Did You know - outdoor edition

[WV Sawmiller]

OSF,

   We have the C Geese here too year round. They are neat to watch on the river but they get on the football field and make a big mess. Our HS is located right beside the river so they don't have far to travel. An old man was our local junk dealer and lived along the river in town. He got all the left over produce and bread from our local grocery store and threw it out on the river bank behind his house to feed the geese and ducks for many years. He invited my son and his friends to come fish there and they spent many nights fishing for there as teens. One afternoon they set up a leaning box, a stick and a string as a trap and baited it and caught a duck and were fixing to kill and cook it. All was going well till they invited Mr. Cox to come eat with them and he told them "You boys better turn my duck loose or I'm gonna skin your heads." and they released the duck unharmed. They were probably going to burn an old tire or such for their campfire to cook him. Mr. Cox told that tale many times and really got a kick out of it. 

[KEC]

The super aggressive behavior of Mute Swans ( the white ones with an orange bill that often hold their neck in an S curve position) is why some state wildlife agencies have proposed getting rid of them. They are old world birds, not native here. A few years ago the New York State Dept. of Environmental Conservation proposed a lethal control program as they displace native waterfowl. There was such an upswell of protests that the plan was dropped. People in canoes and kayaks have been attacked by Mute Swans and drowned. While in the army in Germany I went through the Nueswanstein Castle, the one that Disney portrays in their films. In the king's bedroom is a swan made of silver at the sink that had it so water flowed out of its' mouth.

[WV Sawmiller]

   As I remember those we saw in Norway were white but I was thinking they made a noise of some sort so I don't know if they are same as a mute swan or not.

[KEC]

I did a little search about swans. Apparantly, Mute Swans are not totally mute. I can't say for sure what WV saw in Norway, but the behavior of the swans suggest mutes, which are notoriously protective of their nest and young.

[Will.K]

Speaking of mute birds, vultures have no vocal organs and can only hiss, cough, huff, and so forth. 

Their nesting areas are revoltingly stinky places, usually under rock overhangs, on cliffs, or in small caves. The white (where not vomit stained) chicks hiss violently when approached, but I've only seen adults engage in defensive regurgitation. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   I've never  seen a vultures nest here in the USA. I saw lots in Africa but never got too close to them. I did see a fried buzzard last year who lit on a power line about a mile from my home and crossed the electric wires. he was still smoking when I came by but he won't do that again.

   Dad had a friend who found two large eggs in central Fla and I think he thought they were turkeys and hatched them. Turned out to be a pair of buzzards. He raised them anyway and they would come and go. He'd leave dry dog food on the back porch for them and it was a hoot to see them hopping around the back porch eating dog food.

   They are a nuisance at the landing down on Bluestone Lake where I fish 8.5 miles from here. People throw old carp and other dead fish and minnows and such out at the landing and they eat them. There will usually be dozens hanging around and they land on people's cars and scratch them up and crap all over them.

[WV Sawmiller]

    Did you know bees in Africa are caught using homemade baskets and boxes? One of the neatest bee baskets I ever saw was in Cameroon in February 2008 when we returned on vacation. They were made from a raffia palm frond and were about 3' long and about 1' in diameter. The palm frond was stripped and split down to about 6" from the base which was left as a handle. The split sections were spread for ribs and more sections were inserted to make it bigger. Then thin strips of raffia or bamboo were tightly woven to make the sides. When finished they were shaped like a horn-of-plenty basket. The end plug was made by wrapping half inch wide strips of raffia palm or bamboo into a concentric circle leaving about a 1" hole at the center for an entrance hole. When finished the round mat was tied tight and coated with mud or fresh cow manure, inserted in the end of the basket and tied in place. The bees would seal it tighter once they moved in. This formed container that had about 10 gallons of storage capacity with a small entrance that could be easily defended, was light weight and was hung about 10'-20' high in local trees and when nearby bees expanded beyond their capacity they would split and swarm and take up residency in these bee baskets.

  In Ethiopia I asked my driver why people did not steal the bees and he said if a bee basket was stolen the owner would collect some of the sand from the thief's footprints and take them to the local witch doctor and he would put a curse on it and a mamba would crawl into the thief's hut and bite him and anyone else who eaten the honey. Mamba's are particularly ill-tempered and bite multiple times and one crawling into a hut after mice or rats and stepped or rolled on to by a sleeping resident could result in the mamba biting everyone in the hut.

  A missionary in Zambia set up an operation providing free bee hives made from scrap wood from his WM mill and woodworking operation and he collects and pays the local residents for the honey and it has become (beecome?) a big operation. I read about it in the WM magazines. Here is a video of it.

Customer Stories | Wood-Mizer USA

[KEC]

There are 2 species of vulture in the Eastern US, Turkey Vultures and Black Vultures. The Black Vultures generally don't range as far north as TVs. The BVs are noted for being destructive by trashing vinyl roofs on cars and ripping up roofing material on buildings. This brings to mind, when at a drive through game park in Quebec years age they had an area with baboons. As soon as a vehicle entered that area the baboons climbed on and rode to the exit where workers chased them off. A tour bus was in front of us and the baboons got onto the bus and proceeded to rip off every marker light, even pulling the socket and wires out. Must have been an expensive repair. 

