Also: walking down Perth High Street last evening, a mallard duck sitting in a shop doorway. It's not Edinburgh....
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Leisure
Wildlife highlight of the day
(7166 posts)-
Posted 5 years ago #
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@IWRATS you are to the sparrowhawk, male and female as @jdanielp is to the kingfisher
Posted 5 years ago # -
Saying "male" when you described him as a fine boy seemed unnecessary?
I am undone. Though strictly speaking both IWRATS and CCE are unnecessary.
@IWRATS you are to the sparrowhawk, male and female...
I have been angling for this appointment for years. I am done up again.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Glad to help. Note also that your earlier claim in the Hawkstart thread about false spots of birds of prey IE that you are 100per cent accurate is inexplicably contra disputed by your inexplicable failure to name the male sparrowhawk on your wall, whilst previously posting erudite info on the pimpernel nature of the male sparrowhawk. But then, none of us be perfect?
Posted 5 years ago # -
your inexplicable failure to name the male sparrowhawk on your wall
To be fair, they probably hadn't been formally introduced.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I think sparrowhawks would have medieval knight names. Godefroy or something.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Posted 5 years ago #
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@unhurt, good price for those shorts.
The once and future king has a ranking for Falcons. Goshawk near top, Sparra near bottom. Take no offence, all hawks are loved
Posted 5 years ago # -
The things looked for were exactly that bit of that book. Not sure where my paperback is...
Posted 5 years ago # -
@unhurt
I remember that image from some management training I did.
Posted 5 years ago # -
The swan family were on the canal west of the City Bypass when I left work yesterday. They have a massive territory this year due to the lack of any competing swan families.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Hmm, I clearly spoke too soon given that I passed a pair of adult swans chilling out on the bank of the canal at Wester Hailes as I cycled home this evening... I passed the family heading west around Meggetland.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Just watched neighbour's powder grey Burmese cat make a mighty leap from our garden bench onto the wall. It then sat looking back at me saying with its eyes WTF did you do with the trampoline I used to climb on?
Posted 5 years ago # -
"That is to say, the birds of prey on high
Were perched, then small fowls without fail,
That eat, as Nature does them so incline,
Worms, or things of which I’ll tell no tale.
And waterfowl sat lowest in the dale;
But fowl that live on seeds sat on the green
So many there it was a wondrous scene.There might men the royal eagle find
Who with his keen glance pierces the sun,
And other eagles of a lesser kind
On which scholars love to run.
There was the tyrant with his feathers dun
And grey – I mean the goshawk, who’ll distress
Others with his outrageous greediness.The noble falcon, who with his feet will strain
At the king’s glove; sparrow-hawk sharp-beaked,
The quail’s foe; the merlin that will pain
Himself full oft the lark for to seek;
There was the dove with her eyes meek;
The jealous swan, that at his death does sing;
The owl too, that portent of death does bring; "The Parliament of Fowls, Geoffrey Chaucer, translation by A S Kline
Posted 5 years ago # -
"the tyrant" for a goshawk is perfect. Assume "the noble falcon" is a peregrine then?
Posted 5 years ago # -
@unhurt - I think so.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Chaucer is full of bird song:-
“The briddes synge, it is no nay,
The sparhauk and the papejay
That joye it was to heere,
The thrustelcok made eek hir lay,
The wodedowve upon a spray
She sang ful loude and cleere.”Posted 5 years ago # -
Back in the day i consorted with a blue russian cat, totally committed to reality, acted without indignity toward the local avian community
Ratso, you were a class act, your faux limp only confirmed your stature
Posted 5 years ago # -
Lovely words.
Posted 5 years ago # -
my dealings with the tifosi have not been so smooth
yet one day, we may appreciate the sulphate discount on offer
Posted 5 years ago # -
@bax San, my English relatives have a sort of long haired Jack Russell called Eddy. Getting a bit feart in his dotage but always partial to the fake limp. Often on a walk I am approached by a concerned local who asks, Do you know your dog has injured its paw. I bemuse them with a very stagey French accents and reply Thet's nut mwi dawg
Posted 5 years ago # -
@rosie and @unhurt, TH White riffing on Chaucer clearly.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I love the use of 'full' as an intensifier like the French 'bien'. You know full well...'.
We should bring this back.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@iwrats I believe that's cropped up in things I've read or heard but can recall it only occurring when a deliberate archaic flavouring is intended, except for the odd construction "going at it full beans" which I don't think I've heard for at least twenty years.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I very nearly ran over a pigeon under the railway bridge at Kingsknowe this morning. One was mooching around on the cobbles and didn't react to my approach quite as quickly as I'm used to them doing, which led to me braking to give it time to take off when it eventually decided that this was the best course of action. An oncoming cyclist gave me a smile as I passed them shortly after - I can only assume that a combination of audible braking and cursing moments before a startled pigeon and a slightly irritated cyclist exited from under the bridge was amusing from a distance.
Posted 5 years ago # -
A good hour watching common dolphins (I think) off Ynys Llanddwyn. Lots of interesting flowers as well. Plus every type of corvid seen on the Lon Las Cefni, including ravens a few metres away. There's some great cycling to be had in this part of Wales.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Woodpecker (black and white) flying from telegraph pole to telegraph pole on the long straight road from Walston South Lanarkshire to Biggar this morning 9a.m. Boiling hot.
Also many oystercatchers, two shelduck (white only) and several lapwing
In non black and white - a kestrel flew in front of us on the Whang with a little VoLe in its talons.
Walston has several pretty old farmhouses doing bed and breakfast. Some nice looking walking routes, a BT vintage phone box replacing the red Post Office one. And a George VI post box. Three swings at the Biggar end.of the Hamlet. Apparently also a church and a school but we missed them. Though did see schoolchildren sign. Heading towards biggar veer left after Walston for a lovely long straight road that goes to Biggar (four mile long). Bisects the Carnwath to Elsrickle road. I liked Walston and will be back on that road. If you miss the Biggar turn you hit loose chippings on a road I think taking you back to Dunsyre.?
Posted 5 years ago # -
A crow pecking away at a discarded pig's leg at the side of Lochend Butterfly Way this morning.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@wingpig
Check on the way home. Could have been raven and long pig's leg?
Posted 5 years ago #
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