Avian cheer / Bucky O'Hare / A cache of silvereyes
Avian cheer
I was in a bit of a grump on Saturday so I lit out for the territory Karori sanctuary to take photos of birds. I managed to catch decent shots of two birds that are notoriously hard to photograph due to their constant flitting about.
Popokatea / Whitehead
Riroriro / Grey WarblerEven though that's the best photo I've probably ever taken of a warbler, it doesn't do the tiny bird justice. It's a wee gem in the flesh, despite its muted colours. A marvel made more precious because it is so oftenheard but rarely seen.
As for the popokatea, there were about a dozen in the bushes around me at one point, behaving much as a [insert appropriate collective noun] of silvereyes might.
It was almost as if the birds wanted to cheer me up.
A female juvenile male hihi, which tend to be much shyer than the males, landed on a branch less than a metre away from me and stuck around for a good long moment.
Female Junvenile male Hihi / StitchbirdAnd as I was walking back to the entrance, sufficiently cheered, the shags were splashing about in the lake, possibly to rise off the salt after a day on the coast.
Karuhiruhi / Pied shagNB: NZbirds has an extensive list of collective nouns for birds but nothing for the Silvereye.
Does anyone remember Bucky O'Hare?
Sometimes the phrase 'righteous indignation' pops into my head. It's a nice sesquipedalian phrase. And when this phrase rattles through the deserted chambers of my mind, I don't think of justified outrage, I think of a spaceship in an anthropomorphic cartoon from the 1990's. I'd forgotten everything about the show except the name of the ship and that it featured a rabbit (or hare).
But who needs memory when you've got the internet?
The show was called 'Bucky O'Hare and the Toad Menace'. Here's the intro courtesy of YouTube.
The theme tune features the lyrics:
"If your Righteous Indignation has suffered a hitAnd your photon accelerator is broken a bitAnd you're losing your mind and you're havin' a fitGet the funky fresh rabbit who can take care of it!"
Gold. Pure, nineties Gold.
Possible collective nouns for silvereyes
A cache of silvereyesA flirt of silvereyes (suggested by Claire Browning)A flit of silvereyesA galore of silvereyesA gust of silvereyes (it is thought that the NZ population was established when a migrating flock in Australia was caught in a storm and blown here c.1856)A lode of silvereyesA lustre of silvereyesA mint of silvereyesA party of strangers (the Maori name, Tauhou, means 'stranger')A profit of silvereyesA purse of silvereyesA scratch of silvereyesA suite of silvereyesA treasure of silvereyesA treasury of silvereyesA trove of silvereyesA vault of silvereyesA vein of silvereyesA wealth of silvereyes
I was in a bit of a grump on Saturday so I lit out for the territory Karori sanctuary to take photos of birds. I managed to catch decent shots of two birds that are notoriously hard to photograph due to their constant flitting about.
Popokatea / Whitehead
Riroriro / Grey WarblerEven though that's the best photo I've probably ever taken of a warbler, it doesn't do the tiny bird justice. It's a wee gem in the flesh, despite its muted colours. A marvel made more precious because it is so oftenheard but rarely seen.As for the popokatea, there were about a dozen in the bushes around me at one point, behaving much as a [insert appropriate collective noun] of silvereyes might.
It was almost as if the birds wanted to cheer me up.
A female juvenile male hihi, which tend to be much shyer than the males, landed on a branch less than a metre away from me and stuck around for a good long moment.
Female Junvenile male Hihi / StitchbirdAnd as I was walking back to the entrance, sufficiently cheered, the shags were splashing about in the lake, possibly to rise off the salt after a day on the coast.
Karuhiruhi / Pied shagNB: NZbirds has an extensive list of collective nouns for birds but nothing for the Silvereye.
Does anyone remember Bucky O'Hare?
Sometimes the phrase 'righteous indignation' pops into my head. It's a nice sesquipedalian phrase. And when this phrase rattles through the deserted chambers of my mind, I don't think of justified outrage, I think of a spaceship in an anthropomorphic cartoon from the 1990's. I'd forgotten everything about the show except the name of the ship and that it featured a rabbit (or hare).
But who needs memory when you've got the internet?
The show was called 'Bucky O'Hare and the Toad Menace'. Here's the intro courtesy of YouTube.
The theme tune features the lyrics:
"If your Righteous Indignation has suffered a hitAnd your photon accelerator is broken a bitAnd you're losing your mind and you're havin' a fitGet the funky fresh rabbit who can take care of it!"
Gold. Pure, nineties Gold.
Possible collective nouns for silvereyes
A cache of silvereyesA flirt of silvereyes (suggested by Claire Browning)A flit of silvereyesA galore of silvereyesA gust of silvereyes (it is thought that the NZ population was established when a migrating flock in Australia was caught in a storm and blown here c.1856)A lode of silvereyesA lustre of silvereyesA mint of silvereyesA party of strangers (the Maori name, Tauhou, means 'stranger')A profit of silvereyesA purse of silvereyesA scratch of silvereyesA suite of silvereyesA treasure of silvereyesA treasury of silvereyesA trove of silvereyesA vault of silvereyesA vein of silvereyesA wealth of silvereyes
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