A Guide To The Birds Of East Africa
Hey, somebody got an interesting photo of a woodpecker in Arkansas--no, seriously, they did. It's not an ivory-billed, but some kind of crazy hybrid. Northern flicker looks like one half of the bird...but the other half, who can say? Check out photos here (click on the thumbnails to see larger versions). I'm thinking flicker with a red-bellied, but I'm not married to that.
I forgot to mention that I read a delightful little book earlier this summer call A Guide to the Birds of East Africa. The book by Nicholas Drayson is about two older male birders in Africa having a birding competition. Whoever sees the most species in the span of a week wins the opportunity to ask a prominent local female field trip leader to a big dance coming up. Will the winner by the shy Mr. Malik who has been pining for Rose all these years but is not the best birder on the block? Or will the winner be that rogue Harry Kahn with fast car and hardcore birding buddies? It's a bit British in style, but still has enough of a sense of humor to throw in a fart joke. If you're looking for something light to read with a touch of African birds, this book is a good way to spend a Saturday afternoon.
I forgot to mention that I read a delightful little book earlier this summer call A Guide to the Birds of East Africa. The book by Nicholas Drayson is about two older male birders in Africa having a birding competition. Whoever sees the most species in the span of a week wins the opportunity to ask a prominent local female field trip leader to a big dance coming up. Will the winner by the shy Mr. Malik who has been pining for Rose all these years but is not the best birder on the block? Or will the winner be that rogue Harry Kahn with fast car and hardcore birding buddies? It's a bit British in style, but still has enough of a sense of humor to throw in a fart joke. If you're looking for something light to read with a touch of African birds, this book is a good way to spend a Saturday afternoon.Labels: bird books, hybrid
posted by birdchick at 9:53 PM
5 Comments:
Its british in style but still has enough a sense of humour!?! I'm outraged e're the one's who gave the world Monty Python, Cook & moore, Terry Pratchett, the Secret Policeman's Ball, the Young Ones snd Peep Show as opposed to, for example, Everyone Loves Raymond. For shame birdchick, for shame ;)
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Hmm, I see where you're going with red-bellied cross as the read extends pretty far back on the top of the head but what's up with that black supercilium? That's the most bizarre feature for me. Red-bellied makes sense from a breeding range perspective whereas something like a yellow-bellied sapsucker doesn't. Weird, weird, weird.
For the hybrid woodpecker, my vote goes to yellow-bellied (or similar) sapsucker, for a wild guess. As to British humor, I add my voice to the outrage. Try a bit of Fry and Laurie, please... :-)
speaking of birds in foreign countries and British humour . . I was just surfing and saw this in an article about falconry and Jonathan Marshall who rehabs these birds. My favorite part of this article was:
Although the birds are trained, they are still wild, he says. Anything can happen. On one memorable day at a show, a hawk knocked off a man's toupee with its jesses as it swooped over the audience. "The wig got blown along and you could see the bird think: 'Bloody hell, squirrel!'," Marshall recounts. "It started to pull the hair out until it realised there was no meat on it and dropped it like a pan-scrub. That was pretty embarrassing."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/09/13/eafalcon113.xml
also some great pics on this site
www.experiencefalconry.co.uk
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