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You are here: Home / Nature & Respite / Birdwatching / Lovelier Things (Open Thread)

Lovelier Things (Open Thread)

by Betty Cracker|  March 1, 20171:00 am| 40 Comments

This post is in: Birdwatching, Domestic Politics, Nature, Open Threads

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Forget about that gelatinous marmalade hairball for a minute and check out this osprey with a shopping bag attached to its nest:

The nest is located on top of a light pole — really high up. It’s likely the bag flew up there by chance and got caught on a stick.

But I like to think the osprey added it as a special design feature of the nest. Maybe it serves as a windsock that helps the bird stick the landings?

Oh, and check out this beach bunny:

There’s a closer look at the bunny below the fold…

And here’s a utility boat of some sort in the bay:

And here is the Tampa skyline looking magical in the evening light:

Florida can be a miserable shithole sometimes, and earlier, on the last day of February, it got so hot I had to shut my windows and turn on the A/C despite the calendar. But it has its good points, which I hope to enjoy until the water rises past my nose.

I’d show you snoozing boxer dogs, but you’d accuse me of re-running photos from last year — same old couch-denting slobber dogs slumbering in their accustomed places. Beauty is a comfort sometimes.

Open thread!

PS: Has anyone else watched “The OA” on Netflix? Weird AF, but engrossing!

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40Comments

  1. 1.

    Adam L Silverman

    March 1, 2017 at 1:09 am

    I’ve got a nesting pair of Osprey in one of the trees in the scrub in the front of the house. And a nesting pair of red shouldered hawks. And a bard owl. They all call at/past/to each other all the time. And the owl wakes the hawks and ospreys up at night and they do not sound amused!

  2. 2.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 1, 2017 at 1:10 am

    I’d show you snoozing boxer dogs, but you’d accuse me of re-running photos from last year

    The way it is now, I will accuse you of not running any new boxer photos. However, there is extra credit for the bunny, so it all comes out in the wash.

  3. 3.

    jl

    March 1, 2017 at 1:10 am

    I can see the bunny rabbit and the big boat. I can’t see the shopping bag.

  4. 4.

    seaboogie

    March 1, 2017 at 1:12 am

    Thank you for the fauna and scenic reprieve from reality sinking in tonight…the President’s address to Congress. Guess it’s really real now.

    Here in CA plastic bags are done and gone. You either bring your own bag, or pay ten cents for a paper one. You know how often you see plastic bags stuck in trees or littering the roadside? Never.

    However you do see people running out of the grocery line to their car to grab their bags, or – if it’s a light shopping expedition – wandering from the grocery to the parking lot with random groceries in their hands/under their arms. I’ve schlepped plenty of cat food cans in my purse.

    Stuff like this makes me kind of happy, in a weird way.

    Also, awesome new moon rising, with a brilliant Venus off to the right – it was a breath-taking sight on my ride home…. The days are getting longer for reals, and not just seeming like that’s the case if you read the news.

  5. 5.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    March 1, 2017 at 1:13 am

    @jl: It’s to the right of the osprey.

  6. 6.

    Yarrow

    March 1, 2017 at 1:15 am

    A red tail hawk swooped down really low over my neighbor’s yard yesterday evening. I was outside and about jumped out of my skin. It looked like it was coming straight for me!

  7. 7.

    seaboogie

    March 1, 2017 at 1:20 am

    @Adam L Silverman: Ain’t it grand to have wildlife in your close proximity?

    At work today, the neighboring shop-owner mentioned all the squeeks and squeals and general high-pitched noise-itude coming from under his shop. We’ve agreed that it is likely a new litter of raccoons. I’ve seen Mama outside our back door once or twice, and – in the world’s cutest tiny parking lot (5 cars, and a palm tree) – we have an adjacent dumpster that regularly receives leftover popcorn from our independent and historic movie theater on the Sonoma square.

    I didn’t finish my lunch salad, so I left it out for Mama Raccoon, just in case that’s the deal.

  8. 8.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 1, 2017 at 1:20 am

    @seaboogie:

    Also, awesome new moon rising, with a brilliant Venus off to the right – it was a breath-taking sight on my ride home

    I say that same sight myself driving home from work. Did you see the Earthshine? The crescent part of the moon is directly illuminated by the sun, and in favorable cases, the normally dark part of the moon (as viewed from Earth) can be dimly lit by sunlight reflected off of the Earth. The net effect is that you will see a bright crescent, and the rest of the moon dimly lit.

  9. 9.

    seaboogie

    March 1, 2017 at 1:24 am

    @Jerzy Russian: Yes, I did see that – perhaps why it was so magical to me, without knowing why – thank you for sharing this…I have seen “Earthshine” – no wonder I felt so good!

