|
|
Post by Thorngrub on Jan 5, 2007 13:26:49 GMT -5
Ya shoulda told her "Actually, it's why Sears shouldn't hire people like you", Ampy.
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Jan 5, 2007 21:05:37 GMT -5
Ouch, Amp!
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Mar 11, 2007 20:58:41 GMT -5
Ah, beautiful weather in the mid-70s this weekend, the first week of daylight savings time, things are getting green, the trees are starting to come out... Gotta love it.
There is this one red oak tree out back, on the other side of the creek about halfway back. It's huge - one of the largest. It's over 100 ft tall and maybe 4 ft in diameter. It's hollow about halfway up, for about 20 ft. Last week, KayJay saw a mama-sized raccoon climb up and go into the hollow place. They have a home in there! It makes sense. What a cozy home they must have in there, and it's WAY up there!
Today, I was sitting on the deck about dusk after working outside all day, and I heard this chattering coming from that area. It sounded like monkeys or something, just having a hell of a spat! Way up above the hollow place, there is a crook in the tree, and I could see a silhouette against the sky in there. I got my binoculars and could see an adolescent coon clambering down the tree. He stopped at the hollow place and went in briefly, then started down the tree again. He jumped over to a smaller white oak to complete his descent. Then I saw his sibling way up there, starting down in the same way. They are so funny! It was way cool. I'm happy we located their nest in there. No telling how many generations have used it.
|
|
|
|
Post by RocDoc on Mar 11, 2007 23:36:07 GMT -5
Having moved 30 minutes further than the 10 miles from 'The Lake' like we'd been for the past 10 years(well, 18 years for me, alone) is also a revelation for what we see of nature here...
Just this morning while we had Sonny Boy down at the park (after I went and PIGGED out at a local Boy Scout troop's Pancake Breakfast, mmMMMmmm!), and there's this HUGE flock of some sorta cranes just floating on the updrafts WAY the fuck high in the sky.
Must have been 60-70 of them (honest, no shit!) that variously broke into 3 or four groups..and it was as though they were just scoping out some place to land.
Lots of marshland and various sizeable ponds (natural and man-made) in our area, the SW suburbs roughly 18-20 miles outside of the city....but there are so many varieties of BIG birds that I've noticed here.
Probably I was just completely unaware of the habitats just past my nose basically, but I useta think we had to go clear up to Northern Wisconsin to see this sorta stuff.
Nope.
Extremely cool to see here.
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Mar 12, 2007 17:20:28 GMT -5
They were probably in radio contact with O'Hare and had overflight clearance. Migrating birds blow my mind. Some geese fly at over 20,000 ft., in formation and honking all they way! They take advantage of tailwinds up there and are believed to make ground speeds of over 100 mph at times. Probably more. An eagle carcass was found in the Himalayas at 26,000 ft, and a duck (a DUCK) was hit by a commercial airliner at 21,000 feet in Nevada.
Flocks of Canada geese migrate through here every year. I usually see them near the business corridor where I work, coming in to land, rest, and feed (or taking off). Probably because the Cahaba River runs through that area.
I saw a really good show comparing birds to airplanes a while back. The peregrine falcon, when he goes into his stoop to dive for a prey item, rolls over and heads straight down, exactly like a fighter plane starting a dive. We humans have to learn everything the hard way.
|
|
|
|
Post by Ayinger on Mar 12, 2007 18:17:14 GMT -5
Just this morning while we had Sonny Boy down at the park (after I went and PIGGED out at a local Boy Scout troop's Pancake Breakfast, mmMMMmmm!), and there's this HUGE flock of some sorta cranes just floating on the updrafts WAY the fuck high in the sky. Must have been 60-70 of them (honest, no shit!) that variously broke into 3 or four groups..and it was as though they were just scoping out some place to land. Those packs have been flying overhead here (and heading YOUR way) since late last week. We're spending our time at work out in the field now so it's been fairly common every couple hours or so to hear the honking above going on....and then it takes a minute or two to spy 'em as they're up there so high! |
|
|
|
Post by RocDoc on Mar 12, 2007 18:20:06 GMT -5
100 mph? Effing geese are pretty damned big AND they don't look particularly streamlined either.
Holy shit, how do they not end up plucked and with dislocated wings? Tho I guess nature's got that figured out for them.
