birds

[Tad Eareckson]

The one I ran over was an intergrade between the Black I've known just about all of my life and the Gray I've never seen before. Found another at Rock City Gardens at the Chattanooga end of Lookout when I went to see John and Dale's raptor show.

I've been fighting snake killing idiots since about age five. There was what I later realized was a newly hatched Rat Snake that had climbed the brickwork at my house in Charleston, South Carolina. My mother was determined to chop it in half with a shovel - just in case it was poisonous. I kept scaring it back up into the attic but I - and it - eventually lost the battle.

Rotten - and vivid - memory. My mother later found that she didn't feel too great about it either.

At Scout camp every goddam idiot Scoutmaster wants to kill a Copperhead to keep the kids safe - and a Copperhead can always be identified by the absence of legs. Usually turns out to be a Rat or Water Snake. One time it was a black phase Hognose.

In '85 I took a Prairie Rattler off the road at night about a hundred yards west of "town" at Solen, North Dakota and photographed it the next day. Caught a lot of flack for dumping it five miles west of town (which, I realize in retrospect, wasn't that great an idea for the snake) instead of killing it.

"How do you know it won't bite someone?"
"So let's kill every rattlesnake on the planet to make sure nobody gets bit?"
"No, just the ones where there are people around."
"Where the fuck do you think you're gonna find fewer people around than Solen, North Dakota?"
"..."
"How 'bout tigers? We've made a great start on that. Let's finish the job."

Fuckin' idiots.

Check this one out:

http://austinhaley.com/about.php

I was following that story as it was breaking. At first it was a rattler in a birdhouse. I said "Bullshit. It was a Rat Snake." A couple of days later it was a Cottonmouth. I said "Bullshit. It was a Rat Snake." After about five days it was a Rat Snake.

Despite what you may read in some of the reports I'm pretty sure the snake survived unscathed.

The comments at the time from that neck of the woods were running about twenty to one along the lines of, "Why the fuck didn't they just use a shovel to kill it?"

Must leave on a happier note this time.

We were getting ready to fly The Pulpit / McConnellsburg, Pennsylvania on 1989/04/09. A little Timber Rattler was discovered by one of the ramps trying to soak up some rays - pretty cold and it was moving pretty slow. Everyone ran for cameras instead of shovels, machetes, and tire irons.

[Tad Eareckson]

Just reviewed some of the Austin Gabriel Haley traffic and was at least as disgusted as I was five years ago.

The BLACK Rat Snake wasn't just a rattlesnake - it was a (tree climbing) Diamondback Rattler.

And the comments were virtually nonstop about what kind of stick, baseball bat, crowbar, shovel, machete, shotgun, rifle, ammunition these assholes SHOULD have been using to kill the snake.



And it's a pretty safe bet that nobody in the kid's family has ever uttered a single syllable questioning the advisability of killing it.

It would be fun to rewind the tape, swap in a goddam feral cat with a fledgling Bluebird in its mouth, and watch the response.

A long time back I was doing a bird count with a friend on a farm area when a woman somewhat urgently inquired about the ability of us boys to kill a snake. We assured her that we were great at killing snakes - in fact had killed five of them before breakfast - and gently removed a four foot Rat Snake from her basement stairwell.

Then we did a bit of an education session.

There was a ten year old kid from the house across who asked if he could have it. We showed him how to handle it and told/asked him to let it go after a day or so. Hope that did something to soften the turf up a bit.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=29682
Mt Lion @ McClure

miguel - 2013/08/07 23:26:47 UTC

I saw a Mountain Lion, about the size of a great Dane, nonchalantly cross the entry road, by the creek, Tuesday evening. He was coming from the archery area. He crossed the road, went up the hill a bit. He stopped, turned and looked me dead in the eye. Then he casually disappeared into the brush. Glad I was in a car.

I usually run there, with my dog, in the morning.

Might want to keep close tabs on the dogs in the LZ.

Dan Johnson - 2013/08/07 23:36:47 UTC

The only one I have ever seen was sneaking across the road at Nepenthe (Big Sur), probably looking for rich people's poodles. It's best if you jog, not to have a ponytail! Kitties like that!

Rich Jesuroga - 2013/08/08 02:25:33 UTC
Salida, Colorado

We have a lion that lives near our Villa Grove launch. While it's possible to fly and walk back up to launch to retrieve a vehicle we're reluctant to do so (alone).

