The second cat

My second leopard was sequestered in a tree about 10 months ago. It took an age to see even though I knew it was there and when I saw it it was so obvious I couldn't believe I'd missed it. I suspect most things which missed it would live only briefly to regret their error.

It was the very picture of feline nonchalance; all exagerated stretching, unfeasable wriggling and one-eye-open hopeful half napping. Eventually it rolled onto all fours and commenced to groom offering the perfect picture save for that one tiny branch.

Tiny imperfections in otherwise perfect moments like these are what I love as an amateur naturalist. They're part of the thrill of the chase, the knowledge (as Roy McIvoy put it) that "perfection is unobtainable" reminds us, with the heat and the dust and the uncomfy seats, that we're in the real world, not HDTV-land and that we share it with things that are truly wonderful

Wordless wednesday: Pepper flowers

They're really rather beautiful if you bother to look...

Capsicum annum "Minorcan Pequin"

Capsicum baccatum "Dedo de Moca"

Drownling

I found this floating in my pond today. It is a drowned greater white toothed shrew. This photo is about twice life size as it appears on my screen.

Unfortunately my pond does not have very good exit points. I've tried to address this somewhat but obviously not successfully enough for such a tiny mammal to make good its escape. Hence a sad reminder more work is needed on this front by me and a useful pointer to bear in mind for any of you considering making a pond. Stuff needs to get out. Looking on the bright side as has been said many times sooner or later being a naturalist leads to corpses or crap and this at least shows that my grassy field and garden is home to a population of these brilliant little insectivorous mammals. I've considered some plans by which to get photos of a live one. Time will tell if I can pull this off.

Email from ESPN: the "American Big Day Birding League"

I received the email pasted below a couple of days ago. Wow. I guess a lot of you have received the same email but if not; have a read. My thoughts on this pretty surprising development are at the end of the email as are the attached screenshots Lindsey mentions.

Dear Bird Blogger 

For several years ESPN have been monitoring the development of competitive birding with a view to future programming opportunities. After a 3 year collaboration with many of the leading names in birding optics we are delighted to be able to announce the launch this fall of the American Big Day Team Birding League.

In the American Big Day Team Birding League, teams of 4 birders will compete to see as many birds as possible in a 24 hour period on a series of 6 big days in a range of habitats across the USA in a race to crown America’s top birding team with the winners taking home the prestigious Peterson Cup. Competitors will be issued with specially modified optics with in-built cameras to allow the audience at home to actually see what our birders are seeing and each big day will receive extensive multimedia coverage with multiple live feeds being broadcast on ESPN.com and regular live updates on ESPN.

ESPN is confident that our use of advanced technology including our in-optic cameras, GPS locator units and parabolic microphones together with our expertise in televising outdoor sports will leave birdwatchers throughout the USA more than satisfied with the coverage provided for this most unique of sporting events.

I attach some screenshots to illustrate some of the remarkable views you may see this fall on our coverage. Commentary will be provided by ESPN’s own Cotton McKnight with expert on-air analysis, colour commentary and field reports coming from a range of birding personalities and legends.

Seven of the ten teams contesting the inaugural American Big Day Team Birding League have already been selected but there is still time to get involved. Over the summer three qualifying big day events will be held in New York, California and Texas with the winning teams from each event earning the right to participate in the first league. Please let us know by replying to this email if you would like further details of how to enter a team in any of these qualifying events. In addition we are looking to work with a number of birding bloggers to provide online associated content related to our competitive birding programming and would welcome the opportunity to discuss this with you further. If you are interested in working with us in this regard I would be grateful if you would get in touch and let me know of a suitable time at which we could discuss this further.

With kindest regards,

Lindsey Nagel
Executive Producer, outdoor programming, ESPN8.

Here are a couple of the screenshots Lindsey mentions. Apparently these emerged during a 5 team "test run" a while ago in the New York area.



Here's a shot from one of the in-optic cameras which will basically let the viewer see what one of the birders on each team sees. I don't know quite how or if these will work but if the quality is as good as this appears to suggest it should be pretty remarkable. Looks like the graphics are works in progress! 

The shot below shows the GPS Locator screen which will apparently be used to show where the different teams are headed to in their attempts to find birds. I suspect this'll be a really cool feature for the casual viewer who'll probably be pretty amazed at the different habitats each team will find whilst remaining close to various connurbations.




The ducks obviously represent each team and again are clearly in rough draft form. Apparently this test run was really competitive; with some teams en route to habitats where they could pick up 20-30 species  and others having already ticked them off there were massive swings through the day. This kind of dramatic movement in the scoring from hour to hour should make for an interesting event I reckon.

Suffice it to say I was more than a little interested so I got in touch with Lindsey directly to discuss matters and can let the cat out of the bag that I'll be an "official blogger" providing thoughts on the League for it's online presence. 

My caribbean experience has also led (hopefully) to me being involved as a participant in the what's being called the James Bond Goldeneye Shootout - that's right ESPN plants to take this international for some events in the tropics in winter too and I'll be involved in the Barbados event!

Until then I'll be keeping you up to date with developments on the League (and hopefully some other competitive birding events ESPN wants to get involved with too) and will be blogging on what's happening here and over at the Competitive Birding pages on the Ochozone. Pretty exciting times!