CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Leisure

Wildlife highlight of the day

(7223 posts)

  1. gembo
    Member

    Shellfish? @iwrats, did you say shellfish (spoot.?)

    Which two London train stations are named after shellfish? (Warning - cracker joke)

    Posted 5 years ago #
  2. Frenchy
    Member

    Pickakrilly?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  3. wingpig
    Member

    St Pancrabs?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  4. gembo
    Member

    Nice tries, but no it is

    Charing Crustacean

    And

    Kings Crustacean

    Posted 5 years ago #
  5. Arellcat
    Moderator

    Eeling Broadway

    (not a shellfish though)

    Posted 5 years ago #
  6. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    @gembo

    Spoot, aye. Last time I had them was here in a sherry reduction. Oh my word. They look obscene but taste heavenly the poor things.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  7. dedekay
    Member

    Waxwings in Victoria Park and the large trees on Newhaven Road, near Ferry Road junction. There's a flock of at least 25-30, chirping away and flying short circuits to the rowan tree for sustenance. I took some photos but I don't have Flickr so can't post them I'm afraid!

    Posted 5 years ago #
  8. dedekay
    Member

  9. dedekay
    Member

    But maybe this will....
    https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7925/31600967077_a671f08eed_z_d.jpg

    Posted 5 years ago #
  10. chdot
    Admin

    Both work fine

    Just about right size for putting in img tags -

    Posted 5 years ago #
  11. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    A young peregrine trying to rouse waders to flight on Aberlady bay by stooping on them. They were too fly to take to the wing so the falcon retreated to a rock in the middle of the frozen mudflats and made itself all big and fluffy.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  12. dessert rat
    Member

    Last seen west of Livingston, could be anywhere by now

    Posted 5 years ago #
  13. gembo
    Member

    @diarmid occasionally of this parish had a spectacular spot a few inches abov his head just after recounting a lack of bird life on his walk. He may post about it..

    Posted 5 years ago #
  14. gembo
    Member

    Watched a golden buzzard take off in a field near Woolfords today. Scruffy but it landed on a fence post Aquila like. Holy Roman Emperor Golden Eagle of a Buzzard

    Posted 5 years ago #
  15. gembo
    Member

    Today's buzzard count in west Lothian and south Lanarkshire - 3. A new one spotted from the the brand spanking new Tarmac on the road to Harburn Golf Course from Murieston Village in Livi. Similar grey to the wood of the trendy A frame houses on that rod. It is agreat wee road. The honey buzzard again and then a brown one on distant fence post near Carnwath.

    I have been reading the ultra trendy H is for Hawk by Helen McDonald and thinking this is just a retread of Goshawk by TH White. But then Helen devotes several short chapters to old TH White. A lonely and probably unpleasant man who wrote brilliant books.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  16. chdot
    Admin

    Yesterday, facing into a stiff breeze.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  17. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    just a retread of Goshawk by TH White

    I read that last week. Guy's a bit creepy.

    Had a sparrowhawk smash through the garden at breakfast time. Man, those birds can fly.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  18. gembo
    Member

    TH White creepy. Definite. Many issues. Not good bet as schoolteacher. The falconers at the time gave a one sentence review of Goshawk. "Now any would be falconer knows how not to do it" I am paraphrasing from Mc Donald's book. I am now at the bit where she takes her hawk for a walk around Cambridge. She says go back 400 years, this would be perfectly normal.

    I am happy to lend the book, will be finished soon, can go in the crate with le cidre?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  19. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    Ah cheers, gave that to my old man, he gave it back along with TH White.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  20. gembo
    Member

    Ah I see, your old man made the link. Once and future King then? As read by Magneto in his plastic prison

    Posted 5 years ago #
  21. bill
    Member

    A fox on the towpath between Edinburgh and Ratho this morning.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  22. jdanielp
    Member

    A sparrowhawk flying along the hedgerow ahead of our Car Club car between Hillend and Easter Bush on Sunday.

    A fox casually crossing Lauriston Place from Heriot's to the future Futures Institute on Monday early evening.

    The Kingsknowe Rat diving into the canal as I approached a bridge in Wester Hailes on Wednesday evening.

    Either a kestrel or a perhaps a sparrowhawk being harassed by a seagull above Meggetland this morning.

    No herons on the canal this morning, but there had been on most other days this week. There was also one in a tree by The Loch at Heriot-Watt at Wednesday lunch time.

    No kingfishers.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  23. unhurt
    Member

    No kingfishers

    This is the subtext of all of @Iwrats' wildlife highlight of the day posts, no?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  24. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    @unhurt

    If I have a goal as a wordsmith it is the evocation of absence. The kingfisher-shaped hole in a life.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  25. gembo
    Member

    Raven eating dead rat, towpath this morning

    Posted 5 years ago #
  26. jdanielp
    Member

    @gembo The Kingsknowe Rat?

    Posted 5 years ago #
  27. jdanielp
    Member

    I forgot to mention the black and white cat that I spotted on Monday looking a little uncertain about being close to the top of one of the mid-sized trees on the far bank of the canal opposite the WHEC outdoor sports pitches. It was being heckled by two magpies perched on branches above it.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  28. bill
    Member

    OK, forget the fox. My way back was a lot more exciting with snowdrops, majestic heron, Polish people of Wester Hailes enjoying some outdoor beers..

    However the definite highlight of the highlights was a couple of swans west of Ratho making their way through a thin layer of ice on the canal. Well, one of them was breaking the ice and the other closely followed. The weirdest thing was the sound that made: imagine a large thin sheet of metal which you would start moving up and down to create waves. Never seen anything like that.

    icebreaker_img by Bill Harriman, on Flickr

    And here is a bit of a video of that:
    icebreaker_video by Bill Harriman, on Flickr

    Posted 5 years ago #
  29. I were right about that saddle
    Member

    @bill

    Excellent wildlife.

    Posted 5 years ago #
  30. wingpig
    Member

    "The kingfisher-shaped hole in a life."

    It's only a matter of time before a lack of kingfisher in the trees of the Figgate Park is offset by a kingfisher-sized increase the the volume of one of the otters.

    Posted 5 years ago #

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