd WTE....... 10 miles away 3rd WTE ........ the graph says .... smack over my house. They do say that getting old is like being punished for something you haven't done. How true. And I haven't done it. I wish I had now. Anyway, enough of this sad stuff ..... here's Kettcar to entertain us all ... you'll be incredibly surprised to discover that they're German ... here they are with the excellent, moody " Landungsbrücken" ... ( = jetties, piers) Wollte ich leben und sterben wie ein Toastbrot im Regen? [ that's a brilliant and odd line !]
wie ein betrunkener Hund im Zorn ohne Grund? die Erinnerungssplitter liegen herum ich tret rein. und verblutend am Elbstrand die Getränke sind alle noch ein letztes mal winken auf dem Weg aus der Leichenhalle immer zuviel oder zu wenig in mir als man ankam wollte man werden, die Geschichte schreiben, die Doofen sollen sterben, der Plan als man damals nach Hamburg kam An den Landungsbrücken raus, , dieses Bild verdient Applaus und noch 200 Meter und jetzt geht der Fallschirm auf, jetzt geht der Fallschirm auf. na dann herzlich Willkommen Zuhaus und ein letztes Mal winken und ich bin raus Aufstehen, Atmen, Anziehen und Hingehen. Zurückkommen, Essen und Einsehen zum Schluss: dass man weitermachen muss An den Landungsbrücken raus, dieses Bild verdient Applaus und noch 200 Meter und jetzt geht der Fallschirm auf, jetzt geht der Fallschirm auf na dann Herzlich willkommen Zuhaus ein letztes Mal winken und raus Löschen und spul zurück Löschen und spul zurück I don't know what this bird is. But I wish I'd seen one.... One of the items on the news this morning was about Puffins on the Farne Islands. Much of the air-time was spent reminding us how "comical" they are. And they are in decline. At the moment. It seems that that's more of a tragedy if they're " comical." Had they been some dowdy species like the lowly Dunnock, it wouldn't really matter. It was interesting to hear that "they" hadn't finished their survey yet, but last year they declined by 12 %. There must be quite a few then ... if they haven't finished the survey yet. Plus ... 12% of what ? A 12% decline in a population of 54000 isn't such a big deal. But a 12% decline if you've only got 54 of them is. No actual numbers were mentioned. Of course. Also ... there was no mention at all of how many there are in the world. Of course. Whether the UK has only 1% of the world population, or 87% of the world population is useful to know. But of course, we didn't get told that. So what it amounted to was ... a "comical" and therefore "interesting" bird had declined a little bit last season in what is probably a small outpost in a small country. Which could be totally due to chance factors, or it could be the sign of an imminent extinction, or all stations in between. We weren't told about any of that. Global warming got a mention. But actually, they don't know. Still, I expect the "researchers" are having a jolly time with their clip-boards and egg-counting etc. Maybe it could occur to them that their continual interference might have something to do with it ? Who knows ? One thing's for sure ... the "clip-board" brigades are increasing "year on year." There's a famous, and true saying in the world of statistics... " Not everything that counts gets counted, and not everything that gets counted counts." And, of course, another thing in this context has to be ... why do interviewers never ask the right questions ? Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr !! If we really want to help "the cheery Puffin" we could knock down all those mountains of ours and tip all the rubble into the sea to make lots of brilliant islands all round the coast, and tailor them to suit various types of seabird. That way, our soggy wet cold country would be dryer and less wet, because the air-masses wouldn't have to toil up the slopes and get colder and then deposit all that rain onto poor old us. And Dunnocks. Plus, it would save billions of gallons of fuel we waste hauling lorries and cars up the Pennines and the Grampians and the Lake District. Oddly, people don't seem to think much of the idea. What about the poor old, semi-comical Dotterel for example ? In today's tough world, semi-comical isn't enough. