General Chat > Likes and Comments

Completely off the SF & Heroic Fantasy topics, just a place to discuss what is going on in your life & for other interesting tidbits.

The hummingbird season is reaching its height now. Yesterday I had to make up 8 cups of sugar water for the 4 feeders. The 3 in back are all in line so we can see them out the back door while the one in front is in full view on the front porch. It's great watching them form clouds around the feeders & surprising. I was feeding 10 cups per day last year & usually that would mean a lot less birds this year. We've never had 2 years in a row with so many.

The front feeder doesn't get much traffic during the day, but something is emptying the feeder each night. It's not a squirrel or raccoon since the feeder isn't missing parts. It has little flowers that poke into the feeding holes & come out fairly easily, so I can tell when something big gets to the feeder. Whatever it is sucks the feeder completely dry, too. There isn't anything left in the bottom. That's typical of a woodpecker draining it, but they don't fly at night. We do see them on it occasionally, but I'm up before dawn & I check the level before going to bed after dark. From what I've been able to find online, it's probably bats.

I'm tempted to get a trail cam or something to find out & might, but I know nothing about them. There is a huge choice & I'm not sure what sort to get. Does anyone have any experience with them? There are some fantastic still & video cameras available for reasonable prices, too many for me to choose from easily. Some shoot both IR & regular light which would be best. I could leave the front porch light on if IR pics weren't good enough. Any thoughts?

They bypassed me this year, but I've been faithfully making my nectar. The honeybees have been enjoying it :) Our blue birds and orioles have moved on, but the nuthatches and tufted titmice stayed around with their broods. Usually they're gone for the summer. I'm in Virginia Beach.

We have right now a slew of blue jays, cardinals, Carolina chickadees, woodpeckers, wrens, sparrows, thrashers and mourning doves. Our home is surrounded by 100+ foot oak and sweet gum trees, so we always have very busy feeders! The bird song we hear is glorious!

Michelle wrote: "They bypassed me this year, but I've been faithfully making my nectar. ..."

Sounds great, especially the big trees. None of ours get that big. Most are just 60' tall. Anything bigger gets ripped up even in our woods.

Do you do the Backyard Bird Count? I've done it a couple of times & it's really helped me realize just how many different species we have around. It also helps me figure out the sparrows. Normally they all look alike, but with a list in front of me, I can narrow it down & usually figure them out.

I have not! I have some field guides and my trusty binoculars. But sparrows and wrens, just like grackles and starlings, always get me confused until I compare what I'm seeing in my binoculars to the field guides. Have you seen the new phone app BirdNET? You can record bird songs and it will identify the species. I like that one and Audubon's app.

And 60-foot trees are nothing to sneeze at! I see a lot of properties with nothing but a small token Bradford pear tree.

I have heard of BirdNet, another of Cornell U's offerings. I think the GBBC is done through them along with eBird, another app. I was turned on to them about 15 years ago by an Extension Office agent. They sold a CD of bird songs for $5 which I bought. They've also had one of the best bird ID sites even then. It's so much better now.

I recommend the GBBC because you can print out a list for your area which has all the common birds you're likely to see. I find it very handy, especially with the sparrows even though we have quite a few well used bird ID books full of sticky notes.

No, 60' trees aren't tiny, but it surprised me when I first drove here to KY & was house hunting. I came from MD where most of the woods are 80' - 100'. Very similar big tree species here, but they're just a lot shorter & I'm not sure why. I guess it's a combination of wind, weather, & soil. We tend to get higher winds that tear up the upper branches fairly often. While the average temp is the same, it varies up & down a lot more - no ocean to mediate it. The soil is clay with big, flat rocks. My neighbor bulldozed a grove of 60' hackberry trees & their root 'balls' were twice the diameter of the canopy, but only a couple of feet thick. (Yes, it was a waste & sucked. He was expanding his hay field. I think he just likes playing with the dozer.)

Oh no! Our next door neighbor hates trees with a passion. He's always griping to us that we need to cut ours down, because he's a slave to his grass. No kidding- he has actually shop-vacced his lawn. Who does that?! He's quite the jerk ;). We're hoping that he'll get the urge to move soon.

Thank you for the recommendation about GBBC, Jim! I will definitely look into that!

What is it with trees? We left our last house partly because the neighbours turned a leafy cut-de-sac into a brick and concrete wasteland. All the trees were in the gardens, so nothing could be done. One neighbour went so far as to pave the entire 'garden' and just put out two or three small pots with fake flowers in them. Our friends who hadn't visited for a while were totally speechless at the devastation. Opened up the view of the station car park nicely!

