It's 0040, after an hour's sleep and a trip to the loo I have insomnia and started reminiscing. You seemed to like Icarus' anecdotes so I though it worth starting a thread. Here's my first contribution, hoping there will be others...
Waddle the Caller Duck.
Caller ducks are about half the size of ordinary ones, just nice for a good roast for one very hungry person. But they are too important to be dinner. They are called caller ducks because they are flockers, gregarious, and have a very loud, high pitched quack. If they see other ducks flying over they call to them. This is very useful to hunters, tie a caller to a plant or stake, wait for other ducks to wing in to see who is calling, then pot the incomers for supper.
I worked for a while volunteering at a "countryside centre", mostly building and maintenance but, as there had to be someone over 21 there while it was open, also in a supervisory role. Of course, they had a dozen or more different kinds of chickens, from bantams to Rhode Island reds and ducks, from callers to Aylesburys and Indian runners - plus peacocks. Peacocks are vicious and we did our best to keep them out of the bird enclosure, they were literaly top of the pecking order and let everyone know it.
But, eventually, they pecked Waddle's mate to death and hit her on the head so often the wound never healed and part of her skull was permanently exposed. She was probsbly insane by then but certainly spent the rest of her short life under the bushes, where the other birds could not get to her. We paid her special sttention, making sure she got an adequate supply of the best food, worms included.
Our other "service" to her was to stand in a certain place, our back tight up to the bushes, feet about hine inches apart (this was found by "accident".)Then Waddle would come out from under her bush and stand between our feet, squawking and cussing at the other birds from that safe place and pecking at our boots or trousers in displaced violence. I was quite happy to stand there until she had got it all off her little chest - watching the behaviour of all the birds and animals was one of the delights of the work.
This area had intrigued me since coming across "King Solomon's Ring" by the ethologist, Konrad Lorenz several decades ago. "The Social Contract", by Robert Ardrey, though aimed at explaining the evolution of mankind's social development, probably played a part as well - we have evident parallels with all social animals in our behaviours towards others. Still got the books, maybe it is time for a re-read!
At this moment, though, it's time for another pee, good night morning.
O240 and still just as awake, so I'll tell you about...
Bozo the Bantam Cock.
Well, I called him Boxo because that is what he was - who else but a bozo would take on an opponent weighing at least 30 something times as much? I ask you, is that courage or stupidity? Or just genetically programmed instinct?
Whatever, Boxo hated me. Maybe it was because, when I opened the crntre at 9am on Sundays, to prepare for the 10am public opening, his hareem would follow me as soon as I let them out. We had various sized sections of tree trunk dotted about the place for mugs visitors to sit on and feed the inmates from the exhorbitantly priced little paper bags of corn or peanuts we sold. I would tip these on their sides, it was always cool and damp under them - and full of juicy worms! I was their favourite person.
Not so for their rightful lord and master though!
Chickens fight by jumping up and striking with the rear facing toe/claw, the "spur". Normally this is cut off in free range chicken farms, not so here. However, a couple of kilos of bird can't do much damage through a decent pair of jeans, and certainly not through Wellington boots. So, I would just stand there whilst he exhausted himself. I did not help matters if I had to do maintensnce work, kneeling near Bozo was an invitation to attacks to less well armoured parts of me... So I would bring in one of the big food buckets (plastic ex-wall paint tubs) and if he started on me I would put it over him. After a while he would disappear into the coop when he saw me with a bucket!
Anyway, the centre owners moved to deepest Somerset, on the very north east edge of Bodmin Moor, into what started as a medieval Great Hall with a cobbled courtyard that was now grown over with grass. The roof beams were well smoked oak, as hard as stone, the front door was 50mm thick oak and it had its own, separate, chapel. It was owned by the National Trust and there was a working smithy nearby, run by a young lad who used as many of the old techniques as he could.
