Male and Female Mallards (Photo One)

Dear Readers, for some reason (probably author incompetence 🙁 ) the acknowledgement of everyone’s brilliance last week wasn’t published, so here it is now, and congratulations to all of you! And apologies!

Dear Readers, what a splendid selection of answers! Claire got a very creditable 8/10 (just a teeny tiny mix-up on the small raptors), and Mike from Alittlebitoutoffocus, Rosalind and Mark and Fran and Bobby Freelove all got a perfect 10 out of 10. Well done to all of you, and thanks to everyone for playing. I feel something weather-related coming on for Sunday 🙂 seeings as the wind from Storm Eunice which is racketing around outside as I write this is enough to blow anyone’s tiara off 🙂

A) 8. Sparrowhawk (Accipter nisus)

B) 3.Siskin (Carduelis spinus)

C) 5. Blackcap (Sylvia atricapilla)

D) 4. Greenfinch (Chloris chloris)

E) 7. Pied Flycatcher (Ficedula hypoleuca)

F) 9. Common Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus)

G) 2.House sparrow (Passer domesticus)

H) 1.Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs)

I) 6. Redstart (Phoenicurus phoenicurus)

J) 10. Merlin (Falco columbarius)

Photo Credits

Photo One by Richard Bartz by using a Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM Lens – Own work, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6449086)

Photo A by Sudhirggarg, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo B by sighmanb, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo C Image by The Other Kev for Pixabay. 

Photo D by gailhampshire from Cradley, Malvern, U.K, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo E by Marton Berntsen, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo F by Alexis Lours, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo G by David Friel, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo H by Zeynel Cebeci, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo I by Jerzy Strzelecki, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo J by Cephas, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Dear Readers, this turned out to be much more difficult than I expected (but of course it’s always easy when you know the answers :-)). Fran and Bobby Freelove and Claire both tied on matching the descriptions to the birds, with 6 out of 10 each, but Claire also named some of the birds so I am going to make Claire our winner this week. Well done Claire! Let’s see what I can come up for for Sunday’s quiz. 

Descriptions

1. Compensates for size by noisy and overwrought personality. Unexpectedly loud song explodes from near ground level, a hurried jumble of sweet liquid notes, including a jarring trill mid-phrase, overall like excitable commentator enthusing over finish of race.

D) Wren (Troglodytes troglodytes)

2. Has a red-hot sex life in which both males and females may hold multiple mates, with fractious consequences.

I) Dunnock (Prunella modularis)

3) Parents feed large broods (average 10+) for 2 weeks, making 1000 visits a day carrying caterpillars.

F) Blue tit (Cyanistes caeruleus)

4) Cheerful chiming song, a much varying repetition of two notes TEEcher, TEEcher, can be heard everywhere from late Dec until May.

A) Great Tit (Parus major)

5) Very common mite of woodland and scrub, now increasingly visiting gardens, where it feeds from hanging feeders. Bands of 5-10 relatives spend autumn and winter patrolling large territory, where individuals feed in branches for just a few moments before moving on to the next tree, one after another, always restlessly passing through.

C) Long-tailed tit (Aegithalos caudatus)

6) Forages on lawns or fields for worms, standing still for a few moments, then making scampering runs forward to grab prey, or stand watchful again: may also make 2-footed hops forward.

B) Blackbird (Turdus merula)

7) Makes monotonous 3-note cooing in rhythm of football chant U-NIII-ted; also calls after alighting, a curious mewing with tone of party trumpet.

G) Collared Dove (Streptopelia decaocto)

8) Flight display in straight line: bird rises with wing flaps, stalls as if shot, glides down. When landing, raises tail and slowly drops it.

J) Woodpigeon (Columba palumbus)

9) Astonishingly aggressive: spats routine, killing regular.

H) Robin (Eritacus rubecula)

10)Usually seen adorning thistle-heads, where it can perch horizontal, hold onto the side or hang upside down, often fluttering its wings for balance.

E) Goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis

Photo Credits

Photo A Ken Billington, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo B by Andreas Trepte, CC BY-SA 2.5 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo C Henk Monster, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo D by Alpsdake1, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo E by © Francis C. Franklin / CC-BY-SA-3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo F by © Francis C. Franklin / CC-BY-SA-3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo G by Charles J. Sharp, CC BY-SA 4.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo H by Keven Law, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Photo I by By Charles J. Sharp – Own work, from Sharp Photography, sharpphotography.co.uk, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=104326588

Photo Ten by Trish Steel, CC BY-SA 2.0 , via Wikimedia Commons

Gazpacho – a chilled Spanish tomato soup (Title Photo)

Dear Readers, now that winter is here, is there anything nicer than a big bowl of soup? It’s a great way of getting more vegetables into your diet, and also for using up produce that’s getting towards the end of its shelf life. Here in the UK we apparently threw away 9.5 million tonnes of food waste last year. My grandmother would have found that unfathomable. All over the world, people eat soup as a celebration, and as an everyday way of getting nutritious food into their stomachs. Plus, it’s a well-known fact ( by me at least) that if you eat soup, you’re likely to eat less of other things because it’s very filling.

So, for this week’s quiz,  I’d like you to match the soup in each of the photos to its name, and where it originated. To help you, I am going to name the main ingredients under each photograph (though I do appreciate that there are many regional variations for some of these dishes, so bear with me!)

You will have until 5 p.m. UK time next Friday (21st January) to submit your answers in the comments. When I see your answers I will ‘disappear’ them, but as usual write your answers down first if you don’t want to be influenced by those who came before. Answers will be published on Saturday 22nd January.

So, if you think Photo One is Vichyssoise, and that it’s from Scotland, your answer is 1)A) i).

Onwards!

1) Bread, kale, beans, tomato

2) Leeks, potatoes, cream

3) Beetroot, dill, sour cream

4) Rice, lemon, egg

5) Smoked haddock, potatoes, cream

6) Dried fruit (apples in this case but could be cloudberries, lingonberries or other fruit)

7) Many variations, but always includes tamarind

8) Tomato, lentils and other beans, rice, small amounts of meat, spices such as saffron.

9) Kale, potato, chorizo

10) Shrimp, andouille sausage, often with okra, thickened with a dark roux

Soup Names

A) Vichyssoise

B) Caldo Verde

C) Harira

D) Avgolemeno

E) Rasam

F) Cullen Skink

G) Gumbo

H) Fruktsoppa

I) Borscht

J) Ribolita

Countries

i) Scotland

ii) India

iii) Southern United States

iv) North Africa

v) France

vi) Portugal and Brazil

vii) Northern Italy

viii) Scandinavia

ix) Greece

x) Eastern Europe

(Photo One)

Dear Readers, the quiz was a tie this week, with Claire and Fran and Bobby Freelove both getting 7 out of 10, so well done to Claire, Fran and Bobby, and thank you to everyone for playing the quizzes so diligently all year. 

Now, for Christmas this year I am trying something different. Every day between Christmas Day and January 5th, I am going to do a post on the general theme of the Twelve Days of Christmas (though some days will be more closely related to the song than others). Every day, there will be one related question (though I reserve the right to do multiple parts 🙂 ). I will post the links to previous days every day too, so you don’t have to interrupt your Christmas pudding or New Year champagne to have a go. On Twelfth Night (5th January) I will do a recap of the whole quiz.

You will have until January 7th to complete the quiz, and I would like you to post all your answers at once after the final quiz on January 5th, rather than day by day, just to make things a bit simpler to keep track of. 

So, thinking caps on! We start on Christmas Day!

Question One

This is a wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo)

Question Two

What sex is this holly bush?

This is female – only female bushes bear berries (holly has separate male and female plants)

Holly berries by the River Lagan by Albert Bridge

Question Three

If you saw this bee buzzing about in the autumn, which Christmassy plant is likely to be nearby?

This is an ivy bee (Colletes hedarae) so I would expect there to be some flowering ivy nearby.

Photo by Charles Sharp

Question Four

The world record for the number of brussels sprouts eaten in one minute is held by Linus Urbanec of Sweden. How many did he eat?

31, each one eaten raw and picked up with a cocktail stick.

Question Five

Which popular Christmas vegetable was so liked by the Roman Emperor Tiberius  that he accepted it as part of the tribute paid to Rome by Germany?

The parsnip.

Question Six

Why is a robin called a ‘red breast’ when it’s actually closer to the colour orange?

Because the word for ‘orange’ only appeared in the English Language in 1502, and wouldn’t become popular as a description of the colour until the 1570s when William of Orange came to power in Europe. Before this, many orange things were either called ‘red’ or ‘reddish-yellow’.

Question Seven

Which unfortunate bird was hunted on St Stephen’s Day in Ireland and on the Isle of Man until recent times?