I don't get the clear cutting either. This same neighbor bulldozed the stream that comes from our pond & cuts through his property to expand that hay field. It didn't work due to the way the water seeps from the rock strata. It's a natural swampy area & had been full of brush; great habitat for a lot of animals. A Pine Marten & Green Heron moved up to our pond for a while. That was nice, but the lost habitat was just criminal, IMO.

I'm kind of a tree geek. When I first started turning wood on the lathe I was too cheap to buy wood so I used wood out of the firewood pile. It was gorgeous! I wound up using any wood I could find locally, often stopping by a house with a downed tree where I'd beg a few pieces. If I could turn a few bowls from it, I'd give them one. I've now turned over 75 species that way. I make an egg or two out of each one & keep a list. The egg lets me see how the wood deforms in each dimension plus gives me a good idea of the color & grain. I usually turn my bowls very thin & green then dry them in the microwave so they warp in interesting ways.

I quickly realized that I knew nothing about identifying trees & their wood, though. As a farm boy, trees were either good for something such as firewood or fence posts. I knew the common name or just classed it as useless, a 'trash tree'. As a carpenter, all I saw was the finished wood product with a marketing name which is often pretty meaningless. Many of the trees I found in front yards & along the road were unidentified, so I've spent the past couple of decades trying to figure them out. It's been a long, strange, really interesting trip.

Connecting a tree from a Petersen or Audubon guide to the actual wood was tougher than I thought. There's a lot of misinformation & misleading information out there. For instance, Wikipedia used to have 2 entries for Nyssa sylvatica, aka the Bee Tree. One was for Tupelo & the other for Black Gum. They sure look like completely different trees, but aren't. Tupelo grows in swamps where it has a fine grain & is sought after for carving. Black Gum grows on dry hillsides & has a thick, twisted grain that makes it very tough to split for firewood plus it doesn't burn for long. It's just about a trash tree, but it was used for wheel hubs at one time even though it isn't very durable (rots quickly). Anyway, I pointed that out & the editors of Wikipedia put the 2 articles together.

Even the best references go out of date as trees are changed from one class to another & now they're using clades which make even less sense to me. One of my favorite books, The Woodbook: The Complete Plates has a bunch of species in it that have changed places & even Latin names since he wrote it over a century ago. (Mine is an expensive reprint with pictures. The original book had actual slices of wood in it.)

Sorry for the book. I warned you I was a tree geek, right? I've made & tagged most of my trees & bushes with aluminum plates that have the common & Latin names on them. I've even dabbled in wood microscopy, but I'm not very good at that. Obviously, I find trees fascinating & mourn their loss, especially in large numbers.

I am, too, Jim. And Isabella, I think maintenance can be a factor with some people. lots of raking to be done! Or they just want lush grass. Who knows? But when they are all cut down, all of the squirrels, birds, etc have lost their homes. My daughter and her husband bought a house a year ago, and the first thing my son-in-law did was remove all of the shade trees so that he could have a nice lawn. She said her bill from the AC skyrocketed. I'll bet that it did! The only negative we have regarding ours is hurricane season. We get hurricanes frequently, and watching our super-sized trees swaying alarmingly is nerve-wracking! But we love them any other time.

We don't have any shade trees in our backyard since it was once a field. I've kept it open so we can see the horse barn & its field. It's nice not to have one dumping leaves into the gutters, too. I put up a canopy on the back deck each year to shade it & keep the sun out of the patio doors leading into the dining room. That make a huge difference on the A/C & it's a nice place to hang a hummingbird feeder or two. Looks kind of redneck, but it works. I have planted a lot of bushes, flowers, & vines so there's plenty of habitat for the birds & we have a lot of trees in front & to the sides of the house. The back of the house faces west & that's where most of our high winds come from which would be the main worry for falling trees, so it all works out.

Living in a 3rd floor (4th floor for you Americans) apartment with a small balcony, I don't encourage the birds to come around - too much bird poop to clean up. It doesn't stop me from getting regular visits from pigeons (unless they notice my cat on the balcony), and occasional visits from galahs (the cat is, sensibly, scared of them and will run inside) - but they don't poop on the balcony.

At the front of the apartment building, we get mynahs and plenty of ibises (known in Australia as bin chickens, as they raid the garbage bins). Oh, and the occasional crow,

No lack of trees in our new place but I'll need to do some clearing as next door's sycamore has donated lots of saplings too close to the house for comfort. There's a lot of hazel and laurel as well. The squirrels are picking the unripe hazel nuts and leaving them everywhere, half eaten.

