• Hi all and welcome to TheWoodHaven2 brought into the 21st Century, kicking and screaming! We all have Alasdair to thank for the vast bulk of the heavy lifting to get us here, no more so than me because he's taken away a huge burden of responsibility from my shoulders and brought us to this new shiny home, with all your previous content (hopefully) still intact! Please peruse and feed back. There is still plenty to do, like changing the colour scheme, adding the banner graphic, tweaking the odd setting here and there so I have added a new thread in the 'Technical Issues, Bugs and Feature Requests' forum for you to add any issues you find, any missing settings or just anything you'd like to see added/removed from the feature set that Xenforo offers. We will get to everything over the coming weeks so please be patient, but add anything at all to the thread I mention above and we promise to get to them over the next few days/weeks/months. In the meantime, please enjoy!

We've been invaded.....

AJB Temple

AJB Temple

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The birds, the birds. :oops:. We are basically overrun. I put about a kilo of pork fat and rind trimmings (cut into worm sized pieces) out for them a day or two ago and the lot was wolfed down in a couple of hours.

Today, entire family of sparrows came down the chimney. Into the log burner. Very considerable cheeping alerted my wife. Then they had a fly by in the drawing room for a while until they found the door we opened. They tried all the closed doors and windows first. All copying each other.

This afternoon a (bee enemy) green woodpecker mother or father escorted 3 chicks into the restaurant kitchen. I was sat outside in the BBQ area, contemplating. The other parent (I assume - didn't ask as I don't speak woodie) stayed outside in the fine mist: we had a fine spray over the koi pond (re-circulation from aeration pool) which they had spent some time hopping about in round the edge. Then popped indoors, where it is much cooler. Managed to encourage them out and now there is a goldfinch in there and another one making a tremendous racket in the larder.

We've had this before inc. a Kingfisher, which was amazing. I think I posted a snap of that. It always worries me because if they get scared they crash into the glass and could hurt themselves.
 
The Bass Rock is presently pure white, with...even a few woodbudgies can generate a truely surprising amount of uric acid and other solids.
I'd be wary of spreading the news that your nosherie is attracting avian deposition? Think H&S inspectors visiting.
 
When we drove back from Goodwood last Friday I chose to. Is it Lyme Regis. Walking along the front clutching an ice cream cone I was mugged from behind by a very heavy and aggressive seagull that knocked it out of my hand. Surprise and annoyance in equal measure. And begs the question….why are the bloody things protected.

Adrian..you are way too popular with the wildlife…the word is out..too late :cool: :cool:
 
I think it might be because a) we feed them and b) we have a lot of trees and c) lots of water.

Not even slightly worried about the cookery side: it's cleaned extensively all the time top to bottom :). H&S are not involved at all. It's FSA. Since many restaurants have outside tables (inc all National Trust cafes) I think they are cool with it. Wildlife matters. To us. :cool:
 
FSA? Thank you for the correction; I was using too broad a brush to make the point.
Whichever body it is, publicising:
AJB Temple said:
This afternoon a (bee enemy) green woodpecker mother or father escorted 3 chicks into the restaurant kitchen.
Click to expand...
i.e. four potential vectors of (say) avian 'flu were in your prep area, will have the dear chaps pointing out the difference between al fresco dining loci and whatever mise en place you have created, and is now a bird sanctuary.
 
We have lots of birds round here, too. Lots of House Martin, Sparrow, Little Owl. Lots more.
A couple of days ago I heard a bang and saw something fall past the window. I went outside to find the bird lying on the ground but trying to move. According to Merlin it was a Stripe-Breasted Woodpecker. I didn't interfere with it, just left it there. It hopped up and clung to the surface of the wall (stone, so lots of nooks and crannies to grab). I checked again after a few minutes and he was gone. Beautiful bird.
S
 
Steve Maskery said:
A couple of days ago I heard a bang and saw something fall past the window. I went outside to find the bird lying on the ground but trying to move.
Click to expand...
Yep. I have 2 big picture windows and 40-odd resident pigeons. Regularly get spectacular "thuds" and a subsequent 'ghost' image of preening oil, mid-pane. Rarely injurious or fatal, seemingly. Winged rats are robust?
 
SamQ aka Ah! Q! said:
FSA? Thank you for the correction; I was using too broad a brush to make the point.
Whichever body it is, publicising:

i.e. four potential vectors of (say) avian 'flu were in your prep area, will have the dear chaps pointing out the difference between al fresco dining loci and whatever mise en place you have created, and is now a bird sanctuary.
Click to expand...
Ludicrous.
 
AJB Temple said:
The birds, the birds. :oops:. We are basically overrun. I put about a kilo of pork fat and rind trimmings (cut into worm sized pieces) out for them a day or two ago and the lot was wolfed down in a couple of hours.

Today, entire family of sparrows came down the chimney. Into the log burner. Very considerable cheeping alerted my wife. Then they had a fly by in the drawing room for a while until they found the door we opened. They tried all the closed doors and windows first. All copying each other.

This afternoon a (bee enemy) green woodpecker mother or father escorted 3 chicks into the restaurant kitchen. I was sat outside in the BBQ area, contemplating. The other parent (I assume - didn't ask as I don't speak woodie) stayed outside in the fine mist: we had a fine spray over the koi pond (re-circulation from aeration pool) which they had spent some time hopping about in round the edge. Then popped indoors, where it is much cooler. Managed to encourage them out and now there is a goldfinch in there and another one making a tremendous racket in the larder.

