Nature photos

[CelticRambler]

Chickens? Chickens??

And there you were, giving me a hard time for bringing metal into the woodwork forum.

[bullets]

Nasty little disease spreading critters.

[Del.Monte]

What is it? It looks like something that I would terminate with extreme prejudice.

[CelticRambler]

'Tis the underside of a tick in need of a good feed!

Took me a while to figure out what it was attached to, as I'm not used to looking at those at such magnification!

[bullets]

What is it? It looks like something that I would terminate with extreme prejudice.

This was a pic I took from a few years ago, My wife used to be a dog groomer and we also had several stray/pet cats so spotted this tick on the floor of the grooming room one day and decided to get a photo of it. Ticks can spread lyme disease to humans which is not a whole heap of fun! They will wait on tall wet grass for passers by be it animals or humans and latch onto legs etc (bare legs in short pants! nope for me! when walking through fields)
You need to remove them carefully if attached as if you pinch them they can spew shite inside you or the animal and cause infection.

Normally I'd never harm a living thing but this critter I got to confess I was a little evil I tried to drown it to make it stop moving so I could photograph it, I tried to freeze it in my freezer to kill it none of those things worked it kept moving as I was taking the shots........I might of dispatched the critter with blunt force trauma in the end so it could not make any of the animals I looked after sick.

~B

[Del.Monte]

I thought it was an evil looking critter alright. I was camping on Cape Clear in the 1970s and woke up to find three of them embedded in my belly. If I remember I think I used a cigarette to kill them but it was hard to remove their biting bits - no Lyme's disease thankfully!

[dawg]

In my youth ticks abounded....
We dealt with them by making them drunk
A dab from the gin bottle and they gave up gripping in a minute or two, then pluck them away, legs and all

[765489]

In my youth ticks abounded....
We dealt with them by making them drunk
A dab from the gin bottle and they gave up gripping in a minute or two, then pluck them away, legs and all

Very good tip dawg. Would never thought of that.

[CelticRambler]

A dab from the gin bottle and they gave up gripping in a minute or two, then pluck them away, legs and all

If I remember I think I used a cigarette to kill them

Two well-established techniques for dealing with the critters ... and both equally dangerous for the reason referred to by bullets:

You need to remove them carefully if attached as if you pinch them they can spew shite inside you or the animal and cause infection.

After the tick has attached, the flow of juice is one-way - out of you, into it - which keeps the Lyme disease bugs inside the tick. However, if you do anything to threaten or annoy the tick - such as burning their back end, or dousing them with alcohol, or grabbing them with tweezers - that causes their blood-sac to stiffen up and contract, and re-inject some of your blood back into you, along with whatever else it's been mixed with since it was sucked out.

The right way to remove them is with a tick-remover, slid right underneath the head. Then rotate the whole beastie so the proboscis detaches automatically. Tick hooks are the easiest to use, dirt cheap, and ought to be available in supermarkets (but aren't, at least not that I've ever seen) so look for them in a vets, or online.

[Del.Monte]

Ah, it was back in the days when men were men and... plus there was no supermarket on Cape Clear. I manage okay and not that many people comment on the second head that I grew since... I'll take your advice for any future encounter.

[dawg]

Never knew about that tool
Wonder what the chemist in 1950's Ballyjamesduff would have said if he was asked for it ? ( did I ever tell you about the reaction I got trying to buy double sided sellotape in Dublin in the '90's ? )
Of course I had to go to YT to see all about it

Was I sorry





'comments are turned off'

[765489]

That's going to give me feckin nightmares tonight

[kadman]

Happy little chappy,

[kadman]

Very friendly today.

[765489]

Screenshot_20210821-143822_Gallery.jpg

Screenshot_20210821-143723_Gallery.jpg

Screenshot_20210821-144209_Gallery.jpg

[CelticRambler]

The flutterbyes love my new herbarium - between them and the bees, the lavender and oregano beds are in constant movement all day. Quite funny watching some of the critters (usually the bees) hovering in a queue, waiting for their place on the flower!

Anyway, the other day, I caught sight of this fella:


The zebra-stripes are impressive enough, but he's got a full monarch-style pattern hidden underneath! It's only displayed in all its glory when he's in flight - and I've failed so far to get a shot of that - but you can catch a glimpse of it here:

[CelticRambler]

This evening, I went out to take pictures of birds in the field opposite (there's a hawk-like thing that's delighted with the arrival of the bales: they're great for perching on ...) Mission not accomplished! So I ambushed some deer instead.





(Yer man is heading off to the sunflower field in a great hurry. Don't know what was going on in there, but he wasn't the only one ... )

[Uncle Frank]

Lots of beautiful butterflies floating about.

2.jpg (272.21 KiB) Viewed 4308 times

butterfly.jpg (219.71 KiB) Viewed 4308 times

butterfly.jpg (219.71 KiB) Viewed 4308 times

[Del.Monte]

Cheating a little bit here but it is a photo albeit of a painting! I bought this vintage watercolour recently - a boredom purchase - but I thought it had a certain charm. What it lacks in technical accuracy is made up for by the subject matter. The title is " Cheekie Chappie" which I presume refers to the Blue Tit commandeering the remaining food and holding his own against all the bigger birds.

[Uncle Frank]

Del they should have titled it 'any last words?' as that tit looks like he is in for an awful hiding from the angry mob

[CelticRambler]

Masses of butterflies around today, including one of Uncle Frank's (we seem to get very few of these here):



and someone taking a break from the cabbages:

[CelticRambler]

And on the subject of flying creatures, these are the lads that absolutely love it when the baler's been through:

[765489]

Is that some sort of buzzard CR ?

[CelticRambler]

Some sort, yes. They're very, very common around here - especially so this year, by my own estimation - but I've never got around to finding out exactly what species they are, or what their name is! Had a trio circling overhead this afternoon when another tractor was mowing the other neighbour's field. Would have made a great shot ... but as usual, the camera was in the house.

'Twas a day for missed shots - caught sight of the last 20cm of an asp viper's tail as I was doing my own mowing this evening. Haven't seen one of those on the property for (maybe) fifteen years. In fact, it wasn't even me that saw it then - it was the children! This evening's one slithered into a thin strip of grass that I leave unmown, and I hopped off the mower to try to get a better look but couldn't find it again.

[kadman]

Got this little chappie on my laptop this morning.
Apparently its the 14 spot Ladybird Beetle. I never knew there was such a thing.Very geometric patterning.