Back to Bozo. It was six months before I had a chance to visit the new centre. Chickens can't have that long a memory can they? Wrong! On my first morning there Bozo started on me. It was a Saturday and there were about twenty visitors when i started to walk through the chicken area and across the courtyard. Bozo spotted me and gave chase. I stopped and turned to let him get over it but he stopped as well, nonchalently pecking at the grass. I started walking again and, as soon as my back was turned, he was after me. I stopped, he pecked. I walked, he chased. He finally caught up and started kicking. I explained it to the visitors and they thought it was hilarious.
He gave up altogether after a couple of days, I would carry a pocketfull of corn, chucking some of that down took his attention. Soon I did not even need that,
There is a window over the head of the bed where I sleep. Damned near every morning a gorgeous male cardinal sits or dances around the window sill. No problem with the dancing part but he also pecks at the window which makes a loud sound. He might try that 10 to 20 times per morning and then give it up. Is he trying to wake his benefactor? He must be giving himself a headache.
Around back of the house there is a well stocked bird feeder. The cardinal and Mrs Cardinal are regular diners there along with several other varieties of birds. The red headed woodpecker that comes to the feeder has a distinctly different feeding posture. He somehow clings to the edge of the feeder base. The other birds use the protruding pegs to perch easily at the ideal feeding position. Woodpecker has his own agenda I suppose.
I'm enjoying this thread Dave, and your amusing acecdotes...yours too Icarus. ;D
Animals I've seen crossing my back yard: foxes, turkeys, deer, armadillos, dogs, cats.
Animals just across the fence (my addition used to be a ranch): cows, goats.
Animals you don't want to meet at night that occasionally show up in my neighborhood: coyotes (you can hear them howl), mountain lions (saw one while walking one morning).
Animals of the flying variety (birds) that frequent my premises: mockingbirds, cardinals, crows, grackles, hoot owls, buzzards, finches, sparrows, swifts, black birds, blue jays, doves.
Animals of the slithering variety (snakes & other reptiles) that frequent my premises: coral snakes, rattlesnakes, rat snakes, hog nose snakes, lizards, geckos.
Animals of the creeping or buzzing variety (insects, arachnids, etc.) that frequent my premises: scorpions, wolf spiders, garden spiders, centipedes, pill bugs, ants, yellow jackets, wasps, cicadas, cicada killers (giant wasps), honey bees (fewer now), katydids, dirt (mud) daubers, crickets.
Animals of the amphibious variety that frequent my premises: toads, frogs.
That's the nature report from River Place Addition, Belton, Texas.
I will also sadly report that the Texas horny toad (horned lizard), which used to be found everywhere in this area, is hardly ever seen anymore because of imported fire ants. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_horned_lizard
It's our "state reptile", by the way.
Quote from: Ecurb Noselrub on December 01, 2017, 01:03:48 PM
I will also sadly report that the Texas horny toad (horned lizard), which used to be found everywhere in this area, is hardly ever seen anymore because of imported fire ants. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_horned_lizard
It's our "state reptile", by the way.
Quote from: Ecurb Noselrub on December 01, 2017, 12:58:57 PM
Animals I've seen crossing my back yard: foxes, turkeys, deer, armadillos, dogs, cats.
Animals just across the fence (my addition used to be a ranch): cows, goats.
Animals you don't want to meet at night that occasionally show up in my neighborhood: coyotes (you can hear them howl), mountain lions (saw one while walking one morning).
Animals of the flying variety (birds) that frequent my premises: mockingbirds, cardinals, crows, grackles, hoot owls, buzzards, finches, sparrows, swifts, black birds, blue jays, doves.
Animals of the slithering variety (snakes & other reptiles) that frequent my premises: coral snakes, rattlesnakes, rat snakes, hog nose snakes, lizards, geckos.
Animals of the creeping or buzzing variety (insects, arachnids, etc.) that frequent my premises: scorpions, wolf spiders, garden spiders, centipedes, pill bugs, ants, yellow jackets, wasps, cicadas, cicada killers (giant wasps), honey bees (fewer now), katydids, dirt (mud) daubers, crickets.
