Great Tits Cope Well With Warming....

The blog title above is the actual headline from a BBC News article. The discussion is about how some British birds are coping (or not coping for that matter) with climatic changes. The Great Tit, for example is doing quite well, adapting to the earlier arrival of its Winter Moth caterpillar food by laying its eggs earlier. Thus the chicks have abundant food when they hatch. (from the article, emphasis added)

At least one of Britain's birds appears to be coping well as climate change alters the availability of a key food.

Researchers found that great tits are laying eggs earlier in the spring than they used to, keeping step with the earlier emergence of caterpillars.

Writing in the journal Science, they point out that the same birds in the Netherlands have not managed to adjust.

Understanding why some species in some places are affected more than others by climatic shifts is vital, they say.

Tags: birding,ornithology,bird studies,british birds,global warming affects birds,great tt,winter moth caterpillar

Animal Cruelty in China, an Olympic Disgrace....

A few weeks ago I wrote to a friend:

The ChiComs care only for how they appear to a global audience. Hence their obsession with baby pandas and their present purge of cats. This on top of the routine abuse of animals in China's fur industries where animals are skinned alive or tourist attractions where unsuspecting cattle are released into a den of lions for the amusement of spectators. I say boycott the China Olympic Games.

In addition to the dispute over Tibet another shadow falls over the upcoming Summer Olympics in China: The blot of extreme animal cruelty displayed in the Chinese treatment of domestic cats and dogs. The Salon blog today features an article by Ted Kerasote depicting the gulf separating our Western view of hearthside pets from the Chinese indifference to the plight of such pets which are routinely tortured and slaughtered for food and/or fur. From the blog (not easy reading!):

Undercover videos taken for Swiss Animal Protection, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, and the Humane Society show Chinese dogs and cats trucked to market without food and water, pulled from their cages, sometimes disemboweled, sometimes bashed on the ground to stun them, then hanged by wires, and skinned alive. These investigations led to a ban on the importation of dog and cat fur from the United States, Australia and a few countries in the Europe Union in the early 2000s. A full EU ban will take effect on Jan. 1, 2009

Tags: china animal cruelty, china olympics, chinese animal abuse, olympic boycott, salon, slaughter dogs cats

Easter Sunday on Indian Hill....

The video below was made today at Indian Hill Cemetery in Middletown. The brownstone 1850 chapel is a hidden architectural gem tucked away on this hillside. It was very windy there today so some segments of the video are marred by a roaring wind sound.


Tags: middletown ct,indian hill cemetery chapel,small churches,easter cemetery tour

Falconry in Connecticut....

DENNIS SANTANGELO, a sophomore in Middletown's Vocational Agriculture Center, examines the bone structure of a 3-year-old hawk held by falconer John White of Southbury.White and Jon D'Arpino, of West Hartford, holding his year-old hawk,gave a program on falconry to sophomores at the center. (BOB MACDONNEL Photo)

A little known aspect of hunting is the ancient practice and art of falconry which, yes, is legal in Connecticut as in most states. A recent Hartford Courant article reported on a visit to the Middletown Vocational Agriculture Centerby 2 of 16 Connecticut licensed falconers.

MIDDLETOWN — - Jon D'Arpino and John White tend to their red-tailed hawks as lovingly as a pet owner looks after the family dog. They provide the birds with de-worming tablets, vitamin powder and a special spray to get rid of feather lice. When the raptors are unable to hunt for their own wild prey, they feed them a diet of thawed quail and day-old chicks, ordered frozen on the Internet. And when their tail feathers break, they patch them with small pieces of wood. As two of only 16 licensed falconers in the state, D'Arpino and White are members of a very small circle. Falconry, the use of wild raptors to hunt, was legalized by the legislature in 1998; it took another seven years for the state Department of Environmental Protection to approve regulations governing the sport.

Falconry is closely regulated by the state and federal governments. In Connecticut there are 3 levels of practitioners: Apprentice Class Falconer, General Class Falconer, and Master Class Falconers. Some quotes from the CT DEP on the subject follow:

Allowable Raptor Species to be used for Falconry in Connecticut
(NOTE: No raptors may be taken from the wild in Connecticut.)

1. Red-tailed Hawks, Prairie Falcons, Merlins or Harris's Hawks taken from the wild in another state:


2. any captive-bred raptor species; and


3. any species of hybrid raptors, provided that the hybrid is sterile and unable to breed with wild native raptors.

Is Falconry for You?
Falconry is the sport of hunting small game species with trained raptors. The sport of falconry has a rich history throughout the world and the basic components have changed little over time. Falconry requires a considerable amount of dedication, knowledge, skill, time, and resources. If you are interested in becoming a falconer you must be prepared to provide for the day-to-day needs of one or more raptors. These needs include feeding, housing, training, exercising, and ensuring that the bird has appropriate veterinary care.

Permitting Requirements
To participate in the sport of falconry you must obtain a Connecticut and federal falconry permit (PDF 330k 5 pages). State and federal falconry authorization must be attained prior to obtaining a falconry bird. Based upon your experience, knowledge and ability, you may apply for a federal and a state permit to practice falconry as an apprentice class, general class, or master class falconer.

