Mother duck has five baby ducklings

Hello there, this weekend I went to the old ruins of empuries, the largest Greek colony in the Iberian Peninsula. The ruins are surrounded by protected dunes that lead to the coast. A beautiful area that, even under a strong human pressure, you can still find beautiful nature pictures like this one: a recently born ducklings following their mother. Look at the first on the row, what a martial step, did he train with the marines?

Am I a delicious fish?

I always have seen seagulls when they are standing on land or water like this ones. They never looked at me with both eyes simultaneously, they always bend their head to looking at me predominantly with one eye. That is why I got surprised by this shoot were this flying bird is focusing both eyes straight to me. I thought to myself, am I a delicious fish?

I'm not, but I'm waving one on my hand!

Bye bye and accept my excuses

Dear Mosquitos, I have no words to express my sorry for what other animals from my specie had done to your home. You have to understand that we homo sapiens are not mature to rule the planet, how can we be mature to protect your nest?

But don't worry my friends the best minds are working on artificial intelligence and hopefully one day, a machine, will be ready to rule the world. A machine free from our weak genetic heritage, a machine with a really powerful mind that will treat us humans as what we are, smart monkeys that can't rule their lives without wars, without parasiting our own planet. That day evolution will make a key step. We will pass the baton and we will live a pleasant life in our cages without wars and without the chance to destroy the planet.

Machines will care.

Note that the picture is a fallen egg from a Columba palumbus nest that has nothing to do with my bee-eater friends, but expresses so well my feelings when last Saturday I brought all my family to see the birds and found that all the low forest was devastated and my friend were gone. They have abandoned their nest.

The Mosquito's are still at work

Hello there, in my last post about the Mosquito's I was afraid about how slowly they were carving their tunnel-nest. Tuns out that they have decided to abandon that soil and try better luck in a different nearby terrain.

Good luck my friends, I'll be watching you!

Sunset looking for Mr. and Ms. Mosquito

Monday I was looking for my beautifull lovers when I had to stop at the sight of this magnificent sunset with Montserrat's mountain at the end.

I won't be able to see them again till next Monday and that pisses me off.

Grrr.

Love is in the air, bee-eater (II)

Today at noon my little couple of bee-eaters gave me a love lesson and proved what I've read: that males of this species hunt insects that then offer to their couples. Now I can assure you that this is true and the sequence of pictures I've posted proves so.

In this web you can listen to the sound of the Merops apiaster

Bad news regarding the nest, the soil may be too hard and since last Friday they haven't carved much, maybe 4 inch. Since I've read that those nests are 3 to 8 feet deep, it would take them 27 days to reach the 3 feet. Too much.

Due to the love they show I'm going to call them Mr and Ms Mosquito.

Bee-eater's nest close to Simplonia

The other day I saw this couple of beautifull blue birds. They were busy up and down. It's spring and this two I'm sure they were in love. -Look what I brought you Honey, a fat 'bombylius major' -mmm, thanks dear.

What took my attention is that they were busy doing something on a sand wall and returning to this top dead branch of a young oak tree. What are they doing? I thought to myself. Maybe the wall is full of insects and they are having a succulent lunch? Well... turn out they were starting to build their love nest.

My big surprise came when watching the blog of a 'flower covered beard hippy' called Marmorlu I found a bird just like mines, and learned that those birds are 'Abejarucos' (bee-eater).

I found the position of this nest very weak to predators and stupid tourists like me (just close to an unpaved road), so I'm going to pray to the god's of birds for this couple and make sure that I will keep you all posted from their evolution.

Mediterranean Gulls

Taking pictures of Gulls I realized about the red spot they have on their peak. Turn out to have a clear Darwinian reason to be, or so think I. Gull chicks are born with the inclination to peck flesh, which sounds a good survival instinct to have. Adult Gulls have a fantastic red Target for their offspring to peck against and beg for food. This urges the fathers to regurgitate and feed the baby.

Another thing I saw is that youth Gulls have black peak and different feather. I also guess it's good not to show the fleshy spot until it's really needed.

I wonder if nature is so smart or I'm being too smart and making mistakes in my ignorance.

-th