Animals of the amphibious variety that frequent my premises: toads, frogs.
That's the nature report from River Place Addition, Belton, Texas.
:cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun:
Quote from: Tank on December 01, 2017, 04:51:56 PM
Quote from: Ecurb Noselrub on December 01, 2017, 01:03:48 PM
I will also sadly report that the Texas horny toad (horned lizard), which used to be found everywhere in this area, is hardly ever seen anymore because of imported fire ants. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_horned_lizard
It's our "state reptile", by the way.
Quote from: Ecurb Noselrub on December 01, 2017, 12:58:57 PM
Animals I've seen crossing my back yard: foxes, turkeys, deer, armadillos, dogs, cats.
Animals just across the fence (my addition used to be a ranch): cows, goats.
Animals you don't want to meet at night that occasionally show up in my neighborhood: coyotes (you can hear them howl), mountain lions (saw one while walking one morning).
Animals of the flying variety (birds) that frequent my premises: mockingbirds, cardinals, crows, grackles, hoot owls, buzzards, finches, sparrows, swifts, black birds, blue jays, doves.
Animals of the slithering variety (snakes & other reptiles) that frequent my premises: coral snakes, rattlesnakes, rat snakes, hog nose snakes, lizards, geckos.
Animals of the creeping or buzzing variety (insects, arachnids, etc.) that frequent my premises: scorpions, wolf spiders, garden spiders, centipedes, pill bugs, ants, yellow jackets, wasps, cicadas, cicada killers (giant wasps), honey bees (fewer now), katydids, dirt (mud) daubers, crickets.
Animals of the amphibious variety that frequent my premises: toads, frogs.
That's the nature report from River Place Addition, Belton, Texas.
:cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun: :cryandrun:
I like sitting out back with a glass of bourbon or cognac and just watching the festivities. Something is always happening in the animal kingdom.
I like to watch the animal kingdom too, from the big window of my 3rd floor apartment. In my case, however, it's usually the drunks leaving the bar across the street. Sometimes a squirrel running across the telephone wires, or a crow hanging about cawing for no apparent reason.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on December 01, 2017, 09:35:37 PM
I like to watch the animal kingdom too, from the big window of my 3rd floor apartment. In my case, however, it's usually the drunks leaving the bar across the street. Sometimes a squirrel running across the telephone wires, or a crow hanging about cawing for no apparent reason.
:snicker:
I see raccoons, squirrels, possums, skunks, dogs, cats, humming birds, crows, butterflies, praying mantis, lizards, wild green parrots, pigeons, ladybugs, black widows, crickets and green grasshoppers, moths, wasps, bees, earthworms, mosquitoes, ...like you, I see all kinds of Homo Sapiens everywhere...drunk and not drunk. :grin:
Quote from: Ecurb Noselrub on December 01, 2017, 12:58:57 PM
Animals I've seen crossing my back yard: foxes, turkeys, deer, armadillos, dogs, cats.
Animals just across the fence (my addition used to be a ranch): cows, goats.
Animals you don't want to meet at night that occasionally show up in my neighborhood: coyotes (you can hear them howl), mountain lions (saw one while walking one morning).
Animals of the flying variety (birds) that frequent my premises: mockingbirds, cardinals, crows, grackles, hoot owls, buzzards, finches, sparrows, swifts, black birds, blue jays, doves.
Animals of the slithering variety (snakes & other reptiles) that frequent my premises: coral snakes, rattlesnakes, rat snakes, hog nose snakes, lizards, geckos.
Animals of the creeping or buzzing variety (insects, arachnids, etc.) that frequent my premises: scorpions, wolf spiders, garden spiders, centipedes, pill bugs, ants, yellow jackets, wasps, cicadas, cicada killers (giant wasps), honey bees (fewer now), katydids, dirt (mud) daubers, crickets.
Animals of the amphibious variety that frequent my premises: toads, frogs.
That's the nature report from River Place Addition, Belton, Texas.
