[LindenLea]

Bird-watching, dog walking, reading, trying to support my cricket team (Lancashire County Cricket Club) trying to support my football team (Preston North End) film-watching, gardening, walking/nature rambles, local history, multiple church related activities, cooking, interneting, babysitting for our grandchildren, endless hours music listening, that's about it.

 

[LindenLea]

I'm wanna-be bird watcher and I'm planning to start to take things more seriously from forthcoming summer on. Birds are crazy creatures. I would like to give some egret a big hug but I guess she wouldn't like such idea.

It's a marvellous hobby. How tall are you? Some Egrets are over 5' tall, you may end up hugging his legs!

 

[LindenLea]

We clearly need an ornitholgy thread, so let's see if one appears somewhere! Birds have featured in the works and lives of so many composers, it's difficult to think of any recognised composer who hasn't made some musical reference to birds, from Handel's cuckoo and nightingale and Haydn's lark, to Dvorak's wood dove and Messiaen's, well, Messiaen's virtually every bird under the sun!!

 

[LindenLea]

I dont really have a reason to post this but Weston's story brought back memories.

Once on a travel we were eating dinner under the night sky, on a raised platform. Below us appeared a Jackal hungry for scraps. Despite the warnings we threw it some bread, anxious to see what it would do. Afterwards, my brother and I walked back to our room. We had to traverse some wooden raised walkways and it was pitch black with no light polution. I only had the flash of my camera to illuminate anything. Suddenly we realised the Jackal had been following us down at the side of the walkway. Decided to take some pictures but later began to think whether the flash had somehow irritated it. Walking on in the dark we heard and saw the Jackal jump up onto the walkway behind us, panicked we began to walk quickly, anxious to get into the safety of the hut. Our minds imagination was let loose in that darkness and we could imagine it stalking us patiently for its meal. Finally we fumbled with the lock nervously snd got inside.
I guess it was probably the first time i had an interaction with a real wild animal, and i guess the moral is: if you behave correctly there isnt much to fear.

Edit: concerning an ornithology thread, i have some pictures of fascinating Southern african birds that i cant identify. I would be eager for help?

Wonderful post!

Isn't nature amazing, have you seen this? Talk about life imitating art. The remarkable moment a flock of flamingos spontaneously gathered in the form of one giant bird has been captured by a wildlife photographer in Mexico. This incredible moment was captured by Bobby Haas, an aerial photographer in Yucatan, Mexico. He described the formation, one of several hundred photographs he had taken flying above the flock, as the "holy grail" of wildlife photography. He photographed the flock of flamingos from a helicopter when the birds spontaneously formed in a giant version of themselves. Just beautiful.

THIS is why my hobbie is the birds!

 

[LindenLea]

What an amazing photo, thanks for posting that LL. Perhaps we could develop this into a wildlife thread?



This is Brian

:lol: Excellent, a fellow Magic Roundabout fan! Yes, I'm sure nobody would object if we chatted about wildlife, though I'm not sure if this thread is the place to do it, so we may need to de-camp to a new topic. The more I look at that photo of the flamingos, the more astonishing it becomes, they do tend to flock together in vast numbers on the mudflats on the waterline, but that configuration is miraculous, purely by chance of course, I assume a few seconds later it was gone, but the photographer must have been amazed.