Gullible's Travels: storks

Showing posts with label storks. Show all posts

Tuesday, November 28, 2023

The 2023 Brazil Journals, Chapter Sixteen

(To see photos full screen, click on one and then scroll through them.)

Chapter Sixteen

Roommates, Wanted or Not

Everyone has this universal understanding about roommate drama.

—Leighton Meeser

There is great purpose in Shelly’s stride as she approaches us and announces, “I HAD A FROG IN MY BATHROOM!!!”

“I flushed it and I’m not sorry,” she proclaims. When asked why she didn’t leave it alone, she says she didn’t want frog poop all over her stuff. Besides, she adds, they live in the water pipes and it will probably be back.

"And I'll flush it again!"

We tease Shelly for a while about flushing her roommate and when the hubbub and laughter die down and I have a chance to think, I wonder about three things:

1. What does frog poop look like?

2. Do they really live in the plumbing pipes?

3. Was that really a big moth I saw on the edge of the sink counter when I went into my bathroom without my glasses on? It blended into the counter design so well.

We all have single rooms on this trip so we don’t have human roommates. When I go back to my room, I inspect the bathroom carefully and sure enough, there’s a small frog on the wall.

A really lousy photo of a two-inch long frog in my bathroom.

On another day I run to get my cell phone to take a photo of a frog. It beats me to the door and escapes into the bedroom, never to be seen again.

A Pampas deer fawn.

Pampas deer fawn and daddy.

I watch over the next couple days and it appears in different places—near the ceiling, on the floor, and inside the toilet bowl. I discover that they like hanging out under the inside rim of the toilet.

Southern Lapwing

After one experience of a frog jumping out of the bowl, I make a solemn promise to always stand up before flushing.

I don’t care if the frogs are there and I certainly don’t want to hurt them. They are probably catching insects and I will leave them to it.

Meanwhile, twice a day, we are off by land and river to see what we can see:

A bunch of hyacinth macaws hanging out around a water tank in the evening light.

Hyacinth are the largest macaws in the world. They can crack Brazil nuts and macadamia nuts.

Soft landing in soft sand.

What a cast of characters

These two almost escape the frame as I'm shooting them.

Stealth macaw

Burrowing owl.

Whoo-hoo! In flight!

Southern screamer. That's its real name.

The Jabiru stork is the largest stork in the Americas, standing four to five feet tall with a wingspan to 12 feet. Its name in the Tupi-Guarani language means "swollen neck." That is because of the large red sac at the base of its neck, which serves multiple purposes.

When the sac is pink, the bird is relaxed. When red, the stork is excited or angry.

It also assists the stork in feeding by filtering water from the food it ingests. Adults carry food back to the nest in that neck sac.

Jabiru stork

Friday, March 20, 2020

The 2020 Africa Journals

Chapter Eight:

Trouble with a capital T,
but BOY! He's cute!

The really good photographers I know are gifted with an artistic foresight that enables them to imagine and plan the photo they want long before they push the shutter button on their cameras. Thus, it was no surprise when I saw my friend Marg Wood crouching in the dirt, camera in hand, and ready for an animal with a fearsome reputation to burst forth from the darkness into the light.

Good idea, I thought, picturing the black and gray critter emerging from a black background, white teeth and dark eyes catching the sunlight.

I look around for a spot to kneel down where I could be at the same level as the animal. I see Marg still hunkered down in the dirt, Mary has fallen off the edge of the rubber tire she was sitting on and is now trapped deep in its well, and Janine has a whirling dervish wrapped around her ankles.

I decide upright is a good place to be.

That critter with the white teeth and long claws is a honey badger, one of the least seen and most frightening animals on earth. This one, however, is a rescued orphan that is being hand-raised at a near-by rescue and educational facility. Just a few weeks old when it was found, it was called by a feminine name until its advancing age and forming male genitalia convinced its caretakers to substitute a male name. And Badgey it became.

Badgey is now a juvenile, or “juvenile delinquent” as Marg calls him. He’s black with a gray mantle down his back. Because he knows only humans, and humans that play with him, he hasn’t developed the anti-social tendencies of his breed, but his play is getting rougher and he is starting to mark his territory with a tell-tale musk.

In general, honey badgers aren’t badgers at all, but are more closely related to weasels and polecats. Though they resemble wolverines, they aren’t closely related to them either. About a foot high and up to 30 inches long plus the tail, the males weigh about 35 lbs.

They are fearless and rated by the Guinness Book of Records and the bravest animal on earth. They chase away lions, Cape buffalo, cattle, and horses if those huge animals intrude on their territory. Their loose hides enable them to twist out of another animal’s bite.

Janine, who is married to Pangolin owner/operator Guts, is one of Badgey’s foster moms. She visits him often and plays with him. I found it fascinating that Badgey obeyed her when she summoned him to his enclosed cage. Then, she opened the door and Badgey shot out into his walled outdoor area, which is why Marg was crouching where she could capture the shot.

Badgey spots Mary on the rubber tire and tries to climb into her lap. Mary is a good sport about it, but Badgey plays rough. Plus, he runs over to his small water pool, walks in it, then runs back through the dirt and climbs on Mary.

Badgey also loves Marg’s semi-open sandals, much to Marg’s dismay. Those sharp little teeth can reach her skin through the openings. In trying to shoo him away, Badgey accidentally leaves his dental autograph on Marg’s forearm.