It's nice to know you admire nature this much. :tellmemore:
Most people don't stop to look at it. I also enjoy looking at plants and trees, I try to guess what they are. :)
Edit...
No, Bruce, or
Father Bruno, I do not attempt to smoke the plants I encounter. >:(
So, some time back I was talking to a couple of people at the hospital where I currently intern, and both of them were a little surprised when I flat-out told them I was an atheist after the subject of religious affiliation came up. Yesterday an employee, who is a devout evangelical Christian, and who I like very much for her helpful and kind disposition she's always had towards me, pulled me aside to try and convince me that god was real and that the Bible is clear -- if I didn't believe I would go to hell.
I was stunned at first, but I couldn't help noticing that this person was visibly upset and really worried for my soul. She really believes that I will burn in hell for all eternity if she or anyone who follows her particular brand of religion doesn't 'save' me.
"God loves you", she said.
"Okay..." I didn't know whether to roll my eyes or feel angry. Instead I let my eyes break her gaze.
"God gave us free will, but the time will come when you're spiritually mature enough to see his love."
After a good many minutes of this, I began to feel sorry for her. I wasn't going to try and argue against her steadfast belief in a higher power, apparently it gave her life meaning and made her happy, and she was such a nice person and all...
So I let it be. I guess I have a higher tolerance for this stuff (coming from well-meaning people) than I thought.
Quote from: Magdalena on December 01, 2017, 10:13:11 PM
Edit...
No, Bruce, or Father Bruno, I do not attempt to smoke the plants I encounter. >:(
:lol:
Oh, Mags...
Quote from: xSilverPhinx on December 02, 2017, 12:34:53 AM
So I let it be. I guess I have a higher tolerance for this stuff (coming from well-meaning people) than I thought.
Yeah, it's hard not to feel sympathetic. In these situations I want to say "If believing that makes you happy then you go right ahead and believe it", which is just how I feel except that sounds so condescending that I don't. I feel atheists are hemmed in for responses that are both honest and polite.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on December 02, 2017, 12:46:53 AM
Quote from: xSilverPhinx on December 02, 2017, 12:34:53 AM
So I let it be. I guess I have a higher tolerance for this stuff (coming from well-meaning people) than I thought.
Yeah, it's hard not to feel sympathetic. In these situations I want to say "If believing that makes you happy then you go right ahead and believe it", which is just how I feel except that sounds so condescending that I don't. I feel atheists are hemmed in for responses that are both honest and polite.
Yeah, that's how I feel also, and sometimes being both honest and polite can be so difficult!
When I was very much younger, I was telling some adults how much I liked being raised by just my Dad. In fact, I told them, if I had to have two parents I'd want two Dads. They got funny looks on their faces that I wasn't able to understand until decades later.
Quote from: BooksCatsEtc on December 02, 2017, 12:53:05 AM
When I was very much younger, I was telling some adults how much I liked being raised by just my Dad. In fact, I told them, if I had to have two parents I'd want two Dads. They got funny looks on their faces that I wasn't able to understand until decades later.
;D
Now that Christmas is coming I am reminded of the time when my mother and I went to her parents' place (in another state) and my grandfather, who is the type to speak his mind whenever he pleases, expressed his displeasure at us coming for the holidays because he felt obligated to buy us presents.
Then he went rambled on about how Christmas had become overly commercial, which must be the devil's doing (he's a seventh day adventist). We told him once again that there was no need to buy us presents, and we weren't there for charity.
Then my mother made the mistake of buying him a new pair of walking shoes to replace the old, worn pair he had been using for his morning walks. When Christmas night finally came and he was given the wrapped package he went into the same rant he had previously, about the devil's influence on what should be a celebration of Jesus' birth, and refused to open it.
He would barely even touch the present.
Talk about ruining a family gathering. When I left I vowed never to visit them for the holiday again.
Well damn the luck Silver. The several Adventists that I know are at least partially sane. In the US they have a large presence in the health care industry, often quietly enough.