  10. 10.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 1, 2017 at 1:25 am

    I was bored over the weekend so I watched Downfall over the internet. Most of us have seen various “Hitler is pissed” clips showing him inside his bunker yelling at the generals, etc., but with alternative subtitles, posted here. That clip was from that movie, and I was curious as to what the original dialog was (my German is so rusty as to be useless). Spoiler: nearly all of the main characters die of self-inflicted gunshot wounds by the end of the movie.

  11. 11.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 1, 2017 at 1:27 am

    Well that is a super cute bunny. Thanks!

  12. 12.

    Yarrow

    March 1, 2017 at 1:32 am

    @Major Major Major Major: Aren’t all bunnies super cute?

  13. 13.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 1, 2017 at 1:33 am

    @Yarrow: this one is too.

  14. 14.

    Jerzy Russian

    March 1, 2017 at 1:35 am

    @Yarrow:

    Aren’t all bunnies super cute?

    They are until someone loses a head.

  15. 15.

    Juju

    March 1, 2017 at 1:35 am

    Ecobags has a nice selection of cloth grocery bags. I used to swear that the plastic bags we put in a box in the garage, just to put the bags where they wouldn’t blow around, used to reproduce at night. I don’t have that problem any longer now that we use the cloth shopping bags. I don’t miss those stupid bags.

    I wouldn’t mind a doggie picture. I haven’t had a dog since August and I miss having one terribly. I need a golden.

  16. 16.

    NotMax

    March 1, 2017 at 1:49 am

    Looking at the (always incomplete) listings of what’s coming up on Netflix in March, foreign fare that caught the eye as a cut above:

    For spooky drama/mystery, Beau Séjour.

    For rock ’em, sock ’em action/suspense, Pandora.

    In a more comedic vein, a political series about a strong-willed First Lady, Ingobernable (couldn’t find a trailer with subtitles yet).

  17. 17.

    seaboogie

    March 1, 2017 at 1:52 am

    @Juju: One good outcome of no more plastic bags is that this is a thing of the past: stubbornly carrying too many bags over your wrists to make one trip from the car – and your hands turning purple from the circulation being cut off.

  18. 18.

    John Weiss

    March 1, 2017 at 1:56 am

    Betty,

    Nice pictures. I live in the woods in farthest SW Oregon in the woods outside of Brookings in the hills. We gots the critters as well: tiny bunnies, robust grey dear, gracile brown deer, foxes, bobcats, black bears, racoons (of course!) rats, moles, voles, gods know what else, and about a billion plants, fungi and such. I love it here and I plan to send you some pics.

    jw

  19. 19.

    TriassicSands

    March 1, 2017 at 1:57 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    A “bard” owl? Who recites Shakespearian sonnets? Wonderful. You’re a lucky man, Adam!

    And the owl wakes the hawks and ospreys up at night and they do not sound amused!

    Evidently, ospreys and hawks prefer more contemporary works.

    Seriously, the sound of owls at night is one of nature’s truly great sounds. Until recently I had a pair of great horned owls living across the road from me and listening to them hoo-hoo-hoo back and forth at night was a real treat.

  20. 20.

    Achrachno

    March 1, 2017 at 1:57 am

    Eastern cottontails don’t have proper ears, just little nubs. Don’t they know what rabbit ears are supposed to look like?

  21. 21.

    Major Major Major Major

    March 1, 2017 at 1:59 am

    @Achrachno: right? It’s like they aren’t even trying.

  22. 22.

    seaboogie

    March 1, 2017 at 2:02 am

    @Achrachno: Aha…I was wondering…never seen an animal look more like prey – assuming they must reproduce like crazy just to keep the species going…even field-mice (that I have inadvertently housed) have super-big eyes and ears for their size.

  23. 23.

    TriassicSands

    March 1, 2017 at 2:04 am

    @Jerzy Russian:

    Fortunately, those killer bunnies’ days are numbered due to the loss of sea ice…one more benefit of climate change.

  24. 24.

    TriassicSands

    March 1, 2017 at 2:08 am

    @Jerzy Russian:

    Most of the dialog coming from Hitler was about his historic electoral victories back in the thirties…oh, and how this was all the fault of the media.

  25. 25.

    Arclite

    March 1, 2017 at 3:22 am

    Soooo, did the bunny end up on the osprey’s dinner table?

  26. 26.

    Mohagan

    March 1, 2017 at 3:56 am

    @Jerzy Russian: I’ve heard this called the “new moon in the old moon’s arms”. Beautiful sight tonight (with bonus Venus!) as I drove home tonight.

