I’ve mentioned before that we maintain a couple of bird feeders around the place. We enjoy having our birds around. They are like little sparks of color and sound, and they add a lot to our day. But this week we’ve had a newcomer, and he hasn’t come around for sunflower seeds, suet and millet. The newcomer is a Northern Shrike, and he’s looking hard at our chickadees and redpolls.
Shrikes are interesting. We’re all familiar with the more usual birds of prey, those being eagles, hawks, falcons and owls. But shrikes are unlike them, as they are passeriformes – perching birds – and lack the strong feet and talons of hawks, owls and so forth. Instead they have pretty typical little perching bird feet, but they do have a sharp, hooked bill with which to kill mice, big insects and other birds, even up to their own size. Their habit of storing prey on thorns or stuck in the crotch of a tree branch has earned them the nickname “butcher bird.”
Our local fellow makes regular passes at the feeding birds, although we’ve yet to see him catch one. Some people may not like that, but I’d point out that it is, after all, a bird feeder, the shrike is a bird, he has to earn a living too, and after all his kind were here before we were. So we’re content to have him around.
Also, happy Groundhog Day! With that…
On To the Links!
Piers Morgan finds another acorn.
The meteor that did in the non-avian dinosaurs may have fallen in June. Unclear as to whether the dinosaurs used the Gregorian calendar.
Elon Musk calls President Biden a “damp sock puppet.” He’s not wrong.
When your opponent is in the process of making a calamitous mistake – let him.
Tulsi Gabbard lands another solid hit on Heels-Up Harris.
“We lie to preserve the peace until we can lie no longer.”
This Week’s Idiots:
Salon’s (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.
MSNBC’s Hayes Brown (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.
MSNBC’s Jarvis DeBerry is an idiot.
The University of Nebraska’s sports program is obviously run by idiots.
This Week’s Cultural Edification:
Most of us who were drawing breath in the late Sixties through the Eighties remember the Scottish band Jethro Tull in their glory years, when they were turning out great tunes like My God, Dun Ringill, Cup of Wonder, Heavy Horses and Mother Goose.
As of last week, though, these aging Scottish rockers, still led by vocalist and flutist Ian Anderson, have released a new album. I haven’t taken it all in yet, but so far The Zealot Gene is a pretty good listen. Here, then, is the title song from that album. The video is a bit… odd, but that’s not unusual for Jethro Tull.
And, just for a contrasting bonus, next in line you can see, from 1978, a live version of one of their older tunes I’ve always liked: And The Mouse Police Never Sleeps. I’m pretty sure that’s the studio cut overlaid on this performance, but what the hell. Enjoy.