One of my best lifelong friends was a devout 7th day guy. He never ever tried to convert me from heathenship and I never ever tried to persuade him that he had it all wrong. Jack was a wonderful friend that did not let that stuff get in the way of a healthy and respectful friendship.
I reckon that both circumstances and personalities alter cases.
Quote from: Icarus on December 04, 2017, 02:14:06 AM
Well damn the luck Silver. The several Adventists that I know are at least partially sane. In the US they have a large presence in the health care industry, often quietly enough.
One of my best lifelong friends was a devout 7th day guy. He never ever tried to convert me from heathenship and I never ever tried to persuade him that he had it all wrong. Jack was a wonderful friend that did not let that stuff get in the way of a healthy and respectful friendship.
I reckon that both circumstances and personalities alter cases.
I have yet to meet a partially sane Adventist, the ones I know all like to feel pretty special, the true bearers of Truth to the world. And they'll never let you hear the end of it. ::)
Maybe I'm just unlucky.
Silver, my friend was a rational man at least to the extent that he did not try to impose his beliefs on others. On the other hand I once car pooled with an outspoken Adventist who would not, could not, shut his mouth about the primacy of his Saturday religion. We soon found it impractical to have him as one of our car poolers. I took from that experience that ordinary Christians have little patience with others who presume to reset the holy day of rest. Two of the four car pool people were regular Christians and of course there was me the lonesome heretic. After ditching the Adventist there were only the three of us.
Mandy was a coati, a female - male coatis tend to be loners, don't like company much (except in the mating season of course), females are gregarious. She lived in a fairly small cage, with a "bedroom" that was inside one of the buildings. I felt a bit sorry for her and would make sure that we could socialise a bit before the public got there.
Greeting, for a coati, is a noisyish affair, not barking noisy like a dog but they sort of push air out and suck it back in very fast from their mouths, a sort of "whoosh". They also have to "kiss", no good trying to avoid it, she would just climb up you with her very sharp claws and incredibly strong limbs. We would sit and have a mutual groom for a while, then i would maybe put her lead on and taker her for a walk.
Walking meant stopping her hunting our few frogs (there was a virus around that was killing them off) but letting her dig for worms or snatch the odd spider (which she always treated with care, just in case). Not nice for the worms and spiders but she needed the chance to get somewhere near normal behaviour, and probably the micronutrients as well.
We rarely took her out when cudtomers were about, she was legally classified as a dangerous wild animal, needed a licence, despite being born in captivity and raised by humans after being abandoned by her mother. But we did ocassionaly. On one such ocassion we were coming back from the field, Mandy on my shoulder because she had got fed up with walking. As we neared the building she leapt off my shoulder as we came near a group that included a girl of msybe 6. Before I could pull her back Mandy had grabbed a small chocolate bar out of the girl's jacket pocket and was heading for her cage with it in her mouth! I have mentioned her strength?
We could not take it off her and give it back, for a start it had teeth marks in it and, second, Mandy might object violently! So we gave the girl another one and let her scold Mandy mightily - once the latter was safely in her cage. Mandy did not care, she was too busy scoffing the treat. Another teat was not so funny. We had two garter snakes, an older one, well used to being handled, and a very nervous youngster. On our matenance day, Monday, they let Mandy out into the main part of the building. I was not there of course, work day for me, so this bit is second hand. It seems that, as soon as the hatch (a small door with wire netting in it) from her bedroom was open she rushed out, strainght to the snakes' tank, had the catch undone, opened it, grabbed the little snake and was back in her room before anyone could react! I am sure there had to be an element of careful observation and pre-planning there. The tank catch was a "twist and flip" job, required knowledge to operate. Like their cousins the racoons coatis are very dextrous.
When the centre owners moved down to Somerset Mandy went to a very good home, the extremely well run Burford animal centre near Oxford. I visited there a few months later but could not recognise Mandy from the group of five she now lived with. But I called her name softly and she was over like a rocket. We had a little mutual scratch through the wire and I got told off by one of the keepers. But he relaxed a bit when I told him Mandy and I were old friends.