Caught in the act! This Banded Dotterel, Tuturiwhatu, found something yummy! 🐦
Many beach birds are quite big really: Gulls, Terns Oystercatchers, Pied Stilts. The ‘nationally vulnerable’ Tuturiwhatu or Banded Dotterels though are tiny, more sparrow sized. They scurry along the beach in a quite hilarious way. 🐦 This one has been banded.
Royal Spoonbill, feeding, flanked by two Pied Stilts, with a Black-backed Gull in the background. 🐦
Merry Christmas, folks. At 7.30 am the beach was for the birds, including this group of Black Swans. Can you spot the odd one out — the ‘ugly cygnet’? 🐦
It’s so trivial, but this “Enter This Side” sign at the store’s exit, irritates me every time. Unless they consider you’re entering the mall, but I see myself as exiting the store. 👿 Perhaps there is no one truth…
Remembering Alana Bowman. RIP.
Word's out about the railing! Today a Warou, Welcome Swallow, opted for the full photo shoot, even including the over-the-shoulder pose! 🐦
Vehicles on the beach is a hot topic where I live, so this is interesting: Vehicle access to popular Auckland beach to close over holidays
A permit system was introduced in 2015 to manage the volume of traffic and to ensure drivers were aware of their responsibilities and restrictions when traveling along the beach.
We seem to have our very own house Sparrow. This little cutie likes to sit on the railing outside the east door to our deck from the lounge and either keep an eye on us or just enjoy the view.
Noone tends the grass verges along our private lane but I hate when they get too overgrown, so today I tidied things a bit with the weedeater. An hour’s work. Before and After.
Today the farmer came and picked up the bales of hay. That was a two tractor job.
This is cool. 5.5 minute video. Folks who write detective fic with high tech elements would like this. Comes under Linguistics! Hidden background noise that can catch criminals:
Electrical Network Frequency analysis, ENF analysis, matches background hum against power grid logs.
A couple of days ago the farmer next door mowed the cow paddock. Later he came back with his tractor and spinner to flip the grass and rake it into piles to dry. Then the next day he baled it all up. I love living in the country.
Every single time I use Regular Expressions in BBEdit I just want to shout out my joy! Before and after screenshots.
Today I made Courgette frittatas for breakfast. They were pretty good. Fresh courgettes from the tunnel house and a very small stick of finely chopped celery. I used thyme rather than dill.
In the last 2 weeks we’ve had almost 200 mm rain (over 7 inches), and variously heat, high winds from several quarters, still days, cool grey days. Yesterday’s beach showed the effects: a lot of driftwood, and interestingly sculpted shore by the river mouth.
The Royal Spoonbill was also a little wind-ruffled, while at least one of the nearby ducks was keeping a close watch on me.
Annoying: I put my bike on its side stand so I could take photos of a Royal Spoonbill at the lake. A big gust of wind blew my bike over (it’s OK) and snapped off the stand!
Rats! Apple Watch Locking:
Other issues that can impact sensor performance include wrist tattoos.
Thanks to an inconvenient mosquito bite overnight I’m wearing my watch on my left wrist. The watch keeps asking me to unlock it. Must be the tat!
My friend Alana, and fellow Xena fan, gave me this fridge magnet many many years ago. Alana is very much in my thoughts at the moment.