It goes against the grain but I shall have to resort to weed killer for some plants as there are brambles and dandelions etc rooted in the cliffside (we're on granite) and they simply can't be dug out cleanly. Promise I'll be selective!

I had to Google all of those, Tony! They're beautiful!

Isabella, we have that problem with the sweetgum trees. Saplings everywhere. Those trees could make their own forests in no time! Luckily we can pluck 'em.

Interesting from all of you!

Tony, I had to google those birds, too. I'd think the galahs would sell like hot cakes here. Very pretty, although they sound mean if your cat needs to be scared of them.

Sycamores are filthy trees, but pretty. I only have one small one struggling in the woods here, but we used to have a lot of huge ones in MD. They'd rot out in the center. One guy made a gardening shed out of one, just had to open a split in the side a little. When the top blew off, I cut the top level & put a roof on it for him. It was still growing a few twigs last time I saw it.

I'm all for using weed killers when I need to, but I'm careful with them. I regularly spot spray my grazing fields with 2,4-D to kill weeds & use it mixed with glyphosate to keep some gravel areas & next to the barn clear. The mixture kills most everything. Every few years I spray the base of the wire fences with it, too.

I don't know how I'd live without 2,4-D since it kills only broad-leaved & woody stemmed plants. We have a lot of invasives such as poison hemlock & multifloral rose that will take over fields quickly. Mowing won't kill either. The former will kill the stock if they eat it, so I kill it off & mark the spot so I can come back later to remove the stalk & leaves. It has a really deep tap root.

The worst invasive we have is a pretty little white flower called Star-of-Bethlehem. It looks a lot like clumps of short wild garlic in the spring & the animals will eat it then since it's the first green up. It's poisonous & caused one to colic. It's practically impossible to kill, though. I had to get a pesticide/herbicide license to buy Gramoxone which contains paraquat to kill it & then keep the animals off for 40+ days. It can kill just by skin contact, so I hate using it, but the stuff was taking over our fields. I've only used it twice & can't use it in some infested areas because it would run into a pond & kill off everything in it & the woods surrounding it. I tried to dig it up, but wound up spreading it more. Nasty stuff both the weed & the solution.

That's terrible, Jim!! If I had something harming my animals, my pets!, I'd be spraying the hell out of it myself! Now I need to Google that plant ;)

I found this, which gives barely any information other than two recommended herbicides, but you have far more experience than I do!

https://www.weedalert.com/weed/star-o...

Michelle wrote: "I am, too, Jim. And Isabella, I think maintenance can be a factor with some people. lots of raking to be done! Or they just want lush grass. Who knows? But when they are all cut down, all of the sq..."

I think it's not just the raking of fallen leaves. Some years ago, we had a flat by a river where the bank had been built over with large cobbles. Plants like buddleia colonised the cracks between the stones and the local council sent men with weedkiller to spray the banks. By chance, I met our local councillor one day and asked why the buddleia had to go when it was so good for insect life, especially butterflies. I expected him to say something about possible damage to the embankment. Instead, he told me, 'It may be good for butterflies but it looks so untidy.'

What can you say to such people?

Wow. Great guy.

A galah's body is about the same size as an average cat, so with their wings spread they can look very big, but I think the thing that scares off most cats is that they are very loud. A flock of galahs can generate a lot of noise when they are talking to each other. Ibises might look pretty, but they are considered a pest here - they dig through garbage bins and leave a scattered mess, and they will happily drink from water bowls left out for other animals, which washes the dirt off their beaks and dirties the water bowl. Pigeons are pretty much the same the world over :)

Michelle wrote: "I found this, which gives barely any information other than two recommended herbicides, but you have far more experience than I do! "

Here's a link to the best article I could find when looking for an herbicide to control SoB & it was a decade old then, now almost 2 decades old.
https://cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/u.osu.e...
You'll notice on page 2 that many herbicides can kill some of it, but only Gramoxone has a high kill rate. Worse, there's only a couple/few weeks in the early spring when any herbicide is effective which complicates things since the weather has to be both dry & the air still or I can't spray. That's not always easy to find in the spring while working full time in an office.

The link you provided gives 3 name brand herbicides that are mostly mixes of glyphosate (Round Up) & 2,4-D (Luv Ester) if you read the ingredients listed in the 'Specimen Labels' listed at the bottom of their pages. Glyphosate kills some, but not 3/4 in my experience. It burns off the green, but most comes right back the next year. I tried it for several years & the SoB kept spreading. Glyphosate won't poison the stock, but it will kill the grass & then other weeds spring up; another problem to consider. 2,4-D is almost worthless against SoB & can harm the stock when larger quantities are used.

