Steller’s Jays are beautiful, but it’s only skin deep!
They screech, and imitate the loud calls of large raptors, to frighten off other birds. Then they steal their food and eat their eggs, and sometimes their chicks.
Along with small lizards and frogs, they even eat hummingbirds!
I occasonally see one here — more often an (unrelated, except for also being a corvid) California scrub jay, who tries to do the same things, but is smaller, and less effective. I don’t think they eat birds, “only” eggs.
If you don’t get it… I don’t want to spoil the joke, so I’ll explain it, with a bit of trivia for those who get it, too….
In this box…
It’s representing a Chinese-American restaurant specialty, said to have been invented by a Chinese chef in his New York restaurant …
It’s usually called General Tso’s Chicken, but occasionally, as presumably here, Admiral Tso’s Chicken.
(In fact the Chinese buffet I used to go to called it Admiral Cho’s.)
It’s sweet and spicy. I read that it’s one of the few Chinese-American dishes that ended up being served in China, as well… but they make it there without the sugar.
BTW I don’t think that’s really an admiral’s uniform… not enough gold. A captain, maybe? I can’t remember. But it’s just a joke anyway! Hard to get hold of a real admiral’s jacket. It’s OK.
Yeah, well, all bassets are handsome! This is Bones, from House of Puddles. He was in my email inbox this morning reminding me to run, not walk, to their website and particpate in the raffle.
The Dancing Buffalo screenname is an homage to my dad. One of my favorite photos from his collection – an old family vacation in the 70s – was a bison, on its back wiggling and scratching like my hounds do. Dancing, waving four hoofs in the air. Then, in a wonderful stroke of luck, in 2008 I got a photo of my own – another Dancing Buffalo. (Dad wasn’t there – he’d passed away almost a decade before.)
European badgers look a bit different from the US ones.
They are a protected species over here, you can’t interfere with them, or their setts, even if they’re undermining your house! You have to get the authorities involved, and they will move them in such cases. Farmers don’t like them because they say they spread TB to cows, but I suspect that TB in cows is spread more effectively in other ways like intensive farming rather than by badgers. But that’s just my opinion.
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Would be perfect if it were a statue of St. Francis.
“From the Hand of God…”
..
Here we go again…..
I’ve never seen a spotted moose, so I googled it.
There are some… They’re very rare, called piebald. But this one’s coat isn’t quite right.
So… I searched the image, and yeah…. People were pointing out a few things …
One… This is a bull, not a cow. Females don’t have antlers; males don’t trot around with a calf.
Two… moose calves are born in the spring, so they’ll be bigger, and better able to survive, by the time it’s this snowy.
Three… Well, I think you can guess three.
Sorry.
I wanted to believe it too!
,,.
This looks too real to be AI, but Google can’t find a match, or say where it is.
So… it could be AI, or it could be a private picture, that’s never been on the web, or has only been on one person’s blog, and not for long… or ??
I saw a couple of pictures from a place called Bosa, in Italy, that looked quite similar, but there are probably many.
Meanwhile, where’s the cat that should be sleeping in that sunny spot?
..
,
Oops! Baby go boom!
And the mommies come rushing to make sure everything’s okay.
.
And they are kinda pretty.
But so are these guys.
Indeed. They look just steller!
Steller’s Jays are beautiful, but it’s only skin deep!
They screech, and imitate the loud calls of large raptors, to frighten off other birds. Then they steal their food and eat their eggs, and sometimes their chicks.
Along with small lizards and frogs, they even eat hummingbirds!
I occasonally see one here — more often an (unrelated, except for also being a corvid) California scrub jay, who tries to do the same things, but is smaller, and less effective. I don’t think they eat birds, “only” eggs.
Still, i can’t help but love them. 🙂
They’re all clowns, which makes them endearing… especially the scrub jays.
But I get mad when they chase away my mockingbirds… and they may be the reason I don’t get hummingbirds any more.
