Robin on the chicken house
The robin here is a European robin (Erithacus rubecula). There are lots of other birds called robin redbreast in the world. Our own American one is a very different beastie, actually a breed of thrush with the charming designation Turdus migratorius.
Brits love they robins. It’s one of the few birds that stick around for the whole Winter. Hence they frequently feature on Christmas cards, which puzzled me mightily at first.
They’re cheeky little peckerheads, shaped like chickadees. Red breasted tennis balls. The classic picture is a robin on a spade handle, because they follow gardeners turning earth, looking for worms. I always know where Jack is in the garden, because our robing follows him around and yells at him.
We’re probably on our thirtieth robin by now, but we always have one and they all look the same to me when I chase them off the chickens’ food.
They are not shy. They’re fiercely territorial; they’ll fight to the death with other robins and take on much bigger birds. In fact, I strongly suspect if we could understand and speak robin, we’d find them the most horrible little assholes in the bird kingdom. But awwwwwww, aren’t they cute?
Uncle B took this picture in the garden today. It’s not his usual razor sharp focus because the little bastard was hopping around and wouldn’t pose.
Another day off work today. In fact, I doubt I’ll get in for the rest of the week. Tonight is the last night in the twenties, but it’s not much warmer tomorrow and the wind is going to double into the 40 mph range. Then Friday the wind dies down and heavy snow is forecast.
It’s the wind that’s the problem for us. It’s blowing hard from an unusual quarter, right across an enormous sheep field, picking up snow and landing it in our garden. Our central heating can’t handle it, so I’ve had to pile up in bed under the electric blanket.
I’m trying real hard to look sad about that..
February 28, 2018 — 8:27 pm
Comments: 15
No, in fact, I did NOT go to work today
Indeed, it snew. I reckon we got about three inches, but bitterly cold so it’s icing over fast. More on the way. The roads are clear, but I doubt the bike path is. Luckily, I’m not due back until Thursday.
I’ve had to replace the chicken’s water twice today. I will allow, it’s stupidly funny watching a chicken try to drink ice (that look of puzzlement!), but none of my chickens set foot outside the house today. Cold, plus three of them have never seen that white stuff before. They want no part of this nonsense.
Charlotte snuck out when Uncle B went to stock up on coal and wood and he snapped this picture of her walking in his footsteps. Charlotte is the elderly cat, you may remember, who was horribly mauled by…something back in the Spring. I was sure we would lose her.
Gosh, I wish people aged like cats. Here she is old, scarred, krunky…and looking exactly the same as she did when she was young and strong and padding around in the snow in Rhode Island.
February 27, 2018 — 9:10 pm
Comments: 10
I know that monster!
I flip through a LOT of pictures online in the course of a day. Every once in a while, something turns up in an images search that makes me go what on earth is going on here?
Like the picture above. Goodness knows what I was looking up when this thing appeared in my search results. When I followed the link, though, turns out I know this beast! This is Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins sculpting a megatherium — a giant prehistoric South American ground sloth.
He’s one of the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs (though a megatherium is a much later beastie than the thunder lizards). Uncle B used to live near this park and we went there a lot. This was the first attempt to make life-sized scale models from the big old bones that were all the rage in Victorian times. In the 1850s, would you believe?
Giant cement sculptures. They look all weird and wrong to us now, as paleontologists have re-imagined and re-re-imagined how the bones went together. Who knows? Maybe the Victorians were closer. We haven’t found too many giant corpses with the skin still on. Anyway, I loved that park. Even if the Crystal Palace itself burned down in 1936.
Right! Remember to come back tomorrow, 6 WBT, for DEAD POOL ROUND 107.
February 22, 2018 — 9:33 pm
Comments: 5
It sounds worse than it is
At last, I got my caput mortuum! I didn’t order it specifically, it was part of a package of pigments. Cheapest way I could get my hands on a sample of all the colors I wanted.
But I have found it! The holy grail! The pigment that best matches color of a chicken’s comb with the sun shining through it! It is cadmium vermilion and I am inexpressibly chuffed.
It looks brighter when you mix it up.
Have a good weekend, everyone, and may all your chickens have bright and shiny combs.
February 9, 2018 — 10:32 pm
Comments: 11
Oh, Monday!