More information is available at the Falcon and Raptor Educational Foundation.

The video below is a somewhat humorous look at the history of the activity from a U.K. production:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufstmgDtNrM&hl=en]

Finally, a view of a Harris' Hawk, a bird only coming into use in falconry in the last 30 years or so. The image is from the interesting web site http://www.primitiveways.com/Image3/falconry4.jpg

Tagged: ct falconers, ct falconry law, falconry, falconry in connecticut, history falconry, hunting with falcons

O'Rourke's Diner Redux....

Brian O'Rourke opened his, or should we say the community's, diner today for the first time since the disastrous fire many moons ago. According to the staff it was gangbusters from 5 Am 'till closing at 3 PM. I didn't get a chance to interview Brian this afternoon but hope to do so in the near future.



Tags: middletown ct, orourkes diner

Bird Feeder Hazards....

And you thought you had only the squirrels to worry about!

The "Silver Lining" in Global Warming....

The "silver lining" in Global Warming, the Destruction of Conservatism in America....
Far left reporter Dave Lindorff (Wesleyan '71) writing in the Baltimore Chronicle (12/22/07) opines:

Say what you will about the looming catastrophe facing the world as the pace of global heating and polar melting accelerates. There is a silver lining.....The area that will by completely inundated by the rising ocean—and not in a century but in the lifetime of my two cats—are the American southeast, including the most populated area of Texas, almost all of Florida, most of Louisiana, and half of Alabama and Mississippi, as well as goodly portions of eastern Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina.....
So what we see is that huge swaths of conservative America are set to face a biblical deluge in a few more presidential cycles.....So again, we will see the decline and depopulation of the nation’s vast midsection—noted for its consistent conservatism. Only in the northernmost area, around the Great Lakes (which will be not so great anymore), and along the Canadian border, will there still be enough rain for farming and continued large population concentrations, but those regions, like Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois, are also more liberal in their politics.

(emphasis added)

This is nutty stuff folks. This is the most extreme form of climate change alarmism and clearly illustrates the underlying political agenda; i.e anti-capitalism and destruction of conservatism, United Nations usurpation of our national sovereignty, and other far left nostrums. There is recent, albeit limited, evidence that Global Warming has actually ceased. Astrophysicist David Whitehouse writing in "The New Statesman" (U.K.) 12/19/07) states:

With only few days remaining in 2007, the indications are the global temperature for this year is the same as that for 2006 – there has been no warming over the 12 months.

But is this just a blip in the ever upward trend you may ask? No.

The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 is statistically the same as 2006 as well as every year since 2001. Global warming has, temporarily or permanently, ceased. Temperatures across the world are not increasing as they should according to the fundamental theory behind global warming – the greenhouse effect. Something else is happening and it is vital that we find out what or else we may spend hundreds of billions of pounds needlessly.....For the past decade the world has not warmed. Global warming has stopped. It’s not a viewpoint or a sceptic’s inaccuracy. It’s an observational fact. Clearly the world of the past 30 years is warmer than the previous decades and there is abundant evidence (in the northern hemisphere at least) that the world is responding to those elevated temperatures. But the evidence shows that global warming as such has ceased.

Dr. Whitehouse does not reject the CO2/Greenhouse Gas science. Clearly CO2 emissions are rising but CO2 comprises only an extremely tiny fraction of the earth's atmosphere. Its present concentration is roughly 390 ppm up from 315 ppm in 1960 when accurate measurements of this sort became feasible. To visualize the quantity of CO2 in our atmosphere, imagine the atmosphere as a 100 yard football gridiron. On this scale Nitrogen (78%) would occupy all of the field down to the 22 yard line; Oxygen (21%), would bring us to the 1 yard line where Argon (1%) would bring us to the final inch line of which only a small fraction of that would signify the volume of CO2! This comparison is mentioned in Michael Crichton's "State of Fear"; a similar example, using stadium spectators instead of the gridiron, itself can be found here.

An extended discussion of the CO2 problem and related matters can be found at the EcoWorld website. Here, in an interview titled "Beyond Global Warming", climate scientist Roger Pielke, Sr. throws much light on the subject. He says to blame all of the perceived changes in climate on CO2 emissions is wrong. Important factors being overlooked and/or underreported are changing patterns of land use and land cover. He says:

With respect to extreme weather, a much more important issue than how greenhouse gases are altering our climate is society's greatly increased vulnerability to extreme weather events - a direct result not of changes in weather but of increased settlement by expanding human populations into low-lying coastal regions, floodplains, and marginal arid land.

Roger Pielke Sr. is a retired professor of atmospheric science at Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, and a senior research scientist at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Since July 2005 he has written and maintained Climate Science, a blog that serves as a scientific forum for dialogue and commentary on climate issues. With William R. Cotton, he is the co-author of Human Impacts on Weather and Climate (Cambridge University Press, 2007).

Also please see our recent posting on ConservaCity "Global Warming Hoax Losing Ground"