[Steve Davy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA3LtXnNIto
Osprey -- the ultimate fisher
arkive - 2012/03/05
dead

[Steve Davy]

Arkive web site, home page:
http://www.arkive.org/

About Arkive:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARKive

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.hanggliding.org/viewtopic.php?t=29919
wtf

Bateleur - 2013/09/14 02:11:03 UTC
Africa

The tragedy is that humans could have been almost god like stewards of this, our one and only spaceship, Earth. Earth was pretty durable and could have supported us and all the other Earthlings for many millennia. Instead, we are trashing its life support systems (oceans, atmosphere, rain forests, etc). The disparity between what humans could have been and what we in fact are, is immensely tragic. I adore human knowledge and people who live up to their full potential but have little to no respect or use for those who merely exist and fail to think - deep thoughts are very rewarding.

Majority of people have no regard for other life forms, they live as if their right to comfort and support for their cocked up ideas of happiness takes precedence over all else. How stupid are we?! We have become parasites about to destroy our host!

http://www.ushawks.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=982
Anti-Christian Williams

Bob Kuczewski - 2012/05/09 17:43:17 UTC

The "sustainable growth" people like to carve humanity out from the rest of the eco system and give us the special responsibility to control our own growth. They forget that all species - human and non-human alike - are naturally inclined to overpopulate to the extent that they can do so. So it's part of their beloved Mother Nature's plan that there will always be species who discover new ways to grow and thrive.

From a purely objective view, the success of humanity in covering the planet is no different from the success of green plants in doing the same. After all, if they believe in evolution, then they must accept that there was a time when the earth was free of all that nasty ... chlorophyll. So while they claim to be objective in their criticism of humanity, they're really being hypocritical.

If they really believe in letting Mother Nature have her way, then they should recognize that humans are part of Mother Nature's system and we have just as much of a right to thrive - and even change the planet - as any other species has throughout history.

Now there are other arguments (actually human-centric arguments) for being careful about our growth. But those arguments would balance our human needs with the consequences of growth. Those arguments would have to include our own human needs (and desires) for things like: freedom, and property, and personal security, and personal risk, and even ... fun.

Fuck you, Bob.

[Steve Davy]

Thanks for including Bateleur's post here, Tad. Likely I wouldn't have seen it otherwise.

Jack's loathsome forum is just too nauseating to sift through so I don't bother to read most of the new threads.

[Tad Eareckson]

I'm pretty selective in what I click on over there as well. It's either really nice or really disturbing to see that there are several seemingly decent individuals on that wire.

Recent wildlife news from here...

I think I'm in the process of losing my last regular Hummingbirds for the season this evening.

Can't seem to get them in until late July, they tend to go pretty nuts through August and into the first few days of September, then somebody throws a switch and they're gone - save maybe for the odd migrant blasting through over the course of the next few weeks.

This has been the longest by far I've been able to keep them around. Big dip in temperature last night and I was really surprised to see them still in force for about half the day. Then nothing. Then a several solos within the past hour and a half.

Still had Cattle Egrets in the pasture nearby about the last time I went by last week.

Always saddened when my seasonal guys depart for a lot of dreary months.

Tuesday morning the back third of about a three foot Rat Snake was protruding from a hole in the wall under the kitchen sink where the pipes go through.

I got as forward a grip as I could but it apparently got a good purchase on some piping and made real short work of my ass in the ensuing tug of war contest. The power was incredible.

Never reappeared. I'm thinking and hoping that it got back out however it got in. I don't want it to either starve in here or not starve in here by eating my little parrot.

[Tad Eareckson]

Needed to pick up a prescription at Sam's Club yesterday (Tuesday) evening and figured I'd I could go to a six o'clock iPhone workshop at the Apple Store at the mall to help justify the trip. The class was late starting, I learned virtually nothing in what was left of the hour, and the pharmacy was closed when I arrived afterwards - I had googled the pharmacy hours and didn't notice that I was given the store hours.

I'm a pretty conservative driver and was probably doing about 45 (not far from where I got a fingernail half clawed off rescuing that stupid Snapping Turtle last summer) when at about 19:50 a brown Raccoon sized high speed blur coming in probably from the left on an intercept with the centerline of my old Passat with about a tenth of a second lead time suddenly materialized.

There was nothing I could've done. I've racked up some pretty spectacular saves on Raccoons and Deer before but this was a total suicide move. Like to think that if it hadn't been me it would've been the car behind me.

Felt and heard a terrible lifting impact that I won't ever forget from underneath the car. Pulled over, put the flashers on, stalled out the engine with the transmission engaged. Don't know if something happened to shift linkage or I did something as a result of an adrenaline surge.

Walked back fifty, seventy-five yards to my victim's body on the shoulder and moved him/her to the edge to, got the linkage unjammed, and completed my totally wasted trip.

Cars and roads suck. And there are too many of them - and us.

[Tad Eareckson]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MfAiUusrQsc