animals – Page 24 – don't confuse the narrator

for the birds

Visiting the Google page this morning, I discovered it was the anniverary of the birth of John James Audubon. Why Google had chosen to commemorate the 226th anniversary, I don’t know, but they had one of their doodles depicting a number of the birds drawn by Audubon.

(Incidentally, that link to the Google doodles page is worth a click – it appears to lead to an archive of the different logos they’ve used in all the different language and geographic versions of the Google page.)
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bird watching

The cat in the picture – who, I’ve just realised, was one year old yesterday – would, presumably prefer to have dinner on the wing than settle for the supermarket kibble we bought last time.

The birds actually built the nest directly above the cat-house where the kittens were being nursed last spring, which seemed a little fool-hardy. I assume it’s the same pair that have come back this year and refurbished it.

If I thought long enough, I expect I’d come up with a pun on ‘swallow’, but since the blog has been a bit neglected recently, maybe I’ll leave that up to the readers.

world poetry day

I have been reminded that today is World Poetry Day – “a time to appreciate and support poets and poetry around the world.” Someone even went so far as to wish me a “happy” day, which seemed rather out of place as I’m never very creative when I’m happy.

Ah well, I really should post a poem, I suppose. But not having been very creative recently, it’ll have to be an old one.
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fine feathers three

The discussion about el Centro Educativo Los Morales and whether it might be a centre for teaching lost morals made me think of Thomas Hardy’s The Ruined Maid. I’ve always been fond of ‘Melia.

I suspect her “bright feathers three” would have been rather more ostentatious than the ones I’ve found to illustrate the post, but the cats don’t get much chance at anything more colourful round here.

I think the black and white one came from a woodpecker, and, as far as I know, was shed naturally. The blue one is from a rabilargo, whose wing was left on my doorstep, presumably as a comment on the inadequacy of a kibble diet for outdoor cats. And the rather fine spotted quill is one I picked up from a pile of feathers in the olive grove next door. Whether the cats worked as a team to bring down one of the neighbour’s guinea fowls, I don’t know, but I’d have thought it would have been too big a job for one on their own.
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cosas de caza

Further to my last post here about the crooning that woke me in the middle of the night – which turned out to be a cat defending its prey, rather than one of the locals serenading me outside my window – I’ve been watching one of the semi-ferals play with a rat in the wet grass this afternoon. He was keen on bringing it up to the verandah for me to have my part, but I assured him I wasn’t hungry, so he shared it with one of his brothers instead.
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