We've had this before inc. a Kingfisher, which was amazing. I think I posted a snap of that. It always worries me because if they get scared they crash into the glass and could hurt themselves.
Click to expand...
Quite often sparrows will come down the workshop chimney, I leave the lid off the top of the wood stove so they are free to fly around till I open the overhead door.
 
SamQ aka Ah! Q! said:
i.e. four potential vectors of (say) avian 'flu were in your prep area, will have the dear chaps pointing out the difference between al fresco dining loci and whatever mise en place you have created, and is now a bird sanctuary.
Click to expand...
RogerS said:
Perhaps. Wonder what Kent Council Environmental Health would say?
Click to expand...
I'm not professing to have any expertise on the subject, but I would suggest that the people best placed to work out whether there is a problem are either the restaurant proprietor (Adrian) or the Food Standards Agency. If Adrian is (as I suspect) doing a thorough job of cleaning his food preparation area and the Food Standards Agency are happy then I don't know what there is to get worked up about. Lots of birds fly into kitchens all the time and if it's avian flu people are worrying about then I'd expect a residential kitchen to be far less clean than a professional one.

Perhaps we should all leave the FSA to do their job and only raise issues with Adrian's cleanliness if we can see that it's going to have a direct effect on the quality of his dovetails?

Bob's menu did make me chuckle though...
 
It's OK Al. I've fixed it. Started at 6.30 this morning putting a sign up saying:

"Strictly no birds. And no old fogeys either."

:cool:
 
Anyway, today's challenge is a big fish with swim bladder infection (i think). Moved to high oxygen and salt laden isolation tank. Prognosis not great I fear.
 
The teasing of Adrian about his menu reminds me of a restaurant we saw in Arizona a couple of years ago. IIRC it was just outside Flagstaff and called the Roadkill Cafe. The menu was true to the name. Fortunately it was shut so there was no need to be “holiday brave” and add it to the list of experiences.
 
Blackswanwood said:
The teasing of Adrian about his menu reminds me of a restaurant we saw in Arizona a couple of years ago. IIRC it was just outside Flagstaff and called the Roadkill Cafe. The menu was true to the name. Fortunately it was shut so there was no need to be “holiday brave” and add it to the list of experiences.
Click to expand...

When in South Africa I noticed a distinct lack of litter and road kill along the main roads and supposed it was because of all the preditors but was told that the locals pick up anything and everything to both eat and use. The motorway verges were used by the locals to sell fruit and souveniers so no stopping signs completely ignored.

When in the US I booked an overnight in a one street town called Mexican Hat just along from Monument Valley. What a dump and we were hungry after a very long day. The only restaurant was called the Swinging Steak which had open fire pits with huge swinging iron grids cooking massive steaks. All you could order was steak and beans. The steak was delicious, shame I'm not keen on beans though
 
I euthanised the fish. Upsetting. :cry: We had her for 11 years and she must have been that age already when she came to us. At times the males bully the females, causing scale damage which is usually OK but can lead to infections. She was hand fed every day and recognised us and the children from our nearest neighbour. She would let me lift her out of the pond without thrashing about. Not a great day.
 
HdV said:
Ah, you use the term in a wider sense over there.
Click to expand...
I was curious about it being a narrow definition (I thought guano was all bird "poo", although I think I heard the word first when referring to seagulls) so I checked Chambers for a UK dictionary def:

guano noun (guanos) 1 the accumulated droppings of large colonies of bats, fish-eating seabirds or seals. It is rich in nitrogen and is used as a fertilizer. 2 any fertilizer resembling this.
ETYMOLOGY: 17c: Spanish, from Quechua huanu dung.

You learn something new every day.

So, the only "guano" from birds comes from fish-eating seabirds. You learn something new every day. From a bit of web searching, it seems the normal term for what comes from pigeons would be "pigeon droppings" but "guano" is in fairly common use (despite not making it into Chambers yet :) ).
 
Lons said:
When in the US I booked an overnight in a one street town called Mexican Hat just along from Monument Valley. What a dump and we were hungry after a very long day. The only restaurant was called the Swinging Steak which had open fire pits with huge swinging iron grids cooking massive steaks. All you could order was steak and beans. The steak was delicious, shame I'm not keen on beans though
Click to expand...

The road from Mexican Hat to Monument Valley is where Forrest Gump stopped running. I remember filling up with petrol in Mexican Hat … your description is overly generous Bob 🤣
 
Blackswanwood said:
The road from Mexican Hat to Monument Valley is where Forrest Gump stopped running. I remember filling up with petrol in Mexican Hat … your description is overly generous Bob 🤣
Click to expand...
Yes I tried not to be too unkind. ;)

We loved Monument Valley. Neither of us at all religious but there was something tangible you could feel in the place.

I had an almost new top of the range Chrysler 300 all black and with chrome wheels and instead of taking the transport truck around the route I took the car and if you remember it's a bit rough in places. The car had changed colour to red by the time I got out but the enterprising Indians had a car wash directly across the road. :ROFLMAO:
A 5 week 3000 mile road trip we thoroughly enjoyed and consider ourselves extremely lucky indeed to have been able to do it along with a number of other excursions
 
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