The wren

Question Eight

What Christmas animal makes this sound?

The reindeer – the clicks are tendons in the animals’ legs’.

Question Nine

Which is the only nut (much loved at Christmas) that contains significant amounts of Vitamin C?

The chestnut

Question Ten

And finally, which Christmas bird is making these sounds (and why are you unlikely to hear them these days?)

The grey partridge (Perdix perdix), which has declined in numbers and is now on the RSPB’s red list for endangered birds.

Black-headed gull (Title Photo)

Hi lovely people, well with typical brilliance I posted these answers (briefly) on the wrong day, but here they are for real. Who would guess that this simple little quiz would throw up so many varied answers? However, as usual everyone did extremely well. Claire got 21 1/2 out of 32, Sharon got 27 out of 32, but the joint winners this week are Anne and Fran and Bobby Freelove with 30 out of 32. I struggled a little to be fair with the answer to number 12, where both Anne and Fran and Bobby looked at the plant rather than the bee sitting on it :-). As I’d said that there were 8 ‘black’ answers and 8 ‘white’ answers (and for once I hadn’t messed up the count) I decided to disallow the answer of ‘black knapweed’ though I can see exactly why it was chosen. Anyhow, let’s see what’s coming tomorrow. I’m starting to feel in a Christmassy mood, so who knows 🙂

1) Black-footed ferret (Mustela nigripes)

2) Black Bryony (Dioscorea communis)

3) White Admiral (Limenitis arthemis)

4) Black Poplar(Populus nigra)

5) Whitethroat (Sylvia communis)

6) White-fronted goose (Anser albifrons)

7) Black horehound (Ballota nigra)

8) White dead-nettle (Lamium album)

9) Black tern (Chilidonias nigra)

10) Whitebeam (Sorbus subg. Aria)

11) Blackthorn (Prunus spinosa)

12) White-tailed bumblebee (Bombus lucorum)

13) Black widow (Latrodectus sp. )

14) White-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus)

15) White stork (Ciconia ciconia)

16) Greater Black-backed gull (Larus marinus)

Photo Credits

Title Photo by Miraceti, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo One by USFWS Mountain-Prairie, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Two by Tony Atkin / Black Bryony Berries

Photo Three by D. Gordon E. Robertson, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Four from Meath Garden’s black poplar – ‘the most important veteran tree in Tower Hamlets’ — Roman Road LDN (romanroadlondon.com)

Photo Five by By Andreas Trepte – Own work, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=32563057

Photo Six by Ryanx7, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Seven by Evelyn Simak, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Eight by Franco Folini from San Francisco, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Nine by Andy Reago & Chrissy McClarren, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Ten by Matt Brown at Whitebeam | Matt Brown | Flickr

Photo Eleven by Evelyn Simak / Blackthorn or sloe (Prunus spinosa)

Photo Twelve by Ivar Leidus, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Thirteen by Chuck Evans(mcevan)”., CC BY 2.5 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.5>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Fourteen by Henry Mulligan, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Fifteen by Dick Daniels (http://carolinabirds.org/), CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Photo Sixteen by Des Colhoun at Great Black-backed Gull (Larus marinus) © Des Colhoun :: Geograph Britain and Ireland

Black-headed gull (Title Photo)

Dear Readers, as winter comes on apace here in the UK, I have been thinking about how many plants are animals have the words ‘white’ or ‘black’ in their names, even when they aren’t either colour. The black-headed gull, for example, has a chocolate-brown head, and doesn’t even have that for most of the year.

So your challenge this week is a) to say whether the organisms depicted in the photos below belong in the ‘white’ or the ‘black’ category, and to make things fair there are eight of each. An extra point if you can name the critter/plant, giving a possible maximum score of 32 points.

All answers in the comments by 5 p.m. UK time on Friday 3rd December please, and the answers will be posted on Saturday December 4th. As usual I will make your answers disappear as soon as I see them, but write them down before looking at the comments if you are easily influenced by other people’s brilliance.

So, if you think the creature in photo 1 belongs in the black category, your answer is 1) Black. If you think that it’s a black-tailed spooglehound, you can put that in as well for an extra point.

Onwards!

