Hey ...this is "week 26" ... slap in the middle of the year ... and sure enough, I've NEVER seen anything rare in said week 26 .... Week 25's been a bit duff too.... or rather, two ..... Red-Necked Phalarope ...... Hudsonian Whimbrel Week 27 ? Not too bad .... Pec Sand Collared Pratincole Buff-breasted Sandpiper ( Little Egret ... 5/7/1987 .. they were ultra-rare then ) (it was widely twitched !] ..it has to be admitted, they were all a long,long long time ago. .. more recently, today was OK ... mainly getting 20+ Painted Ladies at a local Garden Centre. I'm not sure I've ever seen that many in one place .. ... no optics required ! Simple pleasures. But ... have I wasted my younger years ?
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Unfortunately, this "poem" isn't one of mine .... I found it in an anthology of "nonsense poems" and it was actually written by one John Skelton ?1460-1529. [ although this one isn't really "nonsense" at all ] [ You will be surprised to hear that I have rather a lot of books of "nonsense" ] Itte be a bitt wandery abowt, sew hav I chowse " Ye beste bittes" Yore taske, shoudde you undertayke itte, is to wurkke owte watte theym byrdes be, and a-watte they be a-dwyn. To wepe with me loke that ye come, All maner of byrdes in your kynd; So none be left behynde. To mornynge loke that ye fall With dolorous songes funerall, Some to synge, and some to say, Some to wepe, and some to pray, Every byrde in his laye: The goldfynche, the wagtayle; The janglynge jay to rayle, The fleckyd pye to chatter Of this dolorous mater. And Robyn Redbrest He shall be the preest, The requiem masse to synge, Softly warbelynge, With helpe of the red sparow And the chattrynge swallow, The herse for to halow. The larke with his long to; The spynke and the martynet also; The shovelar with his brode bek; The doterell, that folyshe peck; And also the mad coote, With a bald face to toote; The feldefare and the snyte; The crowe and the kyte; The ravyn called Rolfe, His playne song to solfe; The partryche, the quayle; The plover with us to wayle; The woodhacke,that syngeth 'chur', Horsly, as he had the mur; The lusty chauntyng nyghtyngale; The popyngay to tell her tale, That toteth oft in a glasse, Shall rede the gospell at masse; The mavys with her whystell Shall rede there the pystell. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Thatt were jyste ye starrt ... mych mor to cumme. Witt ye Lorde's bowntwrfyl blessyng. I heyre thatte thatte "Stormzey" be syngyne atte Glastyrnbry .... ..... lykke thys I wysshe Right then folks .. wake up and sort this little puzzle out .... here's a sequence of ..... yes ... birds .... You might, however, be outwitted,your brain might become clotted, it might drive you totally dotty,your ego, such as it is, could possibly be flattened and/or battered. But ...don't bottle it ..... scatter your doubts to the wind and battle on ..... And your mission, should you choose to carry it out, is to see what's going on, sequence-wise, and to see how far it can go ...... [0] Bittern [1] Coal Tit [2] Mistle Thrush [3] Short-toed Treecreeper [4] Oystercatcher [5] [6] Red-Throated Pipit [7] Great Shearwater [8] Lady Amherst's Pheasant [9] Thrush Nightingale [10] [11] [12] Ok ...how far can it go ? Here's a bit of nifty guitar-playing while you're thinking about all that .... In case you're completely stuck, here's a link to a hint ...........