Then again, I get fewer birds in general, including jays, as my area gets more urban.
….
The mockingbirds are also annoying… I don’t get trilling songbirds, so they imitate trucks, geese, crows, and probably jays, under my window at 4am.
They also build their nests in stupid places, so they fall down, and then they dive-bomb you if you walk near.
But I love them… and miss them as their population declines. So there no accounting for taste.
,.
It was Professor Plum in the Library with the candlesticks.
,.
Tso what?
Considering it looks like a Navy uniform, it is deceiving to what is intended.
Yeah, whoever heard of Admiral Tso chicken?
LOL …. a pun costume!
If you don’t get it… I don’t want to spoil the joke, so I’ll explain it, with a bit of trivia for those who get it, too….
It’s usually called General Tso’s Chicken, but occasionally, as presumably here, Admiral Tso’s Chicken.
(In fact the Chinese buffet I used to go to called it Admiral Cho’s.)
It’s sweet and spicy. I read that it’s one of the few Chinese-American dishes that ended up being served in China, as well… but they make it there without the sugar.
BTW I don’t think that’s really an admiral’s uniform… not enough gold. A captain, maybe? I can’t remember. But it’s just a joke anyway! Hard to get hold of a real admiral’s jacket. It’s OK.
,..
1957 edition this time…. A giant turkey in Macy’s Thanksgiving parade.
He said he would make sandwiches for all the spectators… but he was full of hot air.
I meant to post this yesterday…. from 1924, bringing Santa to Macy’s on Thanksgiving Day…. (The next year they called it the Thanksgiving Parade.)
Hey, at least it isn’t Marshmallow Man!
,,,.
«brrrr»
My wife and her sister used to play hide-and-seek among the coffins in her grandfather’s mortuary. Never saw James Dean, though.
Chicago, 1905
Diamonds and jewelry on credit. Both sides of the street. Moichandising, moichandising!
Cheek by jowl with .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. dentistry?
,
Nailing the shakes on that roof might seem a little precarious, at least to me.
my first thought was logistics …is there a grocery store just out of frame?
I want to believe that this is real.
Me too…. but..
,.
Done.
Yep.
..,,
Robin Hound is fearless!
You will see that he runs from nothing… confronts the King’s men, steals from the rich, and here, battles a hound twice his size. Or intends to.
He’s handsome, heroic… and maybe the teeniest bit foolhardy.
Did I mention handsome?
Yeah, well, all bassets are handsome! This is Bones, from House of Puddles. He was in my email inbox this morning reminding me to run, not walk, to their website and particpate in the raffle.
You changed your name!
I almost said “Welcome to Cleo and Company”! 😄
Yeah – matched it gocomics.
The Dancing Buffalo screenname is an homage to my dad. One of my favorite photos from his collection – an old family vacation in the 70s – was a bison, on its back wiggling and scratching like my hounds do. Dancing, waving four hoofs in the air. Then, in a wonderful stroke of luck, in 2008 I got a photo of my own – another Dancing Buffalo. (Dad wasn’t there – he’d passed away almost a decade before.)
Sunset from the southern part of the island of Crete in Greece from inside of a cave.
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Warning: BITES. Count your fingers before you leave.
He’ll constantly badger you for attention, walks and treats.
it looks like a skunk
Badger
European badgers look a bit different from the US ones.
They are a protected species over here, you can’t interfere with them, or their setts, even if they’re undermining your house! You have to get the authorities involved, and they will move them in such cases. Farmers don’t like them because they say they spread TB to cows, but I suspect that TB in cows is spread more effectively in other ways like intensive farming rather than by badgers. But that’s just my opinion.
Now I’m gonna have to look them up, cos AFAIK the one in the picture IS a European (and UK) badger.
American ones have wider faces with the white stripe going through their eyes.
And I thought the government over there was trying to kill them off, not protect them.
Time for me to hit the Internet again.
Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be the sort of person who doesn’t need to know.
WHACK!