Well, my day started with thundersnow and went downhill from there. First snow of the year, and it came down like a bastard for about two hours. Then the sun came up and the temps rose and it all melted away. It was pretty while it lasted, but no fun on a bike.
Oh, and a badger crossed my path. An actual one. He ran up the driveway and disappeared in a bush. This was pretty cool to see, but not great news if you keep cats and chickens.
I’d like to point out that I have now seen a badger and a weasel out my front door. That sounds like the start of a really odd English blues song.
Then I had two meetings today. Two. I moved to Olde Englande to get away from this piffle.
How was your day?
February 5, 2018 — 9:49 pm
Comments: 10
Enter title here
Yes, of course I went with Peruvian shower rat. I like rats.
Only, somebody in the YouTube comments said you soap up the rat and he just goes nuts trying to wash it off.
So, not so cute. Still…
Eh. I don’t handle Mondays so good.
January 29, 2018 — 9:25 pm
Comments: 9
Just the one
The beginning of my commute is a long, straight bicycle ride with fields on either side. On my left, an arable field with a crop growing in it. On my right, a flock of sheep. Like a big flock of sheep – the field is nearly a mile long.
In that whole big flock, there is one — 1 — black sheep. I find this inordinately pleasing. I can’t settle until I’ve spotted her and yelled hello in the morning (and the afternoon).
One of these days, somebody I know is going to drive up behind me with the window down and hear me shouting, “HELLO! HEY! Sheepie! WOOWOO! Hello, how are you today?”
So I went to Google Images Search to find a picture I could doctor, entered “flock of sheep”…and you’d be amazed how many pictures I got of a flock of sheep with one black ewe. (The one I used I stole from here). It must be a thing sheep farmers do for some reason, but I can’t find an explanation online.
She seems to get along with the other just fine. I suppose she doesn’t know she looks any different, and the others aren’t sure they aren’t black sheep themselves. Yes, sheep have just about that much brain power.
January 22, 2018 — 8:03 pm
Comments: 11
I thought this story sounded off at first, but it was just badly reported. This woman informally raises monarch butterflies, (which explains why she had a spare wing lying around). One of her lot tore his right wing up in the chrysalis, so she glued a spare wing in its place.
Life expectancy is 2 days to 5 months, so the fact that this wing probably won’t age that well may not be an issue. He may well live to experience reproductive success, the goal of all biological entities.
Except me. A little less of me on this planet, please.
Anyway, little dude successfully flew, so yay, I guess.
January 16, 2018 — 7:38 pm
Comments: 9
Happy #nationalbirdday
No, seriously, it’s National Bird Day. In England, I assume from my Twitter feed.
I don’t usually send people to Twitter, but Brits take their birds seriously and there are some genuinely awesome photos and videos being posted. Go there.
Welp, back to the routine. See you Monday!
January 5, 2018 — 7:41 pm
Comments: 12
Something, something, fat Israeli hedgehogs
This little feller was brought into an Israeli animal rescue because he was too fat to run away. He weighed 1.6 kilos when he arrived; he should be 600-900 grams. They’re seeing a lot of this. They think the hedgies are getting into food left out for stray cats.
Stray cats and hedgehogs: two things I don’t really associate with the Holy Land, somehow.
I mean, I knew about African pygmy hedgehogs, which are the breed they make into domestic pets, but I generally thing of hedgies as British, Beatrix Potter-y things.
But no. I am wrong.
Hedgehogs are a food source in many cultures. Hedgehogs were eaten in Ancient Egypt and some recipes of the Late Middle Ages call for hedgehog meat. Hedgehogs are traded throughout Eurasia and Africa for traditional medicine and witchcraft. In the Middle East and especially among Bedouins, hedgehog meat is considered medicinal, and thought to cure rheumatism and arthritis. They are also said to cure a variety of illnesses and disorders from tuberculosis to impotence. In Morocco, inhaling the smoke of the burnt skin or bristles is a purported remedy for fever, male impotence, and urinary illnesses. The blood is sold as a cure for ringworm, cracked skin and warts and the flesh is eaten as a remedy for witchcraft. Romani people still eat hedgehogs, boiled or roasted, and also use the blood and the fat for its supposed medicinal value. During the 1980s, “hedgehog-flavour” crisps were introduced in Britain, although the product did not contain any hedgehog.
Huh.
January 4, 2018 — 10:02 pm
Comments: 10