51-the-cliff-lift-swift-and-other-mythical-birds.html After that thing I wrote about Eve Slane, I got a email from a reader (!)( Bill) to tell me that not only did he know her well, but also that she died just a few weeks ago at the age of 72 .... by which time her UK list had gone up to 27 ! It was only 2 posts ago (526) that I wrote about her extraordinary life I thought I had to commemorate her in some way .... so here we go ... So, Farewell then Eve Slane ! A life punctuated by birds. But very few compared to Lee Evans and his ilk. Anyway ... I'm glad you did that modest "twitch" just two doors up even though you dipped out. And now you've dipped out for good. Keith's mum assures me you will "get" that Nuthatch up there. Bill told me you always wanted a stair lift. So I hope you had a stairway to heaven ... (In the style of) E.J. Thribb, 17½ There I was, strolling along the Flinty landscape,when what should I encounter but a council employee gleefully whizzing around on a huge machine slicing down a massive great swathe of grass ... but it wasn't "just" grass .. it was a lovely, weedy field. Weedy in the best sense of the word. He was having a whale of a time .... tearing along, swerving right and left, going round in bigger and bigger circles...... and leaving behind a devastated, insect-free, squodged and destroyed web of thriving, interactive life ..... beetles, butterflies, moths, woodlice, spiders,caterpillars and the like, which would have been, in turn, food for loads of other creatures in the food chain. It wasn't as if all that vegetation was getting in anybody's way. And it wasn't his fault ..... those all-knowing Masters of the Universe known as "council officials" had sent him out on his glorious, pointless and in fact highly destructive mission. Oh, they're bright sparks that lot. Round our way if often seems that they can do nothing right at all. You would scarcely believe it. Do these people not listen to anything or anybody ? Is pig-ignorance the bog-standard level of competence ? Think carefully now ! Er .... YES. Anyway, I'm going to write to my MP about it. That'll put the shits up them, I bet. But I'm not betting much. About 2/6 in old money. Sic transit gloria mundi. Come on then ...uplifting music is the thing ..... and you won't find anything more wonderful than this .... bloody anthemic ..... We hear far too much about all those top birders who whoosh around the country squashing hedgehogs and polluting the atmosphere. Squirrel-Squashers is what they are. Moth-mashers. Blackbird-bashers. Sparrow-squidgers. Fieldfare-flatteners. Seriously ... what bloody use are they to anybody ? No use at all. Personally, I blame that Lee Evans. If anything, they're worse than useless. " Oh, I'm on 478 !" " You're crap .... I'm on 507 so there ." " 507 ! Shite .... I'm on 512 ... eat that, dogface !" I think we should all look up respectfully to Eve Slane ! She is a bird watcher, and has been all her life. And so far she has spotted 23 species of birds in the UK. Not that she's ever been out of the UK. She's only once been out of Macclesfield. And that was in the back of an ambulance. No ticks available. She's enjoyed every one of those 23 species.. And still does. She only "twitched" something once. Here's the sad sorry tale .... as indeed these things often are .... The lady two doors up called round to let her know there was a Nuthatch on her peanut feeder. She ordered a taxi so Eve could get there in a reasonable time ..... Eve was a bit reluctant at first, but she was persuaded to have a go at it, but when she got there it couldn't be relocated. She enjoyed the tea and jaffa cakes though.. Then she went back to her house in the taxi. Luckily it only had to wait 48 minutes. Quite rightly, she vowed never to waste her precious time and energy dashing off on mad twitches ever again. Quite right too. There are limits you know. She's only "on" 23 ..... but she ain't bothered by that at all. Afterthought.... you know, I can't help feeling there's something strangely familiar about that name ... Eve Slane. Something odd about it.
Surely it can't be ....... "The Lark Ascending" got played on the radio yesterday..... I asked The Significant Otter if it made her feel happy or sad. She found it very happy and uplifting. But I've always thought of it as a deeply, profoundly sad. ...so ...have a listen and see how you react to it. ............ you don't need to listen to all of it ... it goes on a bit ..... I don't know what Vaughan Williams was intending when he wrote it. I would imagine that he has romanticised the whole business of being a lark. But to me, it epitomises the futility of it all . The lark knows no purpose to its life. It doesn't "know" what it is doing, or why. Larks have been doing it for millennia ..... for what ? So they can carry on doing it for more meaningless millennia ? All it is, when it comes down to it, is a "container" for its genes. And it is, unwittingly, relentlessly, programmed to make sure they're passed on. Just like I wrote a short while ago ..or rather, Bob Dylan did .... ..."are birds free from the chains of the skyway ?" ...and my reply is .... no they're not ! OK ... we've had some music of debatable jollytude/glumlyness ... ..... we've had a bit of thinking about it .... .... what we need now is a picture ... preferably something witty and pithy. ..... even, perhaps, marginally relevant ! ........only 18 years ? They can forget that ! Here's another interesting, but flawed, option .... and here's an individual determined to spread his genes more liberally ..... Well, I hope that's made up for that rather dystopian start .... ........... maybe this will help ...... ... and even that, when it all comes down to it, is totally about making sure your genes get passed on to the the next generation, preferably pleasurably.