FWIW, Canada Geese here are at the numbers-level of pests like plague-carrying rodents or at least pooping uncleaned-up-after Dogs...useta have 'em all over the campus at my college, laying their slippery ooze down everywhere...
|
|
|
|
Post by RocDoc on Mar 12, 2007 18:23:40 GMT -5
No Don, definitely these weren't geese....they weren't honking but (to my admittedly shitty ears) they had a sound more like pigeons cooing....and they were just suspending themselves WAY high there in the updrafts.
Quite a wide wingspan too.
I really doubt that geese even do that, since they always seem to be zooming point A to point B when I see them...besides, they OWN Chicago, like I said.
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Mar 12, 2007 21:52:23 GMT -5
100 mph? Effing geese are pretty damned big AND they don't look particularly streamlined either. Holy shit, how do they not end up plucked and with dislocated wings? Tho I guess nature's got that figured out for them. Aw, they can only do about 50 mph on their own (which ain't too shabby). But when they're in a 50 mph tailwind... 50 + 50 = 100 mph ground speed. Everything is relative, eh? FWIW, Canada Geese here are at the numbers-level of pests like plague-carrying rodents or at least pooping uncleaned-up-after Dogs...useta have 'em all over the campus at my college, laying their slippery ooze down everywhere... Boom! Dinner. |
|
|
|
Post by RocDoc on Mar 13, 2007 13:01:35 GMT -5
Spoken like a true carnivore!
I've never had goose, and duck, several times.
Even duck is actually a pretty iffy proposition, owing to the fact that water fowl are major fatty beasts.
Undercook at your own peril.
Geese I'm told are even more fatty than duck, so you've gotta be a very skillful cook to make that meal work.
Makes me wonder who first came up with the phrase 'Your goose is cooked!'?
And was it in fact really cooked?
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Mar 13, 2007 19:29:32 GMT -5
Spoken like a true carnivore! Oh, I talk a good game, but I've never shot a game bird (or any other game animal). Except a crow, which isn't really a game bird, though they can be legally hunted because they're such a public nuisance. They used to have bounties on them in some places that were blighted with them, and they still have eradication programs sometimes. And you CAN eat them. Or so say people who hunt them - probably just to keep people from looking down their noses at them as meanie bird-killers. "I got me a buncha crows here! Well, I better get home and clean 'em now!" *dumped in the nearest ditch*I've had some awfully tasty pheasant and quail though. Chew carefully for the birdshot. Duck can be good, but it's a little greasy for me. Don't know that I've ever had goose. But theoretically, when the giant economic upheaval comes, I could get by alright right here. There's tons of bobwhite quail all around, and dove, rabbits, even squirrels and coons. But I don't like to eat my friends. |
|
|
|
Post by samplestiltskin on Mar 18, 2007 20:01:41 GMT -5
You shot a crow? I can't love you anymore. Public nuisance? Can you shoot a person who is a public nuisance? The day I can shoot a human public nuisance is the day I'll forgive you for shooting a crow.
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Mar 20, 2007 19:14:19 GMT -5
They're a health hazard, too. You might feel differently if you raised crops or had a garden. Hey, I thought you were from Kansas? But not to worry, samps, they're far too wary around here. Where I work, you have to practically kick them out of your way to get to your car, but out here, they stay way away. They never get within 75 yards of a house out here, so I'm unlikely to ever get a clean shot at one with my pellet gun. They make plenty of noise, though. Smart ass bastards.
|
|
|
|
Post by strat-0 on Jun 25, 2007 19:07:49 GMT -5
Snapped some pics of a little coon around the creek this weekend. Digging for crawdads - mmm-mmm-good!  Whatchu lookin' at?  Working late.  |
|
|
|
Post by RocDoc on Jun 27, 2007 11:37:36 GMT -5
Working late, like the skunk we've got under our friggin' storage shed, does.  Bastiche MFer.... Any experience with skunks, Mr Strat? Anyone? Googled 'skunk repellent' and there are a few selling what they are calling 'repellent'....then a whole buncha others saying there ain't no such thang, period. Bundled up mothballs and/or ammonia soaked rags thrown down their holes seem to be a good suggestion....then you gotta bury chicken wire around the perimeter so they can't dig their way under again later...like say in a few months when the smells of the ammonia go away. DARN that wilderness! |
|
