w00t! I caught the Easter Bunny!
Heard a commotion in the henhouse, and found this in the nest box. I reckon if your chicken passes a bunny, it’s an Easter miracle.
Pursuant to the daffodils of yesterday, I give you the natural calendar of Sussex:
Snowdrops first, February sometime. Then daffodils, March.
Then lambs (and bunnies) — the very first in March, most in April.
May. It’s my birthday and the whole place explodes in white — the hawthorn and blackthorn hedges, and the plum trees and apple trees. The elderflowers. All bloom snowy white.
Then begins the long Summer fête season. June, July, August. (I’m on the church fête committee this year. I hope you appreciate the hilarity). Crops from the gardens and the local fruit farms. The Perseid Meteor Showers.
Then September, November. Elderberries and blackberries. Harvest Festival. Uncle B’s birthday. The Sussex bonfire season begins.
Thanksgiving (okay, I snuck that one onto the Limey calendar). Christmas.
Then…ugh. The six, eight weeks of cold and gray between Christmas and snowdrops is mighty grim. Our anniversary in the middle doesn’t liven it up much.
Still, ten months of stuff to look forward to is a pretty good go. I don’t remember such regular seasonal markers back home. I hiked in all four seasons, so it’s not that I was completely oblivious to nature. I guess the cubicle ate so much of my time.
I’m one wimple short of a Medieval Book of Hours here.
Posted: March 30th, 2011 under animals, britain.
Comments: 33
Comments
Comment from Joan of Argghh!
Time: March 30, 2011, 9:32 pm
A bun-bun! In your hands! Squeeee!
Here’s an adorable weasel pun.
Comment from Scubafreak
Time: March 30, 2011, 9:50 pm
$10 bucks if you name him Hossenfeffer…… 😉
Comment from Uncle Monkey
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:01 pm
Yeah, they’re always cute until they eat all the peppers.
Then they’re stew.
So Uncle B is one of those Scorpio types?
Dangerous, them. Heh.
Comment from Mark Matis
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:02 pm
Which one of your kids adopted him? Mapp? Or Lucia?
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:04 pm
Great picture! It really demonstrates how teeny weasels are, doesn’t it?
Bunny is long gone, Scoob. He may be little, but he wanted OUT. He bounded away like a rocket.
I think what happened was, greedy bun snuck in to eat chicken pellets, got caught, ran into the house and hid in the nest box.
Comment from Bob Mulroy
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:04 pm
Was one of your hens brooding it?
I once found a muscovey duck who was sitting on her brood of ducklings, two kittens, a robin, amd three rocks. Such life-force!
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:12 pm
No, the chickens were on the other side of the garden. I think it was pussycat that spooked him from outside the run. I looked out to see the flash of something ducking into the house. Without my glasses, I thought it was a squirrel. Then I realized we don’t have any squirrels in this neighborhood, so then I thought it was a weasel.
That’s a hell of a broody duck, Bob.
Comment from Doug!
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:27 pm
I was watching the National Geographic channel the other day and they were showing a stoat stalking a rabbit. This stoat danced around, ran in circles, and flopped around on the ground all while gradually getting closer and closer to this rabbit who was watching the commotion. Then when he got close enough he attacked the rabbit. It was bizarre.
Comment from Uncle Badger
Time: March 30, 2011, 10:30 pm
I love that story, Bob!
And no, not a Scorpio… something altogether … more harmonious and refined.
Shows what carp astrology is, dunnit? 😉
Comment from Bob Mulroy
Time: March 30, 2011, 11:06 pm
The muscovey drakes are equally hearty. They will try to service anything.
Comment from Can’t hark my cry
Time: March 30, 2011, 11:09 pm
Bob Mulroy: possibly that explains where the kittens, the robin, and the rocks came from? 😉
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 30, 2011, 11:19 pm
That’s the Weasel Dance, Doug. Spooky, innit?
Comment from Armybrat
Time: March 30, 2011, 11:47 pm
Only 6 weeks of gray?! We’re heading on 6 months here…and we’re getting snow AGAIN tomorrow. Woe is me. On the bright side, started booking the summer vacation….9 days in July. Where am I going? Why to your neck of the woods! London and Edinburgh. Some museums, some distilleries, more than a few pints.
