Answers to a query of mine and to a puzzle that I set, accompanied by some photos.
INTRODUCTION
This little post features answers to two problems and at the end a few photos.
BIG AVIAN FIND
A couple of hours ago I put up a post featuring some large water birds that were new to me. Since then two people in the comments section (Cindy and Vicki) have suggested Muscovy Ducks as a possibility, and my twitter friends @team4nature have made a similar though more detailed suggestion.
This level of consensus is sufficient for me – these are Muscovy ducks, possibly domesticated and possibly crossed with some other breed (possibilities raised by @team4nature). Here to conclude this section is the feature image from the previous post:
SUPERPRIME RESOLVED
I offered up this problem from brilliant last night:
This is my own solution, posted as such on brilliant, and reflecting mu frustration at the sheer number of people commenting based on failure to fully read the terms of the question:
Can you identify these large water birds that I saw near Kettlewell Lane, King’s Lynn, today?
INTRODUCTION
I was out walking this afternoon, and one of the places I walked was a section of river that runs parallel to Kettlewell Lane in King’s Lynn. It was there that I saw some birds I have never seen before…
BIG NEW AVIAN FIND
These are large birds, similar in size and build to a goose, but with colouring unlike any goose I have ever seen, and not matching any of the goose species listed in my bird book. They were probably about half as big again in each direction as the mallards that I also saw (and due to being overfed King’s Lynn mallards are bigger than average mallards!). I have lots of photos for you…
Based on the size of the birds and all the features that my camera managed to pick up can you identify them? If you can please let me know by commenting.
A bird post provoked in part by the Angling Trust seeking permission to double the rate at which they cull cormorants.
INTRODUCTION
This post has two elements: first, I saw on twitter something about the Angling Trust calling for cormorants to be shot “to protect stocks of coarse and game fish”, and following the link located the details which you can see here, and second while out looking for cormorants to photograph for this post I saw something else that I had not previously captured.
CORMORANTS
I would take a lot persuading that increasing the number of cormorants licensed to be shot copuld be justified in any case, but the grounds given, which amount to a statement that “our sport counts for more than cormorants” fail to come even remotely close. There is a cormorant colony within walking distance of central King’s Lynn, and although they were not about in big numbers when I went looking, there were four of them in evidence. Here are the pictures:
AN ASPI.BLOG FIRST
While observing the cormorants I also a got a couple of pictures of this:
Going through my bird book I could find only two birds with black wings and a white bar across their tail. The first, the Storm Petrel was an unlikely option given how far King’s Lynn is from the nearest ocean (it is an ocean going bird). That left me with the second, the Lapwing, a medium sized wader that likes marshy or muddy conditions (not a problem in the vicinity of the Great Ouse!). Here to conclude this post is what my bird book has to say about Lapwings:
An account of the time I spent in Penzance on the Saturday of my Cornish holiday.
INTRODUCTION
I have finally edited all the pictures from my recent Cornish holiday and have now at last got time to get back to blogging about it. My last post described my journey down to Penzance, and this post provides the story of the rest of the day.
GETTING MY BEARINGS
Having arrived in to Penzance pretty much bang on schedule I visited the local information office, purchased a detailed and very cheap souvenir map (I will conclude this series of Cornish posts with one featuring all the publicity materials that I collected while down there), and set out on the first part of my exploration of the town. An early necessity was finding somewhere to eat lunch (although I am not entirely inflexible on the matter I generally aim to eat lunch some time close to 1PM), and having walked past the Harbour and the Chapel I found an establishment suited to my needs. The Turk’s Head was not too extortionate (there are no cheap places in Penzance). I opted for a BBQ Chicken, Bacon and Davidstow Cheese melt, and enjoyed it, although I felt that it did not really live up to its name on two counts:
1. There was precious little evidence of bacon (though they had used good quality chicken)
2. Davidstow is supposed to be a strongly flavoured cheese and yet I barely noticed it over the other flavours – if I ask for something of which cheese is a featured ingredient I want to taste said cheese.
Here some photos taken between leaving Penzance station and having lunch:
The Egyptian House
The first of a number of shots of interesting items on display at The Turks Head
There were five sets of framed banknotes starting with this one.
Poor lighting prevented me from doing full justice to this map.This, and the two set of framed cigarette cards the follow it were in a narrow passage that meant that I could not get them fully in shot from front on – had to photograph at an angle.
POST LUNCH EXPLORATIONS
Having consumed my lunch I headed for the Promenade, and walked along it. From the other end of the Promenade I walked back to the train station and then did some exploring on the other side of the train station, locating a path that ran between the tracks and the sea. Here are some photographs…
In November one would not expect an open-air pool in Engalnd to have much custom, and indeed the Jubilee Pool was empty.