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ OK ..enough of silliness and gloom ... here's a song about nada = nothing. What a beautiful song .... and the words are on it so you can join in. In this dystopian world, joining in is a good thing. Well, if there's nothing to be seen, and it's a sunny day (the two often go together) then you can turn your scope through 180° and try to find some sunspots. Obviously, you don't look at them THROUGH the scope. That way blindness lies. You project the Sun's image onto a flat, pale surface .... your notebook is an obvious choice, or the flyleaf of whatever book you're carrying. All sensible people have a book with them ... [preferably in Welsh of course ]. It's a pretty spectacular thing to do. It got poor old Galileo into big trouble for a start. He got put in prison for saying the sun had spots on it ... the Sun is supposed to be "immaculate" - literally, without a spot. ( macula = a spot in Latin ). Observing them from day to day, you'll see them trundling along.... that's how we first realised that the sun rotates. They're not always anywhere near as spectacular as that lot up there. But even the dinky spots are a good bit larger than the entire Earth. Crumbs. Plus, they are very very hot ... thousands of degrees. They only look black because they're a lot less hot that the Sun's surface. But here's the exciting thing..... quite often when doing this, I've got into arguments with people. Oh yes. For a start, most people tell you that "we" can't see sunspots. Only "astronomers" can. And then they tell you that those spots aren't sunspots, just dust on the lens. So then you rotate the scope and the "spots" stay where they were. They don't like it. It tends to annoy them. Rather than believing you, they get angry. Smashing ! Then there's the hardliners who go down the "sling these dissenters in prison" route. I've had two of them. The "immaculate Sun" types. It takes all sorts. Incidentally, you can use the same "projection" technique to look at transits of planets ... I've been fortunate to watch transits of both Mercury and Venus in this way, as they drift across the Sun's image over a few hours. But those events are very ( very) rare indeed. Cook's marathon voyage to the Southern Hemisphere was mainly to observe a Transit of Venus . Plus, it's the ideal way to watch eclipses. I've set up the scope in our street quite a few times so that we all get to see it clearly. On a slightly different level, a few months ago I was in a hide with a few others, and it was as dead as a door-nail bird-wise.. Scanning around the skyline with my scope, I found that the incredibly faint sliver of the Moon was rising over the hills to the East. It looked totally beautiful, even ghostly. Looking for it with the naked eye, it couldn't be seen at all. With binoculars, you could just make it out, once you knew where it was. Everyone was dead chuffed to see it. Memorable. I'm wondering now what would be a suitably "relevant" bit of music. Well, me being me, we're going to have a beautiful version of a Gorky's Zygotic Mynci song, "Sbia ar y Seren" ( look at the star) .... mistakes and all ! A few posts ago I came up with the phrases " Teenage Ticks" and " Good for Gulls" ...and it occurred to me when re-reading them ( yes, I read my own stuff... ) that they were smashing song titles .... I mean, there's "Cool For Cats" which works. Except it's not about birds. Our Current Cat,"Lupin Pooter", is indeed ultra-cool. And then I got to thinking about actual bird-related songs.... there's lots of "bleedin' obvious" ones, but the one that came to mind first was Van Morrison's " Coney Island." I think he's the only performer we've ( Me and The S.O.) seen two nights running ... he was brilliant, but he told the same jokes both nights. Plus, he lived not far from where The Significant Otter grew up. Coney Island Coming down from Downpatrick Stopping off at St. John's Point Out all day birdwatching And the craic was good Stopped off at Strangford Lough Early in the morning Drove through Shrigley taking pictures And on to Killyleagh Stopped off for Sunday papers at the Lecale District, Just before Coney Island On and on, over the hill to Ardglass In the jam jar, autumn sunshine, magnificent And all shining through Stop off at Ardglass for a couple of jars of Mussels and some potted herrings in case We get famished before dinner On and on, over the hill and the craic is good Heading towards Coney Island I look at the side of your face as the sunlight comes Streaming through the window in the autumn sunshine And all the time going to Coney Island I'm thinking, Wouldn't it be great if it was like this all the time. We go there almost every summer, usually staying near Groomsport. It's such a remarkable and beautiful area, and almost completely devoid of " other people " as well. Those islands up there ...there's hundreds of them over the whole of Strangford Lough, and more offshore as well.