So I agree that it's terrible, but it's something every farmer has to deal with & why proper herbicide/pesticide use is so important. They're expensive & not as specific as I'd like, so I don't want to spray more than I have to. I'm a tree hugger at heart & foster a lot of habitat for wildlife, but we love our horses & goats too, so it can be a real balancing act. Gramoxone is the nastiest herbicide I've ever used & I do it very reluctantly, but it was the best choice I had when all options were considered.

Isabella wrote: "...Instead, he told me, 'It may be good for butterflies but it looks so untidy.'

What can you say to such people? "

Nothing printable or productive, unfortunately.
:(

Tony wrote: "A galah's body is about the same size as an average cat..."

Wow! That's a big bird & they'd scare anyone in a flock.

They'd scare me! Speaking of big birds, my daughter was walking through the woods with her friend, and they came across a turkey vulture. Ugly suckers they are! Anyway, this turkey vulture must have thought she looked appetizing, because it chased her down the trail! She had to go into some brambles until it left. That scared the heck out of her! The weird thing about it, well, more weird, is that it ignored her friend.

Jim wrote: "The hummingbird season is reaching its height now. Yesterday I had to make up 8 cups of sugar water for the 4 feeders. The 3 in back are all in line so we can see them out the back door while the o..."

Ahoy Jim and everyone! I live in the foothills of the San Gabriel mountains (NE Los Angeles area), and we have a ton of birds. Red-Whiskered Boubils are the latest thing this past year or so--beautiful red cheeked bird w a black-tufted crown. Lovely song/ call too! We get woodpeckers, owls, bluejays, mockingbirds, lots of crows, and the weekly cacophony of our local wild parrot flocks. We have the usual assortment of finches, sparrows and other perching birds, too. However, those latter birds are more scarce in my yard these days, and the hummingbirds, too. Could be the two feral cats we've adopted (or more like they have adopted us!) They are a mother and daughter pair of tortoise shells, and I fear that their hunting skills are just too good! (Yes, they leave us offerings!) Anyway... anyone writing a sci-fi or fantasy books that feature birds? Inquiring avarian minds would like to know! :)

PS: Why would anyone cut down beautiful trees? (sigh) The half-elf in me is very sad!

K.G. wrote: "PS: Why would anyone cut down beautiful trees? (sigh) The half-elf in me is very sad!"

That's what we are all wondering!

K.G. wrote: "Anyway... anyone writing a sci-fi or fantasy books that feature birds? Inquiring avarian minds would like to know! :)"

The obvious ones are owls in the Harry Potter books and ravens in the Song of Ice and Fire series - both used as messengers. I'm sure there are others, but none off the top of my head.

How about the crebain in Lord of the Rings?

I had to look up Red-Whiskered Boubils - totally new to me. Sounds as if you have a lot of great birds to watch, K.G.

I'm not much of a cat person & I particularly dislike feral cats since they're wreaking havoc the environment. NPR did an article on them a while back.
https://www.npr.org/2020/04/18/820953...

I looove cats! Love 'em! Although mine aren't allowed outside; they're strictly indoor. We have the bird and squirrel feeders arranged just outside our kitchen bay window, and the cats are mesmerized. The birds and the squirrels aren't even fazed anymore having three cats staring at them through the glass. I guess they figured out that my cats are trapped 🐱

Michelle wrote: "I looove cats! Love 'em! Although mine aren't allowed outside; they're strictly indoor. We have the bird and squirrel feeders arranged just outside our kitchen bay window, and the cats are mesmeriz..."

We let the daughter cat in...took her in to get her shots and to spade her, and we discovered that she already had all of the work done! Also a chip in her, but unregistered! She and momma must have been abandoned! Anyway, the daughter (Boudicca) is very flirtatious and cuddly (on her terms, though!) and she sleeps in every night. Momma (Mamagata) on the other hand, still has very suspicious ideas regarding humans... she does let me pet her, though, and she gets her flea medication every month-- but i do have to trick her to administer it! Still, they are both delightful... but i do miss the abundance of birds!

Jim wrote: "I had to look up Red-Whiskered Boubils - totally new to me. Sounds as if you have a lot of great birds to watch, K.G.

I'm not much of a cat person & I particularly dislike feral cats since they're..."

