Six Things, Volume 33
Sparrows | Moose | Wind | Illusion | Bridge | Letter
Thing 1 – Sparrows
A couple of days by the coast over the Bank Holiday weekend yielded many delights, not least the boat trip with Birds of Poole Harbour, during which we saw not only a couple of ospreys doing their impressive thing but much more besides (other people’s bird lists are generally tedious, but I urge you to picture the kingfisher, turquoise flash glimpsed over the water for just long enough that I was able to call its name and direct those in my immediate vicinity to its aura, but not – of course – to the actual bird itself). If you find yourself in the area (and I realise that for many of you this isn’t geographically viable) I do recommend it – the guides, Paul and Liv, communicate their deep knowledge with enthusiasm and clarity.
Those excitements aside – and not drawing too much attention to my hole-in-one at the first hole in the crazy golf, not least because I continued that “play the hole in the same number of strokes as the hole number” sequence all the way to hole 6 – there were two other memorable bird encounters.
The first was with this swallow. It was swooping around my head, so I took my phone out and filmed, with a sort of desperation and the slight hope that I might catch just half a moment of it. Going through the film slowly later, I found that 99.5% of it was indeed grass and sky.
The other half percent, though, was rather pleasing.
The second encounter, on the front at Swanage, was with a bush full of house sparrows.
Easy birds to ignore, sparrows. The ultimate LBJ (Little Brown Job). They used to be so commonplace that you’d barely glance at them, but like so many birds their population has declined since the 1970s (by about 70% between 1977 and 2018, although there has been a slight resurgence since then). We have a few in our area in south London, and their occasional visits to the garden are always greeted with the exuberance engendered by a surprise encounter with old friends.
These south coast sparrows were, as I say, gathered in a bush. And when I say it was 'full of house sparrows' I do in fact mean it. I counted thirty of them, babbling and chattering and falling over each other to say hello – their chattiness is only matched by their willingness to approach and be approached. And of course they know where they can thrive – visitors to UK seaside towns play notoriously fast and loose with the foodstuffs, and there are easy and almost infinite pickings to be had.
Strange how these encounters lift the mood. The sparrows themselves, of course, remain indifferent. Unless you give them a chip.
If you’re reading this in America, you might have a somewhat different relationship with these birds, given their status as the continent’s first 'invasive' species.
And as an urban birder I always take an interest in things like this.
Thing 2 – Moose
I’m a big fan of Moose Allain, purveyor of warmth and silliness over on that place-I-still-cling-to-despite-everything.
As well as his excellent cartoons, Moose sometimes thinks out loud in a way that sets off chains of thought of the most delightful kind.
It’s really worth clicking through and having a good old delve into the replies, but here are some of my favourites so far (the thread continues to grow)
I made my own modest contributions.
Do share your own in the comments, if so inclined.
One of the answers ("Don’t get me started on wind. Where the hell does that come from?") had in turn its own reply, which was simply a link to:
Thing 3 – Wind
A lovely, and slightly weird, short animated film about wind.
Thing 4 – Illusion
Without spoilers, I give you the Changing Room Illusion.
If you want to read more about it, here’s Rob Walker (whose The Art of Noticing comes recommended) to explore it and the ideas it triggered.
Thing 5 – Bridge
Travelling about the place I sometimes wonder about the history and provenance of things I see. How did they happen to come into existence? Who had the idea? Who paid for it? And so on.
Occasionally I might Google them and do a bit of a rootle around for a few minutes. If the answer isn’t easy to find, I’ll leave it at that.
Tyler Vigen would pour scorn on this desultory approach. He asked himself a simple question: why is this bridge here?
Here’s the answer. It is well worth your time.
Thing 6 – Letter
Courtesy of the consistently excellent Letters of Note, let’s have a heartwarming letter to Einstein, shall we?
I SAW AN OSPREY!!!
It flew about 3 metres over my head!!! It was HUGE and incredible. (Crickhowell).
Please excuse capital letters. It was just soooo exciting.
The bridge was a fabulous bit of research.
Volume 33. Luck for some! Well all of us! Thank you
A point well made about sparrows.
At the end of our garden there is an old hedge the original farm land boundary with no housing estate behind it however the hedge itself is a superhighway, for sparrows each and every moment of the day. Then they sometimes fly in and often get caught in the fruit cage in my wife's garden so we have to rescue them.
And We have taken the fruit cage down to make life safer!
Thanks you for a six wonders!