It's "Good for Gulls" as well. ..and when I was young, "Teenage Ticks" too. Plus, up at the top end there, offshore of Scrabo, I watched a UFO in broad daylight for about 10 minutes .... if it wasn't a UFO, then I don't know what the hell it was. So there ! Maybe I'll write about that sometime ... and maybe not. We don't want those Men in Black coming round. I'm a mysterious old Hector. You will be able to guess what "tylluan" means I expect. And "wen" = "gwen" = white. And I've told you about "wedi marw" before. This morning I was walking (v.slowly) "The Shredder" along the estuary embankment in the searing heat ...when I found a dead Barn Owl in the grass at the edge of the marsh. . I'm fairly sure it must be the one that me and other local birders have been seeing sporadically. Most of it was reasonably intact, there were a few clumps of detached feathers scattered around , but its head was missing. Although I'm a fairly unsentimental old Hector, I felt very sad. If it had eggs/young, that's probably the end of them too. I didn't have my proper, but dinky, camera with me so I used the crappy duff one on my mobile phone. Astonishingly, they've come out quite well. Even more astonishingly, I have just now found out how I can get them off the phone and onto the computer... well, obviously I have. That means I can get the others ones off there too. I shall put them on this when I've done it. A whole new world of cacky snaps has opened up in the mini-birding household ! Plus, on the brighter side, there were 2 Stock Doves on the edge of the Flooded Field. They've always been a good bird to get around here, but they've got much scarcer over the last few years, so I was v. chuffed to see them. [ If all goes well, some more snaps will appear eventually, in the fullness of time etc.] Yes, it went well.... look at those claws and imagine all the rodents they have squidged. Here's another thing I used to do when there was nowt much to see from the hide. One particular hide had a huge hardboard Bearded Tit screwed to the side wall. It was about 3m high ! Well, over a period of a couple of months "we" that is, any of us conspirators who were in there on us own, we would shift it a bit to the right. About 3 inches at a time. There were only 4 screws holding it in place, so it wasn't too tricky, as long as you had the right stuff with you. We got really quick too... with two of us it took about 5 minutes. On a couple of occasions people came in while we we in mid-shift. We told them we had found it on the floor, so we were putting it back. It worked. Every time. Eventually,after a few weeks of gradually trundling rightwards, it got to the right edge of the wall. Nobody seemed to have noticed, which was a bit disappointing really. So, over the next couple of months, we slowly shifted it back ... and not only that, we carried on moving it further and further leftwards, so it finished up tight against the left-hand corner ! For the first half of the return trip it was really quick because we used the old screw-holes. Synergy ! Our final, and most amazing thing was .... we made another one !! It wasn't too hard to match the colours .. .it wasn't perfect,but it was pretty close. Nobody seemed to notice the difference anyhow. They're still there to this day ! Side by side, neat as 'owt !! We did consider making more of them, but we didn't want to push our luck .... we were amazed that we'd got that far. We've considered shrinking them little by little, week by week ...and then, of course, growing them back again. That's what happens in Roald Dahl's Nab Wrc.... which is, of course, the Welsh version of Esio Trot. Except it's a tortoise not a Bearded Tit . But enough of dreams ....it's time for Bon Iver ( Bon hiver ) and the interestingly titled "Holocene" .... Someway, baby, it's part of me, apart from me
You're laying waste to Halloween You fucked it friend, it's on its head, it struck the street You're in Milwaukee, off your feet And at once I knew I was not magnificent Strayed above the highway aisle (Jagged vacance, thick with ice) I could see for miles, miles, miles 3rd and Lake it burnt away, the hallway Was where we learned to celebrate Automatic bought the years you'd talk for me That night you played me 'Lip Parade' Not the needle, nor the thread, the lost decree Saying nothing, that's enough for me And at once I knew I was not magnificent Hulled far from the highway aisle (Jagged vacance, thick with ice) I could see for miles, miles, miles Christmas night, it clutched the light, the hallow bright Above my brother, I and tangled spines We smoked the screen to make it what it was to be Now to know it my memory And at once I knew I was not magnificent High above the highway aisle (Shake it, fake it, stick with us) I could see for miles, miles, miles On this very day in 1989 I went to see the Baillon's Crake which was "frequenting" (as they say) a tiny scratty park lake in Sunderland. The odd thing about it was, "they" had had to put out a request for people "not to pick it up."