A number of post boxes were painted gold to honour people who were successful at the London 2012 Olympics – this one Penzance is dedicated to rower Helen Glover.
I conclude this post with two special sections, firstly…
ST MICHAEL’S MOUNT
Being grey the whole time, and misty for most of it this was not a great a day for taking long-range photographs, but St Michael’s Mount was not a target I could resist, even under those circumstances, so here are the results:
You will notice gulls in a couple of these shots, which leads to the second special section, which concludes this post…
BIRDS
There are many seabirds to be observed in Penzance and I was able to capture some of them on camera…
The journey back was uneventful, and with the train departing Penzance at 16:41 on a November afternoon it was too dark for photographing through the windows of that train.
A review of a new find – Steve Burrows’ Birder Murders, with some Norfolk bird pictures of my own for company.
INTRODUCTION
This post concerns two books by a writer I discovered in the last few days:
MAKING THE DISCOVERY
When I saw these in the library there was never any doubt about borrowing them – detective stories set in Norfolk and heavily concerned with birds looks a darned good mix.Â
THE BOOKS
There is much of interest about birds and about North Norfolk in these books, and the strikingly different characters of each of the police officers makes for some good interplay between them.Â
In the first of these two books, “A Siege of Bitterns”, the first victim is actually a birdwatcher. The second victim is a suspect in the first case until he is found dead. It eventjually turns out that the first case was not murder but suicide, and that the murderer in the second case was the MP.
In “A Cast of Falcons”, the hero’s boss, DCS Shepherd, is shown up in a very poor light when she initially refuses even to entertain the notion that the exceedingly rich Sheik who has bought an old dairy farm for his pet project (research on method of carbon capture) could be guilty. She shows herself to be more concerned with not annoying someone who is rich and powerful than with justice, which given her job is entirely unacceptable.
There is a third book in this series that I know of, called “A Pitying of Doves”, and it is sufficient comment on just how good these two books are that I have reserved a copy (costs 60p) and am awaiting it’s arrival at King’s Lynn library.
If you get the opportunity to pick up a book with the name Steve Burrows on the cover please take it!
SOME NORFOLK BIRDS
To finish this post here are some new pictures of Norfolk birds…
A post for the #Inglorious12th, featuring the right kind of bird shooting – that done with a camera.
INTRODUCTION
Today is August 12th, which is for well-heeled British hooligans the start of the grouse shooting season, known to them as “The Glorious 12th”. For folk like me, who view those who derive pleasure from taking pot shots at birds with utter contempt it is therefore the #Inglorious12th.
SHOOTING BIRDS THOMAS STYLE
I choose to mark today by posting pictures of birds shot the only acceptable way – with a camera. Most of these are from this morning, but I am also including some older pics.
The Little Egret that featured a couple of weeks back.A magpie on the path alongside the Great OuseI was at the racecourse before my colleague arrived with a key, and this wagtail caught my eye while I was waiting.
The first of the new pictures – this and the final cormorant pic are in their correct positions, but some of the rest of the cormorant series are out of order.
I finish with this Jay – two live photographs and the relevant page from my bird book.The close-up shot.
A mixed bag of a post, featuring local politics, libraries, autism, science, nature and photography.
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to this post in three parts. I am going to start by mentioning a local election that took place in my area today and in which I voted, then I will be mentioning an event that will be taking place at Gaywood Library (one of four such establishments in Norfolk that I visit at least semi-regularly) and I will finish up with some links to do with nature which will lead naturally to some of my photographs.
A FORCED BY-ELECTION
The election in which I voted today happened due to the laziness and arrogance of the incumbent councillor, who in spite of living just across the road from the Town Hall never attended meetings.
Four candidates were in the contest, in alphabetical order:
Rob Archer of the Green Party Francis Bone of the Labour Party Helen Russell-Johnson of the Liberal Democrats Mike Taylor of the Conservative Party
In the ordinary course of events my inclination, especially given that the displaced councillor had been from the Labour Party would have been to vote for Mr Archer. However, the Liberal Democrat candidate happens to be my aunt. Therefore I voted for her.
I have started this post by covering this election for two reasons:
I want to make it clear to the Liberal Democrats that I voted for my aunt IN SPITE of the fact that she was representing them not because of it.
Also, just in  case Mr Archer happens to be reading this, I hope he will take it as both explanation and apology for not having voted for him on this occasion.
