Tea? (Part 2)

[HelenD123]

It was Tdr1nka, in the Tea room, with a stale Battenburg.

[/Cluedo]

*passes Tea to Waffles*

Wouldn't a stale rock cake be more effective?

 

[Arch]

Wouldn't a stale rock cake be more effective?

Depends if you want to batten someone to death.

 

[HelenD123]

Depends if you want to batten someone to death.

To batter someone to death would one need to involve a fish fryer?

 

[Arch]

To batter someone to death would one need to involve a fish fryer?

Yes, but a person being quite big, they'd probably fillet... Unless it was a huge fryer.

 

[mr Mag00]

thats a real shame about the veg Co.


*places fresh pot*

 

[Arch]

thats a real shame about the veg Co.


*places fresh pot*

Just goes to show that fine ideals don't always make for competent business.

Ah, fresh tea... Cookie anyone? They are just out of date, but I got them free. Choc chip with a hint of almond essence I think. Very moreish.

 

[Moderators]

I'd like one please!
*vanishes in puff of smoke*

 

[Dayvo]

Dayvo, I reckon you'll be in need of a tea transfusion after three weeks... What type should I cross-match?

Neat (with milk and one level spoon of sugar) PG Tips, Yorkshire, Tetley or similar, on a rather strong drip, something akin to a burst water pipe! Thanks!

 

[Gerry Attrick]

Is there one in the pot for me, please? Ive just got back from the town (horrible place) and I'm a bit frazzled. Why does everything wizz about so fast? Drivers with not a second to spare, grannies with a violent streak and shop assistants who serve you without so much as registering your presence. Aaaaaargh.

That's better, I like a rant.

 

[Gerry Attrick]

Oh, I forgot, Mrs A arrived home last night with a broken windscreen in our van. (Another aaaargh!)

 

[Dayvo]

Oh, I forgot, Mrs A arrived home last night with a broken windscreen in our van. (Another aaaargh!)

Why did she buy a broken windscreen? Just to drive home with it?

 

[Gerry Attrick]

Why did she buy a broken windscreen? Just to drive home with it?

 

[Amanda P]

I'll have to get my fleece gloves out soon.

Or I might knit some in Cyclechat colours.

Eureka! We've been wondering how to kit out Team CycleChat at the Brompton World Championships - and even wondering how we're going to recognise each other, since everyone is going to be wearing suits and clutching Bromptons. If there were a CycleChat tie, would could all wear that, but there isn't.

Have you got time to knit us four matching CycleChat knitted ties before I set off on Saturday lunchtime, Arch?

Probably not. Still, maybe for next year...

 

[Arch]

Eureka! We've been wondering how to kit out Team CycleChat at the Brompton World Championships - and even wondering how we're going to recognise each other, since everyone is going to be wearing suits and clutching Bromptons. If there were a CycleChat tie, would could all wear that, but there isn't.

Have you got time to knit us four matching CycleChat knitted ties before I set off on Saturday lunchtime, Arch?

Probably not. Still, maybe for next year...

Oh alas, probably not. Next year, definitely.

 

[Amanda P]

I have a relativley sensible question for Uncle Phil. Often I see what I think is geese flying (north to south) in the early evening. I say "think" because I can see the V shape they form together, but not identify the birds themeselves.

One evening this week, they flew straight over the house (ie east to west). Why do they suddenly set off in a different direction? I do not think they have done this before, as I would hear the noise they make.

Well, I don't know what your geese get up to, but...

If they're flying in a fairly tidy V, they are almost certainly geese. Are they honking? Geese are rarely quiet in flight.

There are geese that migrate to Britain for winter - pinkfooted geese, brent geese, barnacles, some greylags. Most canadas and greylags (the commonest ones) are resident all year round. What you're seeing, Speicher, are probably not migrating geese, but local ones which are commuting back and forth from a regular roost (probably a water body somewhere).

Where are they commuting to? A feeding site - often farmland. At this time of year, they'll be gleaning grain from stubbles, eating waste potatoes and root crops, or grazing on newly-sprouted cereals.

Chances are they've changed their flight path because a field where they'd been feeding on stubble has been ploughed, or someone's harvested a new potato field and they've just discovered the waste. Or something like that.

Or they might have changed their roost if there's been disturbance like shooting or dredging there.

We did some work a few years back using GPS satellite tags to follow the local movements of geese, so I have far more information on this sort of thing than you could possibly want to know.

This bird (known as BUI, because that was the code on his collar), for instance, was quite happily roosting at a reservoir-cum-bird reserve at Tophill Low, and spent his days foraginging on farmland a kilometre or so south of there.

Then the farmer who owned that farmland had a shoot. BUI wasn't shot, but he shifted his pattern and took up roosting on the lake at East Park in Hull, and foraging on farmland to the east. You can see all this quite clearly on the map.

(One of BUI's flock-mates was shot. Unfortunately, it takes a heavy load of large shot, fired accurately at close range to kill a goose. Most shooters use ordinary game cartridges, which don't come anywhere close to killing geese, but often cripple them. BUI's flock-mate (also collared and tagged) was crippled and eventually starved to death. This happens quite often with large waterfowl, and is something the shooting fraternity, and the RSPCA, should be more aware of. But that's another rant...)