Comment from steve
Time: March 31, 2011, 12:24 am
Flopsie?
Comment from Deborah
Time: March 31, 2011, 12:39 am
Stoaty? Do you ever wear a white coat?
(Do English women wait until Easter to wear white shoes?)
Comment from Mike James
Time: March 31, 2011, 12:53 am
Day late and a wimple short…
Comment from Christopher Taylor
Time: March 31, 2011, 12:56 am
Well if you run out of fuel you can burn the bun like the swedes.
Comment from EZnSF
Time: March 31, 2011, 1:48 am
Yeah Spring! The weathers warmed for the first time in months yesterday and even warmer today, the birds are making such a racket outside its almost annoying, and everything is budding. And I’ve got a three day weekend. I’m so giddy I just may belt out ‘The Hills are Alive….’ on the balcony.
Happy Spring all!
Comment from Nina
Time: March 31, 2011, 1:49 am
Trees in these parts start budding in mid February, and by now things are usually fairly well leafed out. Full leafage by mid April, and it’s already shorts weather. It’s green, but won’t be for much longer–they don’t call us the Golden State for nothing, you know. Gonna be hot as the backside of a furnace come July, though.
Comment from Mark Matis
Time: March 31, 2011, 1:54 am
Hey, coastal East Central Florida. Highs around 80. Lows around 60. We do occasionally get a freak night every few years that drops below freezing. Some times ya just gots ta tough it out…
}:-]
Comment from Elphaba
Time: March 31, 2011, 5:30 am
Aw…he’s obviously stealing eggs for the Big Day. Adorable!
Comment from Mike C.
Time: March 31, 2011, 11:02 am
TGoP spooked a couple of deer the other day going down to bring up the trash cans (or rubbish bins, if you insist.) Fortunately for them, we’ve no desire to shoot deer.
The neighborhood thugs are another matter entirely, but there’s all these pesky laws regarding plugging those little bastards…
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 31, 2011, 12:24 pm
It’s England, Armybrat. It can turn gray at any time, and stay that way for days.
But it never goes brown. The lawn is green twelve months of the year. It’s vivid green in Spring and Summer, but it’s plenty green in January.
Comment from Mark Matis
Time: March 31, 2011, 12:50 pm
For SWeas:
Even under a couple feet of snow like this year?
}:-]
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 31, 2011, 1:00 pm
Five inches is the most we got this year, Mark. And that’s a lot for the sunny South.
I’m not speaking for Scotland. It always seems to be snowing oop there.
Comment from dfbaskwill
Time: March 31, 2011, 2:17 pm
Just hope you never find one of these!
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/discoveries/2011-03-31-rabbit31_ST_N.htm?csp=34news&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+usatoday-NewsTopStories+%28News+-+Top+Stories%29
Comment from Mark Matis
Time: March 31, 2011, 3:47 pm
For dfbaskwill:
Look, you GOTTA have at least ONE of those if you want to use ostrich eggs for Easter. I mean, SURELY you can’t expect Peter Cottontail to hump THOSE around…
}:-]
Comment from JuliaM
Time: March 31, 2011, 5:23 pm
*jealous*
I’ve got one in my freezer (albeit a bit bigger). Does that count?
😉
Comment from SCOTTtheBADGER
Time: March 31, 2011, 10:31 pm
Did he ransom himself with those wonderful Cadbury fudge filled eggs?
Comment from Richard
Time: March 31, 2011, 10:48 pm
The wife wants to use this as wallpaper, it being a cute bunny. Thought I should ask permission as you are a professional (graphics I mean; not trying to imply anything else).
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 31, 2011, 11:08 pm
Hang on, Richard — I’ll upload a big color version. As it turns out, I’m using it as wallpaper myself.
Ahem.
Comment from S. Weasel
Time: March 31, 2011, 11:12 pm
Okay, Richard, here it is. I’ve got a widescreen monitor, so it’s 1920 x 1080. Let me know if she (or anyone else who wants to use it) needs that knocking down a bit.
Even if you don’t want to use it for wallpaper, it’s worth having a look at. It’s adorble. By the way, that’s Uncle Badger’s photo. Me holding bunny.
Comment from Richard
Time: April 2, 2011, 1:28 pm
Thanks for that! It’s a notebook, but I can shrink it.
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