  27. 27.

    TriassicSands

    March 1, 2017 at 3:57 am

    @Arclite:

    Bunny? Ospreys prefer fish. If you’ve never seen them “fish” it is spectacular. If an osprey did have a taste for bunny, I wouldn’t give the bunny much of a chance.

  28. 28.

    ThresherK

    March 1, 2017 at 5:12 am

    It’s cuter than anything when my cat gets caught by the bag monster, and I extricate her, and two minutes later she’s in it again.

    Does the bag on the neck represent a threat to the osprey?

  29. 29.

    Schlemazel

    March 1, 2017 at 5:39 am

    There is a nest like that near the Coon Rapids dam, just North of Minneapolis. Woven in with the sticks is a little red dog leash and collar.

    Its assumed the bird swiped the leash, they really can’t lift that much weight to take a dog.

  30. 30.

    daryljfontaine

    March 1, 2017 at 5:46 am

    This is, oddly, one of the better pieces of political analysis of Dolt 45 that I’ve seen.

    Actually, How Donald Trump Eats His Steak Matters

    D

  31. 31.

    Zinsky

    March 1, 2017 at 6:08 am

    Betty, were those pictures taken from the St. Pete or Tampa side of the bay? I like Tampa more than most Florida cities because, with the large Hispanic population in Ybor City and elsewhere, there are more Democrats than other cities like Miami or Pensacola. Peace to you!

  32. 32.

    TriassicSands

    March 1, 2017 at 6:14 am

    @Schlemazel:

    A large osprey could lift a small dog, but I think you’re probably right about how the collar/leash got there. I’ve seen osprey catch and fly with fish that weighed as much as a little lap dog. I’ve also seen bald eagles catch fish they couldn’t lift. In one case, the eagle swam ashore with the fish, dragged it up onto the beach and ate lunch. In the other case, the eagle was in desperate straits. Eagles have a fairly powerful grip, but apparently, when they lock into a fish they can have a difficult time releasing it. This eagle had latched onto a sizeable salmon but when it tried to lift it out of the water the fish was too heavy. The eagle struggled but could neither lift or release the fish and every time it flapped its wings it became wetter and wetter. I was in a sea kayak and I began to fear that I was going to see what I’d read about — an eagle drowning after catching a fish that was too heavy. Fortunately, the fish’s struggling and the eagle’s efforts eventually separated the two and the eagle, exhausted, swam to the nearest rock and settled down to dry out and regain its strength.

  33. 33.

    ET

    March 1, 2017 at 6:23 am

    I watched the New Orleans station WYES live stream of Comus and Rex meeting over their YouTube channelwith my friend on the phone. I am from NOLA ND had never been/seen it and she is from Atlanta. Even after she heard all my stories about Mardi Gras she was still amazed that all that went on on the 21st century.

  34. 34.

    mainmata

    March 1, 2017 at 8:50 am

    @Yarrow: We have red-tailed hawks in our backyard. They are very curious and not at all wary of humans so they will get pretty close. What cracks me up is how badly they are harassed by crows that gang up on any hawk they see.

  35. 35.

    AnotherBruce

    March 1, 2017 at 8:53 am

    @TriassicSands: I think he means a barred owl, or maybe a barn owl, or maybe he’s a poet.

  36. 36.

    Elizabelle

    March 1, 2017 at 8:59 am

    @ Betty: I love these photos. Especially the osprey at sunset (or sunrise). Thank you.

    Into any non-Trump content.

  37. 37.

    Miss Bianca

    March 1, 2017 at 9:37 am

    @Adam L Silverman: lucky dog. I love ospreys. Around here I mostly have to live with red-tails, golden and bald eagles. And the occasional huge owl, provenance unknown.

  38. 38.

    stinger

    March 1, 2017 at 10:29 am

    @TriassicSands:

    A “bard” owl? Who recites Shakespearian sonnets?

    It’s a wise old owl.

  39. 39.

    SWMBO

    March 1, 2017 at 10:48 am

    @AnotherBruce: I live further south than Adam but I’ve heard them called bard owls here. They are small (less than 12 inches tall) ground burrowing owls. We used to have a lot of them in this neighborhood until they expanded the airport and baseball fields. They used to make their nests near the ball fields near the stadium lights where the bugs would swarm the lights and offer a free, easy meal for them. When they doubled the number of baseball fields, the owls lost their nesting grounds.

  40. 40.

    HeidiMom

    March 1, 2017 at 11:07 am

    @daryljfontaine: I think that analysis is a bit overdone (sorry). General Grant also insisted on eating beef well-done. He took lots of risks (see Vicksburg campaign).

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