Birders' Nest

[Iota]

I think this means I'm ub for free coffee and puns, too...

I meant to post this bird yesterday, but got sidetracked by the Cordonbleu.


Hartlaub's Turaco (Kenya)

A gorgeous photo (much better!!) of this beautiful bird is available here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/121240404

Am going through last year's pics...

That is indeed a beautiful bird! Such a cute face too!

                    ----------------------

@Elgarian Redux, your 'Flurry of pheasants' header for the pic in #1170, had me wondering if that might be the recognised collective noun for them. It turned out not to be (but I must say I preferred it to the 'real' alternatives). One of them a 'Bouquet' of pheasants, describing what they look like when they've been flushed seemed nice enough, but rapidly lost its allure when I realised it may well have been coined/be used by people who are about to shoot them. If so, it suddenly seems rather tasteless. (.. sorry for maybe-mistaken rant ..)

I think this is my favorite bird photo: Grey Heron in the Rain (taken in Jakarta)



Cite: https://www.reddit.com/r/wildlifephotography/comments/188vwam/grey_heron_in_the_rain/

Yes, a beauty!

[Elgarian Redux]

I think this is my favorite bird photo: Grey Heron in the Rain (taken in Jakarta)



Cite: https://www.reddit.com/r/wildlifephotography/comments/188vwam/grey_heron_in_the_rain/

Wonderfully atmospheric!

[Elgarian Redux]

I meant to post this bird yesterday, but got sidetracked by the Cordonbleu.


Hartlaub's Turaco (Kenya)

A gorgeous photo (much better!!) of this beautiful bird is available here: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/121240404

Am going through last year's pics...

Yikes! What a bird. Again I am driven to think that if I sat for days with brush and paint, trying to invent birds out of my head, I would fail utterly to invent birds so outrageously colourful, decorative, startling, and beautiful as those that actually exist in your collections of photos, Owl.

[owlice]

Just ub myself this morning, apout to get my cub of coffee, and found this miniature gem. My turn to laugh aloud! I am thinking hungrily now of iced puns; cream puns; and toasted pread with lashings of putter. [And now I am in near hysterics at the thought of beanut putter.]

Do you have any bictures of peautiful benguins, Owlice?

No, no. This way lies madness. I don't even know why I find it so funny! Enough of this foolishness!! Coffee!!! And sanity!!

I'm glad I made you laugh! And it depends on your definition of peautiful. Will cute do?

African Penguin (South Africa)

[Elgarian Redux]

I'm glad I made you laugh! And it depends on your definition of peautiful. Will cute do?

African Penguin (South Africa)

In my present state of lunacy, I am glad to accept any sort of benguin - including cute!

[Elgarian Redux]

White-eyed Slaty Flycatchers (Kenya)

We don't need to ask why they're called 'slaty' and 'white-eyed', do we? Exquisite creatures, beautifully composed.

[Elgarian Redux]

@Elgarian Redux, your 'Flurry of pheasants' header for the pic in #1170, had me wondering if that might be the recognised collective noun for them. It turned out not to be (but I must say I preferred it to the 'real' alternatives). One of them a 'Bouquet' of pheasants, describing what they look like when they've been flushed seemed nice enough, but rapidly lost its allure when I realised it may well have been coined/be used by people who are about to shoot them. If so, it suddenly seems rather tasteless. (.. sorry for maybe-mistaken rant ..)

I was just going for a mild bit of alliterative fluff and knew nothing of the true collective noun. My own feeling when seeing these birds is simply that I would never want to shoot such noble creatures with anything other than a camera. So your comment seems both mild and valid, to me, and completely rant-free. [At the same time, I recognise a certain inconsistency in my approach because I'm not a vegetarian.]

[owlice]

Yikes! What a bird. Again I am driven to think that if I sat for days with brush and paint, trying to invent birds out of my head, I would fail utterly to invent birds so outrageously colourful, decorative, startling, and beautiful as those that actually exist in your collections of photos, Owl.

