Flamingo Friday: The Look

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Trousers (and Birds) in Waterland

As our friend Sarah, who’s lived in the Netherlands for eight years, drove us (Annie, Annie’s sister Christin, and me) towards the quaint villages of Volendam and Edam, we passed a road sign that made Sarah laugh. I don’t remember the Dutch, but Sarah told us that the translation was something like “Trousers in Waterland,” and it meant, more or less, “Be grateful you’re wearing pants [and therefore not underwater].” I’m not entirely sure why trouser-wearing should be the antithesis of being submerged, but maybe it’s a Dutch thing.

In any case, the point to take away from this is that the Netherlands should, by all rights, be underwater; the country is, in fact, below sea level, but its submersion has been indefinitely delayed thanks to the work of centuries of engineering. Still, if the land isn’t quite suffused with water, it’s still infused by it—as you can see from every town and city’s myriad canals and from the channels of water that cut through the flat sheets of fields like patterns of inlay.

Our drives—even our first drive from the airport—were full of visions of vast stretches of green dotted with sheep and frisking lambs, of fields streaked with bands of colored tulips and bordered with strips of water lined by an incredible variety of birds. During our stay, I saw: oystercatchers; innumerable coots; horned grebes; cormorants; little and great blue herons; mallards and other domestic-y ducks; plovers; and what I’m pretty sure were lapwings. (For those of you who are not birders, these are all names for types of waterfowl.)

[horned grebe]

Because it was spring, we saw not only waterfowl but waterfowlettes—that is, baby waterfowl: ducklings of all size, color, and number, and also baby coots, which I will insist on referring to as cootlets.


The ducklings were, of course, adorable and fuzzy, and as all good ducklings should be—but the cootlets were a complete surprise.


Who would have thought that such chic-but-austerely-plumaged adults could produce such vivid, punk little offspring?

[the little punk crested heads of the rainbow-y cootlets
behind their mother]

[parent-child bonding]

It was quite a surprise, and I have to admit that, for me, seeing my first-ever cootlets was the highlight of our day’s visit to Amsterdam (what red-light district? What Van Gogh museum?).

We saw a variety of adorable domesticated animals in our trip, too, and I’ll no doubt spend another post discussing those—but what charmed me was how welcoming the country seemed to be to wild birds; in every field, cows or sheep or goats coexisted peacefully with herons and coots and plovers and oystercatchers—the very design of the fields and towns and cities is such that these birds always have habitat available to them. It made it seem more possible for humans to coexist with wildlife, too, in a way that doesn’t involve requiring other species to adapt to an urban environment and then resenting them for it.

[a coot on a nest of its own design
in an Amsterdam canal]

[baby coots in a Leiden creek]

Of course, I was just a visitor, so who knows what kind of skewed impression I got of the country. But it was a pleasant one, and it left me feeling somewhat optimistic: what with global warming and the likelihood that sea levels will be rising everywhere around the world, maybe the U.S. will eventually have to become a bit more like the Netherlands.

I’m not sure I’d want us to go so far as to put up road signs about trousers, though. I do have some national pride.

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Only in Europe...

Will you see hens jealously guarding a captured quarter-croissant:

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Un Peu Fatiguée

This adorable little kid that we saw in the Netherlands was not suffering from jetlag, but I am, so I will leave you with its image and the promise to post a more involved update on the wildlife of Europe soon.

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One Good Shot: Hoping You Have a Lazy Weekend

Just to let you know, I will be out of the country until April 25th, so whatever posts appear (having been scheduled in advance) may be a little light on text, and I certainly won't be able to respond to comments. If you're longing for more Beasts in a Populous City-ness, then take the caption contest, and encourage your friends to do the same! It will provide you with hours of entertainment and distract you from the aching void created by my absence from this website.

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Flaming Friday: Ruffled

Just to let you know, I will be out of the country for the next week, so whatever posts appear (having been scheduled in advance) may be a little light on text, and I certainly won't be able to respond to comments. If you're longing for more Beasts in a Populous City-ness, then take the caption contest, and encourage your friends to do the same! It will provide you with hours of entertainment and distract you from the aching void created by my absence from this website.

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OneGoodShot: Stretch

Just to let you know, I will be out of the country until April 25th, so whatever posts appear (having been scheduled in advance) may be a little light on text, and I certainly won't be able to respond to comments. If you're longing for more Beasts in a Populous City-ness, then take the caption contest, and encourage your friends to do the same! It will provide you with hours of entertainment and distract you from the aching void created by my absence from this website.

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Fatherhood (Finally) Agrees with Him

Luke the lion has not always seemed particularly excited about his cubs, but in the past few weeks he’s become much more tolerant of their high jinks, allowing them to stalk him, pounce on him, and gnaw on him—and even appearing to enjoy it.



Has he just matured along with his offspring, or is he relying on some sort of father’s little helper to get him through…?



Just to let you know, I will be out of the country until April 25th, so whatever posts appear (having been scheduled in advance) may be a little light on text, and I certainly won't be able to respond to comments. If you're longing for more Beasts in a Populous City-ness, then take the caption contest, and encourage your friends to do the same! It will provide you with hours of entertainment and distract you from the aching void created by my absence from this website.

{A note: I do write all text and take all pictures. Please do not reproduce either without my permission.}

The Greater Rhea Photo Series

The thing I like best about the zoo’s greater rheas (apart from the fact that the zoo has the good taste to exhibit greater, rather than lesser, rheas) is that they’re generally quite interested in people, and they approach their fence, and you, with an amicable curiosity—there’s none of the shyness of the egrets or the menace of the wattled cranes (who stilt their way over to you and glare at you from their orange eyes). Instead, they just seem pleased that you’ve come to visit and given them the opportunity to observe you and your curious behaviors.


