rivercrow

This morning I took my parents to the botanical gardens. It was an impromptu visit to the gardens. I didn’t think they’d want to get out and walk.
Lesson #1: Always take your damn hat.
We went in and started wandering around. The critters were all cooperative — butterflies sat still, dragonflies were patient.
Lesson #2: Always take […]

There’s a fantastic botanical garden here. I’ve been spending two to three hours there every weekend I’m in town, mostly hanging out in the swamp area.
The first day I was there, a dragonfly cooperated with me. I had the 50mm 1.8 and a 2x closeup filter. He (blue dasher) reared into an obelisk pose while […]

There was a box turtle on the back patio this morning. The dog paused to look at it, which is what caught husband’s attention.
I fixed a plate of overripe banana and watermelon chunks. The turtle ate all the banana chunks and left the watermelon. When the fruit was gone, it wandered off.

This morning I decided to eat the last, overripe, banana for breakfast. It was too soft for bird paws to hold–or so I thought. The Grey flew to the sofa as soon as she saw the banana in play. I took her back to her cage and offered her a taste. She took a nibble, […]

Here are some more….
Aphid farm

A fly

Another fly, or same fly from above

It’s been four years since Sedgewick died. I dreamed of him this morning–the darned cocky bird grinding his beak and acting coy and content.
I woke up smiling, thinking of him and feeling he was at peace. I realized that I’d been unconsciously sad because of the anniversary.

Musical interlude #1 (30 second streaming MP3 clip)

I […]

A friend sent me some music samplers. He has good taste in tunes, but one sampler in particular got the African grey parrot going. Really going. The whole vocal repertoire accompanied by wing-flapping and acrobatics.
What’s on the CD that the parrot likes?

Brian Eno, “Grid Monster Edit” from Ali Click
DJ Krush, “Esthero Vocal Edit” from Final […]

It’s fitting that the same week scientists announce support for the theory that dinos and birds are related, Der Spiegel runs a story on the intelligence of ravens.
The last several years seem to have had an explosion of “smart corvid” stories, ranging from the Japanese crows who crack nuts with the assistance of traffic and […]