Some bird!! And there are so so many I haven't seen/have no photos of!

Some years ago, I was in Africa and sent a friend a photo of a hornbill; he wrote back something along the lines of, "They're real?? I thought they were just cartoon characters!" Not only are they real, there are 63 species, each one outrageous in one or multiple ways.

The array of birdasaurs is astonishing. There are ~ 11,000 bird species (different taxonomies give different numbers) on this life-teeming tiny planet of ours. I have only scratched the surface and will never run out of new birds, nor mammals, reptiles, amphibians, etc., to see. I will at some point run out of energy/ability, though, so ... I want to see what I can see while I can. I feel the pressure of time, and the older I get, the more I feel it.

[owlice]

On my screen it looks more like Cordonturquoise.

And more purple cheeked than red cheeked.

These bird namers need to get another color spectrum chart from Sherwin-Williams.*

*Do they have that in the UK?-- housepaints and supplies for housepainting.

Word on the street is that half the bird namers be colorblind, and half be crazy, and there is overlap between the two. 

Only the males have the red cheeks; here's a pic that shows them better:

[Elgarian Redux]

Some bird!! And there are so so many I haven't seen/have no photos of!

Some years ago, I was in Africa and sent a friend a photo of a hornbill; he wrote back something along the lines of, "They're real?? I thought they were just cartoon characters!" Not only are they real, there are 63 species, each one outrageous in one or multiple ways.

The array of birdasaurs is astonishing. There are ~ 11,000 bird species (different taxonomies give different numbers) on this life-teeming tiny planet of ours. I have only scratched the surface and will never run out of new birds, nor mammals, reptiles, amphibians, etc., to see. I will at some point run out of energy/ability, though, so ... I want to see what I can see while I can. I feel the pressure of time, and the older I get, the more I feel it.

1. Are they birdasaurs, or birdosaurs? Or can we choose for ourselves?

2. I hope it doesn't seem gushing, because I really mean it when I say that we're all benefiting from your drive to see more, by what you post here. And speaking purely personally, I can say that you've transformed a mostly dormant old interest into a revitalised active enthusiasm that has quite taken me by surprise. You're doing a great job, Owl!

[Elgarian Redux]

Word on the street is that half the bird namers be colorblind, and half be crazy, and there is overlap between the two. 

Only the males have the red cheeks; here's a pic that shows them better:

If one were painting a portrait of this bird, surely no one would dare to put that cheek colour together with that breast colour!

[owlice]

We don't need to ask why they're called 'slaty' and 'white-eyed', do we? Exquisite creatures, beautifully composed.

Thank you; the birds did a good job of arranging themselves!

These remind me a bit of Dark-eyed Juncos, in that they have a monotone color palette (gray) and "wear a cloak" of a darker shade over the lighter. @Iota had found the Junco elegant, and these little birds have (to me, anyway) the same kind of elegance.

[owlice]

1. Are they birdasaurs, or birdosaurs? Or can we choose for ourselves?

Oh! Birdosaurs! How silly of me to get that wrong, and thank you for the fix!!

2. I hope it doesn't seem gushing, because I really mean it when I say that we're all benefiting from your drive to see more, by what you post here. And speaking purely personally, I can say that you've transformed a mostly dormant old interest into a revitalised active enthusiasm that has quite taken me by surprise. You're doing a great job, Owl!

Wow, Elgarian, thank you; that's very kind of you to say. Thank you!

I've been going through pics and goodness, there are a lot of really bad ones. Will try to post one, very typical, that made me laugh.
And also want to cry a little bit.

[owlice]

Can you see the problem? Unlike most other photos in this category, it's not all vegetation.
So close, yet not close at all!
On the left edge.
No idea what it was and no way to find out. ~~~ sigh ~~~

[owlice]

If one were painting a portrait of this bird, surely no one would dare to put that cheek colour together with that breast colour!

If one were painting a portrait of the bird, wouldn't one have to put that cheek color with that breast color?