Or maybe they just want something to eat.


Just to let you know, I will be out of the country until April 25th, so whatever posts appear (having been scheduled in advance) may be a little light on text, and I certainly won't be able to respond to comments. If you're longing for more Beasts in a Populous City-ness, then take the caption contest, and encourage your friends to do the same! It will provide you with hours of entertainment and distract you from the aching void created by my absence from this website.

{A note: I do write all text and take all pictures. Please do not reproduce either without my permission.}

Flamingo Friday: Why the Long Face?

Just to let you know, I will be out of the country for the next week, so whatever posts appear (having been scheduled in advance) may be a little light on text, and I certainly won't be able to respond to comments. If you're longing for more Beasts in a Populous City-ness, then take the caption contest, and encourage your friends to do the same! It will provide you with hours of entertainment and distract you from the aching void created by my absence from this website.

{A note: I do write all text and take all pictures. Please do not reproduce either without my permission.}

The Frog Game

Earlier this week I had the opportunity to stroll around the campus of the National Labor College on beautiful, unnaturally warm day. I photographed the flowers, searched for the birds I could hear trilling in the trees, and wandered by the marshy pond, where I played the frog game.

Maybe you’ve played it, too: you’ll be walking by a stream or creek or pond—any body of water with some reeds or grasses growing along the banks—and suddenly you’ll hear an “Eeeeeeep!” and a splash—and you’ll know you’ve lost the frog game. –Because, you see, the frog has seen you, but you have not seen the frog.

So I spent a fair amount of time walking quickly but stealthily along the bank, trying to spot the frogs basking among the reeds before they saw me and, with a scream, threw themselves into the concealing water. I was somewhat successful, although I hadn’t brought along a camera with a sufficiently powerful zoom to document my triumphs. Still, I have my memories.

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Caption Contest!

You know how, occasionally, you look at a picture and think to yourself, “Wow, this is such a striking [pose/portrait/what-have-you]—wouldn’t it be great if it had a snappy caption that really summed up the emotion or humor inherent in it?” And you know how you usually conclude that thought with, “Oh well; can’t think of something right now”—? Well, that’s how I feel.

That’s right: sometimes I get tired of writing things to accompany my photos—so I’ve decided you can do it instead!

Here’s the deal: Below are a number of photos (I’ve even numbered them). You pick the photo that most inspires you and write a caption for it. Once submissions are in, I’ll select some of my favorite entries and then let the good readers of this blog vote to decide the Very Best Caption. The winner gets, of course, glory and adulation—and also a travel mug with a Beasts in a Populous City photo on it! (Here’s an example at my Zazzle site; the winner may request either a pre-made mug or one with a design of his/her choosing. The losers can buy one for themselves and then claim that they won it.)

INSTRUCTIONS: Don’t put your submissions in the comments! To submit a caption, send an email to squidfan@gmx.com with: 1. The subject line “Caption Contest”; 2. The number of the photo associated with your caption (no need to try to copy the image); 3. The caption; 4. Your name. The contest is open until the end of April. Each person may submit no more than three (3) captions total—and only one per image.

Have fun!

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One Good Shot: You Lookin' at Me?

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Flamingo Friday: “Come and have a bathe.”

Do you suppose these flamingos have read, or seen, A Room with a View?

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The Things You Don’t See

(Okay, the caption contest will be on hold for just a little while longer—but everything’s all set for it, so don’t worry! And there will be a prize, too… Oh, the suspense!)

I am one of the many people who, when I lived in Boston, would enjoy going to the New England Aquarium and watching the harbor seals in their outdoor (free to the public) tank; I would peer through the glass like everyone else and ooh and aah over the seals’ cuteness, their speed in the water, their ability to close up their nostrils when they dove.

I was also one of the only people who noticed the other residents of the tank—mainly the myriad little snails gripping the inside of the glass and using their tiny little radulae (one radula per snail) to scrape at the algae growing on the tank. On the occasions when I went inside the aquarium, I was one of the few pointing out snails and hermit crabs and mussels in amongst the brightly colored or impressively toothed fishes. The one time I went snorkeling, I exclaimed over the sea urchins.

I still enjoy the seals and fishes, mind you—but it’s fun to discover other animals that no one else seems to notice, as if there’s a separate aquarium, a separate world, just for people like me. That’s how I felt at the zoo a couple of weeks ago when I noticed these hydromedusae all over the walls of the starfish tank:

[this hydromedusa was about 5 mm across]

Hydromedusae are—well, it’s a little complicated. A fair number of animals in the cnidarian (Nye-dARE-eee-ann) phylum—which includes anemones, corals, and jellyfish—have alternating life stages, with a sexual form (usually a “medusa,” or jellyfish-like-form) and an asexual form (a “polyp”—something that looks like an anemone). Hydrozoans are cnidarians that can either have alternating forms (hydroids and hydromedusae) or just a single form (one or the other). The animals I saw in the tank might be hydromedusae that are never polyps, or they might be a species that has hydroid forms, too; any help in their identification would be appreciated.


Either way, I have only two points to make about them: in spite of the fact that there were many of them in the tank, no one else appeared to notice them; and my computer’s spell-checker has had no problem with either “hydroid” or “hydromedusae,” even though it always tries to insist that I don't really want to type my name that way.

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