And if you don't, you're " genetically dead" ... oh dear !!!!! It's a strange thing, the way all those foreigners name birds ..... ..................... here's two extremes ... The Germans are normally very terse .... most of their bird names are squashedintoasinglecompoundword .... whereas the French seem to enjoy making the name as l o n g - w i n d e d as they possibly can by stringing loads of adjectives onto the noun. Just so you can see what I mean , here's a little thing for you to have a go at.... Here's a sequence of German birds ....... I want you to follow on with a final one that continues the sequence ... just one will do ..... Adler Amsel Eisvogel Krähe Meise Möwe Reiher Rotkehlchen Saatkrähe Schwalbe Star Taube ? And now, after all that excitement and struggle, an interesting spot of music .. "Tom Tiddler's Ground" is the land between the tides .... that comes and goes ... I thought you had passed, but you caught me at last,
Where you know I could never be worn. And now that you're here, and you finally hear, It's so clear on the wings of the dawn. Where your smile starts to shine, as you breath in the brine Of the spray on the very same day. The same day we all go, when we're sure that we know, What it is to be floating away. And there's a lovenest, on Tom Tiddler's Ground And there's a lovenest, on Tom Tiddler's Ground And there's a lovenest, on Tom Tiddler's Ground Long before Eden, was lost and found. But you know you'll have to be kind, if you're ever gonna find, The place that your face could have been shown. Especially when you don't dare, to force anyone there, To share in the ice being blown. And there's a lovenest... And you heard me say 'yes', but you know its a guess, As somebody else shouted 'no'. And you know freedom is free, of all the forces that be, And the ice that you too thought you should throw. And there's a lovenest... I thought you had passed, but you caught me at last, Where you know I could never be worn. And now that you're here, and you finally hear, It's so clear on the wings of the dawn. And you know freedom is free, of all the forces that be, And the ice that you too thought should be thrown. And there's a lovenest... Today's "thing" seems remarkably unlikely, but we'll give it go The Californian Bush Jay has been observed by scientists to give “funerals” for other birds – gathering, and giving a special call, known as a “scold” - regardless of species. ( I told you it seemed to be rather unlikely ) ( Even the photograph seems a bit other-worldly) ( Anyway, who are these "scientists) ( Shouldn't they be doing something "useful") (Disclaimer ... the following poem is not mine .... I wish it was, but it ain't ) Said the Jay, he was my brother, Though we had feathers of a different colour Though his land was different from my own, And from different eggs we had grown Still, he was my brother, And we mourn him just the same Chorus Once we dreamed of wings, the lightest secrets of flying things Now earth holds us down, and we close our eyes But just as all who fly, with wings unclipped they should see the sky I will let the tears roll, for all who fall Said the Jay, we'll sing the song Of all his loves and his battles, his whole life long All the air he held beneath his wing, All the joy he did bring We'll sing his song, And we'll mourn him just the same Chorus Said the Jay, hear me scold, To bring all our kind to the memory of his soul, A stranger, or friend, you have never known From a distant land he may have flown Still, hear me scold For we'll mourn him just the same Chorus Here's that song, actually sung .... rather beautifully ..... Last night I went mad and attached the tripe-hod to the Jelly-scope for the first time in ages. I don't normally do it, because the whole arse-jumbly weighs about 8 tonnes and I'm much too old and deep-crepit to carry the blasted thing. That's why I don't arsejumble it very often. I can just about manage it with the monopod, as the bishop must surely have said to that actress ..whoever she was. Anyway, why doesn't she do the talking ?Eh ? But .... but ...why ? Why did I tackle this cone-scraption ? Well, it was 10:15 post-Marillion and it was just dusky enough to spot Jupiter, everyone's flavourite planet, low darn in the Sarf-East. And The Significant Otter showed some faint stirrings of interest. Blimey. So .... 8 mins later, the assemblage was carted outside and stood standing at the ready, adjusted to Otter-Height. BUT ..... in that 8 minute "minute" inter-mini-val the clouds had rolled in like a tragic carpet and ob-scoured the bloody lot. Spode's blasted Law had won again .... whenever there's something up there ..... ......... the clouds roll in... and/or rain, thunder, fog ........ grrrrr. And we didn't even hear any birds either. The only other interesting thing is .... it's the Longest Day. I've never spotted a rare bird on the longest day ..... you would think that with all that extra daylight it might be one of the very best sort of days for "that sort of thing." Maybe the interminable heat gets in the way. The only thing of note is .... 15 years ago on this very day, me and Mike Flower flew to Lithuania .. so there. You'll be fascinated and surprised to hear that I've written all about it on here, in four gripping/griping inthrallments...... 288-when-i-was-in-lithuania-part-1.html 293-when-i-was-in-lithuania-part-2.html 389-when-i-was-in-lithuania-part-3.html 486-when-i-was-in-lithuania-the-final-installment.html I've read them all, and was tho-roughly squoggled.. ... and yes, I know we've had this bit of music before, but it's very "appropriate" and bloody gorgeous ...... like me, in fact .... on a good day .... |
AuthorThat's the author up there ... I was young and sprightly then. Archives
October 2022
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