Hey Jim! They were new for me, too! Apparently a new transplant from Florida and tropical locales, but settling in here in SoCal... I see them all over, at the Huntington Gardens, too.

Tony wrote: "K.G. wrote: "Anyway... anyone writing a sci-fi or fantasy books that feature birds? Inquiring avarian minds would like to know! :)"

The obvious ones are owls in the Harry Potter books and ravens i..."

Birds as familiars seem fairly common. Also there was the Guardians of Gahoul series (owls), which I never read. I'd love to see a book written from the point of view of birds... like Watership Down was for rabbits! (One of my favorite books, all time, btw...)

I just looked those up, and they look like a cross between a blue jay and an Eastern Towhee! I've never heard of them, and I liked in Florida for nine years!

Michelle wrote: "I just looked those up, and they look like a cross between a blue jay and an Eastern Towhee! I've never heard of them, and I liked in Florida for nine years!"

Yes, they are beautiful, and so is their song, Michelle! I've lived in SoCal most of my life and never saw them here until about a year ago.

K.G. wrote: "Tony wrote: "K.G. wrote: "Anyway... anyone writing a sci-fi or fantasy books that feature birds? Inquiring avarian minds would like to know! :)"

The obvious ones are owls in the Harry Potter books..."

There are eagles in The Hobbit and LOTR, also Granny Weatherwax does some shape-changing in the Witches books by Terry Pratchett, including birds. Same in Patricia McKillip's Riddlemaster series. And if you like humour and are not too grown up for a children's book, my daughter and I spent many a happy hour reading 'Arabel's Raven' (and its sequels) by Joan Aiken, where Mortimer the Raven creates havoc in the household.

I had forgotten about Patricia McKillip. Her The Forgotten Beasts of Eld has a slew of animals. Great book!

Michelle wrote: "I had forgotten about Patricia McKillip. Her The Forgotten Beasts of Eld has a slew of animals. Great book!"

That's an oldie, but a goodie.

I like how this general chat somehow managed to become and SF/F one anyway :)

For books written from the POV of birds there is the Guardians Of Ga Hoole : The Shattering series, with owls as main characters. I haven't read them, only seen the movie...

Andrea wrote: "I like how this general chat somehow managed to become and SF/F one anyway :)

For books written from the POV of birds there is the Guardians Of Ga Hoole : The Shattering series, wi..."

I guess SF/F is always on our brains :)

Hello folks. It's nearly the weekend, Friday tomorrow. So, I thought it might be time for something like this...

I noticed that there are lots of lists on Goodreads but not a list like this...

BOOKS THAT DON'T EXIST BUT REALLY SHOULD

Principles of Optometry – Seymour Klearleigh
Pyrotechnics – Katherine Wheal
The Nude in Art – N. A. Kidd
Popular Religious Songs – Michael Rotherbote
Think Twice! – R.U.Shaw
Feline Nutrition – Felix Ducanhart
Vampires – Nora Neick
Edible Fish – C. Codd
Moving Pictures of Japan– Annie May
Policing Today – Lauren Dorder
Looking into Myopia – Piers Dimleigh

What? What? look, I'm a Whovian, I'm just following the Doctor's rule no 27 'never knowingly be serious.'

Go on, add to the list ... You know you want to... you do want to, just give into it....

I tell you what I will be really impressed if anyone manages to come up with one of these that is F&SF related...
:-)

Robin wrote: "Hello folks. It's nearly the weekend, Friday tomorrow. So, I thought it might be time for something like this...

I noticed that there are lots of lists on Goodreads but not a list like this...

BO..."

I love the last one in particular, Robin, by Piers Dimleigh!

I believe he is very good friends with Seymour Klearleigh. :-)
They both attend the Annual Optician's Ball. Piers gave a speech last year...
"They laughed at me when I said I wanted to become an optician. But they'll see, they'll all see,"
Go on Michelle, add to the list. You know you want to. :-)

LOL!

How about

Making Friends by Annette Work
How to Fix your Roof by Lee King
Cooking with Eggs by Sue Flay
Rhyming Couplets by May Day and Stephen Even
The Safe Crackers Guide by Peter Mann
Beyond the Milky Way by Anne Dromeda

Silly enough?

Silly is good! These remind me of the classic law firm from the Three Stooges... Dewy, Cheatham and Howe!

There is never enough silly in the world. ☺ I think Anne Dromeda deserves a special merit award for being F&SF related. I was however fairly tickled by Sue Flaye... Which was nice ☺
Come on, who's got some more. LOL

The Night Sky by C. O'Ryan
Lost and Found by I. Secombe