I conclude this section of the post with a picture of my Political Compass certificate (it is free and does not very long to answer the questions which are used to assign your score):
THE GAYWOOD LIBRARY EVENT
The event at Gaywood Library is a Business Eveningat which I hope it will be possible to raise the subject of the Autism Hour, one of the National Autistic Society’s recent initiatives. I have already confirmed that I will be in attendance. Here are a couple of pictures to end this section:
SOME NATURE PIECES
My nature links naturally divide into three segments, with a few photographs of my own forming a fourth. We will start with…
A NEW DINOSAUR FIND
This story courtesy of scienmag.com is about a dinosaur that has been named Albertavenator Curriei (“Currie’s Alberta Hunter”, named in honour of Canadian paleontologist Dr Philip J Currie). Below is a representation of this creature by Oliver Demuth:
Stan Kroenke, current owner of Arsenal Football Club, has just launched a new TV channel devoted to blood sports. I have two links to share, and some words for Arsenal fans at the end:
A change.org petitionaimed at the sponsors of Arsenal Football Club asking them to withdraw support and so help force Kroenke out, screenshot below:
For ordinary Arsenal fans my suggestions are simple – boycott all home matches until Kroenke goes, and if you are a season ticket holder return your ticket and demand a full refund, making it clear that you will return if and only if Kroenke is no longer involved with the club.
MORE ON THE FIGHT TO PROTECT TROSA NATURE
This morning I reblogged Part 4 of Anna’s series of “Paradise on Earth” posts highlighting the wildlife that can be seen around Trosa and the Tureholm Peninsula. Since then she has added yet another post to that series, and I include links below:
Part 4, concentrating on birds including the Osprey shown below.
Part 5, also dedicated to birds. I have chosen as my sample image a Linnet.
Finally, to end this section, and the post as a whole we have some of…
A walk in and around King’s Lynn and a number of interesting and important links.
INTRODUCTION
I am making the walk the centrepiece of this post, with some links either side of it, starting with some general links, and then following the walk with some science and nature themed links.
Yesterday was bright and sunny, so I went out for a walk. The sun was shining on to the Lower Purfleet, revealing that the surface still had a thin covering of ice…
When posting about a walk in King’s Lynn I always like to showcase at least one of our historic buildings, and today I have this picture showing Hanse House and the Rathskeller with the towers of King’s Lynn Minster in the background:
There was nothing else of note until I reached the Nar outfall, where I have often observed cormorants. This time there were no cormorants, but there was a small wading bird which I had not seen before and which consultation of my bird book suggested was a Common Sandpiper…
I left the river by way of Hardings Pits, taking a couple of shots (one each way) at that moment.
The view towards townThe view away from town
Crossing the Nar on my towards the parkland I took a picture from the bridge…
Passing through the Vancouver Garden I spied a squirrel. It eluded my first attempt to photograph it, but…
I then decided to make it a long walk and headed for Lynn Sport, to then go back into town by way of Bawsey Drain. Along the way I got a shot of the railway station as seen from Tennyson Road level crossing…
At Lynnsport I stopped to photograph a decorated signpost…
The Bawsey Drain segment of the walk provided a number of pictures, including a raven and some moorhens…
Unfortunately Bawsey Drain is used as a dumping ground by people who cannot be bothered to dispose of their rubbish properly.
While walking a,long John Kennedy Road I took this picture of the back of St Nicholas’ Chapel…
Right at the end of the walk I spotted a pied wagtail..
NATURE THEMED LINKS
The first link in this section is to a piece that appeared as part of WEIT’s Hili Dialogue series. The star of the series is a cat, the eponymous Hili, also known as the Princess of Poland. Hili has a staff of two, Andrej and Malgorzata and graciously permits a dog named Cyrus to share in this. The pieces always feature something about that particular date, and apparently yesterday was Penguin Awareness Day. While I do not object to a day being designated Penguin Awareness Day, surely we should be aware of them and the rest of the natural world every day. To read the piece in full, click on the graphic below which is extracted from it:
This leads neatly on to two recent pieces from Anna, the first of which is titled “This can never be wrong”, the ‘this’  being taking care of our planet. The other piece from Anna that I am sharing here is about the Save Trosa Naturecampaign.
WEIT get another mention, for this piece about a new species of mothwhich has been named after Donald Trump.
I started the ‘general links’ section of this post with a piece by Heather Hastie. I now finish the piece with another piece, the title of which, “Huge Crack in Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica Grows” is sufficient introduction. I ‘pressed’ a link to this yesterday, but it is so important that I choose to share it again.
An account of the grand finale of the 65th King’s Lynn Festival, some splendid pictures from in and around King’s Lynn, a plethora of important links and some cool infographics.