[WV Sawmiller]

   Baboons are notorious for getting into stuff and can be very dangerous and they are powerful animals. The worst is where people feed them and get them used to being around people. I have seen them in Saudi and various places in Africa. They are very alert and young impalas hang out with them for protection. They always have a guard or two watching. Where they are damaging crops and such and people try to shoot them they first have to kill or sneak past the sentry. I saw 2 big males in Saudi jump off a rock wall into the back of a moving P/U and get in a fight. The same troop had reached in an open car window and dislocated a child's shoulder trying to get food or such.

   We were camping along the river that is the border between Namibia and Angola. The office had a sign saying "Don't feed the monkeys - they already eat better than the staff." The owner would walk around shooting them with a paintball gun and they would scream and warn each other as soon as they saw him walking around. The day we left we had cooked breakfast and had one piece of sausage and one piece of French toast and we were all looking at it wanting it but too polite to take it and a Vervet monkey jumped off a nearby tree and stole them both resolving the issue.

[WV Sawmiller]

  Did you know horses in Mongolia typically will be seen side by side in pairs and standing head to tail? This means when one horse swishes his tail he is knocking the flies off the other horses face at the same time.

   I worked a project in the Gobi Desert in 2006 at a gold and copper mine project (Oyu Tolgoi) and at the time I was told there was something like about 2.5 million people and over 8 million horses. When you'd drive into a town or village it looked like an Old West scene with buildings made from small poles and lots of Gers (Yurts) the round tents common there. In front of every dwelling you would see a hitching post to tie your horse while you were inside.

[KEC]

WV your posts are hard to beat. Reminds me of a few years back I was driving past a pasture and it was raining. In the pasture was a very big draft horse standing there with a goat taking shelter under the horse. No camera, of course.

[WV Sawmiller]

   Did you know that a giraffe has a very difficult time drinking water? First they have to spread their front legs very wide just to be able to bend his neck down to reach the water and then when he does his lips do not seal and water pours out from between his lips when he lifts his head to swallow.

  Here is my journal entry of 27 June 2010 when we were touring southern Africa on a private tour and stopped over to visit Etosha Game Park in Namibia. We were watching a water hole on the park:

Several large giraffe come and drink. They have to spread their front legs very wide to be able to reach the water. When they finish drinking and lift their head a quart or so of water always runs out of their mouth as they can’t swallow it all and I gather their lips don’t seal it in. One cow is evidently coming into season as the bull follows her closely and tastes her urine to see if she is in heat.

[Tacotodd]

I knew that they had to lower their head to extremes, but I didn’t know about the lack of closing of the lips or the inability to swallow until closer to the upright position. I’m learning new things from this thread quite often. 

And to think, several people already say that I’m the smartest person that they know. What THEY don’t know is, this all just means that I need to find smarter people to hang around 🤷

[WV Sawmiller]

Taco,

   Thanks. The odd and really awkward thing was how really wide he had to spread his front legs to reach his head down to the water. I don't know how much he actually swallowed while he had his head down and I guess it is a bit of a chore to pull enough of a vacuum to suck it up that far but when he raised his head the water did spill out. The guide knew it would happen and told us to watch so we saw it and my wife got a picture of it.

    BTW - did you know they have a really big head? I think the head of a big bull giraffe is nearly 3' long? Also our guide said a young cow giraffe is very good eating and provides a lot of meat. I guess they mostly make biltong or jerky out of it. 

   No offense since I don't even know you but if people are saying you are the smartest person they know, I agree you need to start hanging out with a better group of people.

[Tacotodd]

Yes, yes I think I will!

[WV Sawmiller]

   Does that mean you have changed your mind about coming to visit?

[K-Guy]

Like these guys??

[WV Sawmiller]

    Did you know that White Rhinos are grazers and typically live on the plains and savannahs of Africa while the Black Rhinos are browsers and live in the brushy areas of Africa resulting in them being much harder to find?

    Did you know the White rhino is not white but got his name from the old Dutch settlers pronunciation of the word "wide" for his wide mouth?

    Did you know rhinos are severely threatened for the value of their horn (Actually a Keratin substance like hair rather than true horn) which is sold to Asians to make aphrodisiacs and to wealthy Arabs who want to make traditional rhino horn handled daggers?

    Did you know poachers will typically give a local tribesman an AK-47 and 30-40 rounds of Ammo to go kill rhinos for them and the value for such a horn may represent enough for them to buy a farm and build a home on it? To put that in perspective what would it cost you to buy 100 acres or so of good farmland and build a contemporary home on it?

    In December 2011, my wife, daughter and I visited Kruger Game Park in South Africa for about a week and stayed in a different camp/lodge every night to see the different areas. At every campground they typically had a map of the park set up as a game sighting board with little colored magnets to indicate where tourists had seen various big or unusual animals. They quickly learned to remove the symbols for rhinos because the poachers were using that info to help them go slaughter them. Rhinos and leopards are the two hardest members of the big five (Elephant, Rhino, Cape Buffalo, Lion & Leopard) to actually find and watch.

[Tacotodd]

  Does that mean you have changed your mind about coming to visit?

No. Unequivocally NO!
I still want to meet up with everyone that is there. I believe that it will be great fun. 

BUT, back to the current fun and learning 🥳