The lamby way

Dried out, warmed-up and, eventually, picked-up by a distraught mother, this little bleater rueeened [Eh?!] my Saturday morning [Rueeened? Really? Oh, come on!].

NB. It would be best to view the picture at 100%, the scaling down of the image rueeens the text [You know what? I'm just going to ignore you].

[Say 'roo']
[Roo]
[Say 'in']
[In]
[Say 'ruin']
[Rueeen]

Birding Tulgey Wood

Dodo, Greater Flamingo, Yellowhammer (heard only) and Jubjub Bird; Wonderland produces the goods once again. Can't see me paying the extra for the 3D version next time though. If a film has a half-decent story and cast then the 3D is just pointless gimmickry; naturally, if a film is a useless mishmash of computer effects and dumbed down tale of pseudo-environmental shire then I'm sure the 3D helps paper over the cracks (although, seemingly, not well enough to win a decent Oscar).

A hint of a trickle

Had three Chiffchaff at Uskmouth, two of which were singing; not an awful lot else on the migrant passerine front though. Notables at Goldcliff included Ruff, Spotted Redshank, Greenshank and Green Sandpiper. Managed to miss both Wheatear and Sand Martin but I did have students in tow, so I do have an excuse.

Where are they?

If someone could pop a migrant in a box and post it to Gwent, I would be eternally grateful,... thanks.

Nice pear!

Actually, it's not that nice, the fruit never seem to ripen, the thrushes like them though; and the puddle below has drawn in a Green Sand this winter, I wonder if it tastes like watered down perry?

Day out

Bufflehead, Mediterranean Gull, Great Northern Diver, Black-throated Diver, Black-necked Grebe, Black Brant - home,... and,... relax.

[Addendum: a brilliant pic of the bird, some plonker phoned this into the pager boys as "showing well", presumably meaning "not hiding between waves or skulking behind a swan"?]

With tuppence for paper and strings

A couple more from Saturday's turkey-in-a-barrel shoot,...

Was going to plunder Joanna Newsom's 'Flying a Kite' lyrics for a title but you can't beat a bit of Sherman & Sherman, at least, not via the laryngeal prisms of Tomlinson and Van Dyke.

PS. Dick Van Dyke, now there's a stage name that wouldn't be coined nowadays.

Comin' atcha

Bird table? Zoo? A hang out for middle-aged camo-clad camera-bearers? Whatever Gigrin Farm is supposed to be, currently it is also home to a Black Kite. Whilst the bird's provenance is a topic for discussion, it's definitely worth a little Saturday morning jaunt.

 

Birds that don't fit comfortably into our tidy little prefabricated taxonomic boxes always cause a slight perturbation in the birding force,... doubt I'll have sleepless nights over it though.

The supporting cast at Gigrin ain't too bad either, with...

... or without patagial tags.

Lost and found

Too little time and motivation for such luxuries as fully formed sentences, so...

Park car at a jaunty angle; two PE; glorious technicolor über-panoramic crystal-vision morning; -7°C; friendly rabbits; curiously a (slightly nostalgic) whiff of angling shops hangs in the air, maggots writhing in carcinogenic colourant, don't lick your fingers; today the sea-wall is like a box of chocolates,... strewn with unwanted nuts (including those who choose to go jogging in a buttoned up shirt [minus tie] sawn off trousers, knee-pads and boots whilst carrying a plastic 'stick'); proof positive, you can polish the largest of architectural turds; Y; fox carrying a huge Cumberland sausage; partially summer-plumaged flyover GP; dog-walkers everywhere; man, you been a naughty boy, you let your face grow long; if you drink much from a bottle marked 'poison', it is almost certain to disagree with you, sooner or later; and so it continues,...

Have you lost your bins? Found along strandline adjacent to Thornbury Sailing Club, to reclaim drop me an email. Please note, it was so cold I had to wear my authentic Dutch wooden mittens, originally made in the 1500s for speed skaters on frigid polders they are the bees bollocks when it's really frizz.

Up and down, not side to side

Did Goldcliff this morning in the hope that something would be pushed onto the pools in the face of the monster tide; lots of the regulars including 2 Spotted Redshank, 1 Greenshank, 6 Avocet, blah, blah, blah,... oh, and a pair of Peregrine put the fear of [enter fictional deity here] up everything at one point, blah, blah, blah,... I think I'm losing the will to live,... and this is why,...

On pottering back down Boat Lane post high-tide, somewhen between 10:00 and 10:15 (I think, not sure exactly when, am estimating this from a complex back-tracking calculation based on a Morrison's receipt), I peered through the viewing-lattice-thingy and noticed the arse of something large flying directly away from me over the power station (for those who don't tread the paths of Gwent, the distance between retina and bird was circa 3.25 km), I thought "Probably nuffin' special but I'll just put my scope on that", but, of course, you can't peer through the viewing-lattice-thingy with a scope, oh nooooo, so I backed up, opened the tripod and,... nuffin',... absolutely nuffin', empty sky. "Oh well", thought I, "Probably nuffin' (having seen nuffin' this seemed a safe conclusion), forget it" and off I pottered, the bird forgotten, Morrison's bound, a nice slab of Caerphilly and a box of Bran Flakes.

And that's how it would have stayed, and that's how it should have stayed. But nooooo (for the second time today), on getting home I slapped the Apple on, stuck the phone on charge, turned back to the screen and,... BANG! Twitter slays me with "Severnsidebirds Common Crane flew north over Aust Warth at 09.30 !!!!" and suddenly a rushing in the ears, dizzying light-headedness, a slight stumble and I slump, broken, into the office chair. The discarded half-truths swirl, the mind fills the gaps, it was large, very large, long in the arm and hand, heavy bodied, but perfectly arse on, I mean, come on! Give me a flippin' break! Hateful bird, hateful Twitter, hateful interweb, horrid Apple, I hate everything, I hate you all!

I had to phone the county recorder and Weekend birder in search of some twisted ornithological amalgam of confession-penance-contrition-absolution (didn't work). The girlfriend tried to smooth the waters with a "It probably wasn't it" but I know, and I'm going to sulk for days, or slash my wrists, or bury my bins, or have a cup of tea.

[Addendum: with a bit of luck it'll be seen somewhere east of Aust Warth and I can claim it never entered NWR airspace and we can all forget the whole thing.]

[Additional addendum: oh birds, Twitter, interweb and Apple, I love you all, let's never fight again.]