INTRODUCTION
Hello and welcome to all who read this, old and new followers alike. As well as my title piece I have some excellent photos from in and around King’s Lynn, some very important links and a few infographics to share. I hope that some of you will be inspired to share this post in its turn.
A FINAL FLOURISH
Last night’s concert at the Corn Exchange, which brought the curtain down on the 65th King’s Lynn Festival was an unexpected pleasure in two ways. First of all, we had not (my mother and I) originally been going to attend it, but then at a previous concert a family friend had two tickets for this one that she could not use, so we ended up with them. The second sense in which it was an unexpected pleasure was that the star attraction of the evening was pianist Freddie Kempf and I am not the world’s greatest fan of piano music, so I had been a little concerned as to how the evening would go.
The stage pre-performance (obviously no pics once the evening was under way!)
I need not have worried – the Flanders Symphony Orchestra were quite magnificent, and at no point save in sections which were supposed to be solo did the piano (on which Mr Kempf delivered a spectacular performance) drown out the rest of the  orchestra.
All in all, this was an excellent way for a great festival to end. I have mentioned before in this blog that King’s Lynn as a town is good at public festivities, and it really showed with this festival.
A PICTORIAL INTERLUDE
Before moving on to the links section, here are some pictures from in and around King’s Lynn…
A huge black backed gull at close range.
A close up of the frontage of the new visitor’s centre at King’s Lynn bus station.
The new seating areas between the bus station shelter and the Lynn Museum
Two boats moored at the jetty yesterday, this one, Blue Bird 2, which I had not seen before, and Kalyptos, a regular visitor.
This year’s blackberry harvest is going to be super massive if these bushes in Hardings Pits are anything to go on.
An albino duck
One brave duckling spurned to wooden walkway down into the water!
Some entertainment in central King’s Lynn yesterday lunchtme.“Of course the comfy chair is for me – I’m a cat”
LINKS
I am going to start with coverage of various petitions that are running at the moment.
PETITIONS
Within this subsection I am dividing things up yet further for reasons that I hope will become obvious.
TWO PETITIONS THAT RELATE TO WOMEN’S RIGHTS ISSUES
First in this little section, an update on the petition to get the Canadian authorities to deny “Roosh V” entry to their country, as we in Britain denied entry to Julien Blanc:
2)Simultaneously introducing what is to me a new blog, extremecrochet, and pointing you to an excellent piece, posted on that blog, that connects to the above petition.
NEWS ON THE GROUP B STREP PETITION
I am giving this a section to itself because as well as two links to share, I have some news of my own. Namely, that having responded to a call to write my MP I have received a response from Mr Bellingham indicating his willingness to support the Early Day Motion that relates to this petition. The links I have to share are as follows:
My last petition calls on David Cameron to remove Jeremy Hunt from his position on account of his offensive and out of touch comments about NHS workers.
POLITICS
First up in this section, a piece detailing some truly outrageous expense claims on the part of the Downright Dishonourable John Bercow. For the full details you will have to read the piece, but the single most outrageous claim was for £130 for a journey of 0.8 miles in each direction (i.e. 25 minutes walking time for both journeys combined given that Bercow is an able bodied man).
Next up, Vox Political’s latest post about the perfidies of the politician that site calls the Gentleman Ranker in honour of his previous military career.
A personal view of England’s exit from the Cricket World Cup
The match between England and Bangladesh at the Adelaide Oval has just ended, with James Anderson being clean bowled to give Bangladesh victory by 15 runs. This means that Bangladesh are in the quarter-finals, and irrespective of what they do in their last game against Afghanistan England are heading home at the first possible opportunity. Buttler’s aggressive 65 kept the match alive longer than the England team as a whole deserved. The dismissal of Chris Jordan, run out when his bat was over the line but in the air, summed up England’s failings in a nutshell.
This is England’s worst ever showing in a cricket world cup – although morally speaking 1996 when England progressed into the quarter-finals only by virtue of unconvincing victories over Holland and the United Arab Emirates was on a par.
To Bangladesh, and especially Mahmudullah and Mushfiqur Rahim who batted so beautifully, the former racking up Bangladesh’s first ever world cup century my heartiest congratulations. To England: it is time to face facts – you are not even a passable one day side – never mind a good one.
For the rest, I hope that Ireland can conjure up one more good result against either India or Pakistan to ensure their progress to the quarter-finals. I think that todays result is a good one for cricket as a whole – it nails for good and all the notion that the quarter-final line ups could be predicted from the start of the tournament.
aspiblog 