Shellfish? @iwrats, did you say shellfish (spoot.?)
Which two London train stations are named after shellfish? (Warning - cracker joke)
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Shellfish? @iwrats, did you say shellfish (spoot.?)
Which two London train stations are named after shellfish? (Warning - cracker joke)
Pickakrilly?
St Pancrabs?
Nice tries, but no it is
Charing Crustacean
And
Kings Crustacean
Eeling Broadway
(not a shellfish though)
@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.
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!
I doubt this will work:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/155495003@N04/31600967077/in/dateposted-ff/
But maybe this will....
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7925/31600967077_a671f08eed_z_d.jpg
Both work fine
Just about right size for putting in img tags -
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.
Last seen west of Livingston, could be anywhere by now
@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..
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
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.
Yesterday, facing into a stiff breeze.
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.
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?
Ah cheers, gave that to my old man, he gave it back along with TH White.
Ah I see, your old man made the link. Once and future King then? As read by Magneto in his plastic prison
A fox on the towpath between Edinburgh and Ratho this morning.
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.
No kingfishers
This is the subtext of all of @Iwrats' wildlife highlight of the day posts, no?
@unhurt
If I have a goal as a wordsmith it is the evocation of absence. The kingfisher-shaped hole in a life.
Raven eating dead rat, towpath this morning
@gembo The Kingsknowe Rat?
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.
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
@bill
Excellent wildlife.
"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.
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