! Now that's a pretty strange thing to have to say, but it was truly mega-tame. there we all were lined up in a giant row along the edge of the lake, and the bird itself calmly strolled along the waterline pecking at invertebrates ( this probably includes some of the attendees). It had a good peck at my shoelaces, and the bloke next on from me watched it walk onto his boots and peck at them. Crumbs. It was also remarkably tiny. Another strange thing was the close proximity of shoppers ...and indeed, shops. Plus, the weather was good and the journeys ( all by myself) there and back were OK. It was my approximately 358th UK tick. I'll find the list soon I'm sure. Hmmm. I HAVE found my photograph of the event but, typically, I can't currently find the blasted camera.I'll stick it on here tomorrow. But I'm posting this now because I want it to be the same date as when I saw it ... I'm a nostalgic old Hector. Right ... that's enough nostalgification for now .... let's have a burst of top music with Klee and "Erinner dich" ... ( erinnern = to remind (of)) ... Die Sonne scheint Es riecht wie Frühjahr und die Farben leuchten Erinner dich An die Zeit als alles noch neu war (Alles so neu war) Erinner dich, an die Luft und an das Licht und an mich Erinner dich, an die Farben an das Licht und da war ich Erinner dich, es riecht nach Gras und deine Hand hält meine Hand Erinner dich, meiner Liebe, deiner Liebe Die Sonne scheint, nur einen Moment nur ein Gedanke Erinner dich, an die Farben an das Licht und da war ich Erinner dich, an die Luft und an das Licht und an mich Erinner dich, da war ich Erinner dich, da war ich Erinner dich, da war ich Erinner dich, an die Farben an die Luft und da war ich Erinner dich und an mich Erinner dich Erinner dich, da war ich I hope you all noticed that descending riff nicked from a Cure song at 1m 40-ish . Right ... I've found the camera and here's my magnificent picture ... but to be honest, I'm not totally sure it's the right one. Luckily, it doesn't really matter.
This is ...or might be ...or isn't ... a primitive depiction of an ancient bird. .... .... and I found it ! Foreword ... by Jermaine Tinkleby ( Reader in Controversy Studies at the Uniworthlessly of Brumchesterton ) ( Though he insists that he's nothing of the sort) There are those conformist sort of people who read books the way the author intended.... but it's not the only way to go about things. After all, we've bought the bloody thing ...we can read it any way we like..... so read on ..... and enjoy this "extract" from " Birds of the Tropics" It has been estimated that there are scales, insect legs and wing-cases, seeds, in the form of "pellets", egg-shaped masses which have become adapted to exploit to both, of two requirements : food and birds with which he is familiar. More finches, which eat insects in the summer and use a salivary secretion to glue their eggs in books for the specialist ; or even because more people are becoming aware of wildlife, and the reason for these rather grotesquely inspired guesses. There are some 8600 species such as Cock-of-the-rock, which no accurate list of those which occur in the wires and electricity pylons have benefited the worst enemy that birds have. He grows and moves upon the surface of the tropical countries, but this is only a small criticism on many grounds, not the least of the full capacity of a particular place to the complete length of the branches. It would seem that a long, slim bottom as a protection against marauding nestlings, and it is most unlikely that some breed in the tropics do not, generally, provide food and breeding sites without those birds ( or their close relatives) which have been expected would be included. Well readers, that is all in the book, in fact it's all on pages 8 and 9 .. but I've not read it the way the author wanted me to. The first bit ... " It has been estimated that there are " is line 24 column 2 of p9 The bit that follows it ..... "scales, insect legs and wing-cases, seeds, " ........... is 9 lines up, column 1, p9 ...and the bit that follows that ... "in the form of "pellets", egg-shaped masses" ... is line 31, column 1, p9 ... and so on. This was great fun to do , and it produced a rather odd-feeling, slightly ungrammatical passage that did however make a sort of sense. It was all a bit surreal. I could have done a similar thing using any pages in the book, and in different ways. By spreading my net wider and using other pages I could have created a more sensible text, or a more surreal one. This idea was not mine. There was/is a "movement" called "Oulipu" which amongst other things propagated the idea that every text had within it an almost infinite numbers of other texts which could be revealed by different processes. And that's exactly what I did there. I could generate a whole panoply of texts from that book, or any book, using similar or different processes, revealing (?) different "realities" contained therein. One of my acquaintances only reads the "speech" bits of novels ..... it speeds things up considerably and cuts out all that descriptive rubbish about dusk falling over the cottage and the contents of Aunt Plumage's sideboard. Brilliant. And I've condensed several rather long-winded German novels dramatically by just reading the first and last sentence of each chapter. It's often a considerable improvement. But enough of literary theory ... let's have the music before we all go mad.. here's top German band Einsturzende Neubaten and one of their most famous songs ... " Stella Maris" .... |
AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
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