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

6)

7)

8)

9)

10)

11)

12)

13)

14)

15)

16)

Autumn trees in St Pancras and Islington Cemetery 13th November 2021

Dear Readers, how did you get on? The answer to the anagram was

Spindle
Yew
Cedar of Lebanon
Alder
Monkey Puzzle
Oak
Rowan
Elm

Claire got all the trees  right – the first tree is a mountain ash, also known as a rowan, and the Araucaria is also known as a monkey puzzle. Rayna got all the answers right (though she doubted her id. on the first tree), but because she did get the anagram right I think she just edged ahead this week. Well done to both of you! Let’s see what’s tomorrow has in store. 

1) Rowan

2) Alder

3) Elm

4) Yew

5) Spindle

6) Oak

7) Monkey Puzzle

8) Cedar of Lebanon

Autumn trees in St Pancras and Islington Cemetery 13th November 2021

Dear Readers, this week we have a quiz with a twist! First of all, identify the eight trees shown below from their leaves/berries/twigs/buds etc etc. Then, take the first letter of each tree to make a ninth tree. Voila! You are a tree expert.

All answers in the comments by 5 p.m. UK time next Friday (19th November) please, and the solution will be published on Saturday 20th November. I think it’s especially important not to look at the comments until you’ve worked out the anagram – I will try to disappear any answers quickly, but there’s sometimes a delay between you posting your replies and me getting a notification.

Onwards!

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

6)

7)

8)

Not in the least spooky….(Photo One)

Dear Readers, we had another good week on the quiz! Everyone identified correctly the animals that  the poems and songs were about, and some people managed to also find the poem or song and the artist. So, this week we have Claire with a most creditable result of 20/30, and Rayna and Fran and Bobby Freelove with 30 out of 30. Well done everybody, and have fun listening to and reading some of these masterpieces. 

1. This is about a bat – it’s by Lewis Carroll, and is recited by the Mad Hatter in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Twinkle twinkle little XXXXX
How I wonder what you’re at
Up above the world so high
Like a tea tray in the sky

2. This is about a (black) cat and comes from the Poem ‘Black Cat’ by Rainer Maria Rilke.

She seems to hide all looks that have ever fallen
into her, so that, like an audience,
she can look them over, menacing and sullen,
and curl to sleep with them. But all at once

as if awakened, she turns her face to yours;
and with a shock, you see yourself, tiny,
inside the golden amber of her eyeballs
suspended, like a prehistoric fly.

3. This is about a spider, and comes from ‘Boris the Spider’ by The Who, from ‘Meaty, Beaty, Big and Bouncy’. You can have a listen here. Or not. It’s not quite ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again :-)’

Look, he’s crawling up my wall
Black and hairy, very small
Now he’s up above my head
Hanging by a little thread

4. This is about a snake, and comes from D.H Lawrence’s ‘Snake’. You can read the whole thing here.

For he seemed to me again like a king,
Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,
Now due to be crowned again.

And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords
Of life.
And I have something to expiate:
A pettiness.

5. This is, of course, from Meatloaf’s Bat Out of Hell. My misspent youth comes back to me as I listen to it, as this was on a constant loop in my student days. If you would like to have your misspent youth come back to you, the whole 8.10 minutes is available for a listen here. What a very unlikely rock hero Meatloaf is. 

But when the day is done
And the sun goes down
And the moonlight’s shining through
Then like a sinner before the gates of Heaven
I’ll come crawling on back to you

6. This is, of course, from Edgar Allen Poe’s ‘The Raven’.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and nothing more.”

7. This is from Al Stewart’s ‘The Year of the Cat’. And here he is, on the Old Grey Whistle Test. This takes me back to my teens. 

She doesn’t give you time for questions
As she locks up your arm in hers
And you follow ’till your sense of which direction
Completely disappears
By the blue tiled walls near the market stalls
There’s a hidden door she leads you to
These days, she says, I feel my life
Just like a river running through
The year of the xxxxxx

8. ‘Hungry Like the Wolf’ by Duran Duran. Good lord. Every video I could find of this song features ‘picturesque’ local people, half-naked black women on all fours and captive tigers used as props. The eighties really were abysmal. Bug Woman is having none of that nonsense on her blog! But you can listen to the song here. It’s not all bad.

In touch with the ground
I’m on the hunt I’m after you
Smell like I sound, I’m lost in a crowd
And I’m hungry like the xxxxxx
Straddle the line in discord and rhyme
I’m on the hunt I’m after you
Mouth is alive, with juices like wine
And I’m hungry like the xxxxxx

9. This is a classic nursery rhyme (about a spider of course) so happy to accept whatever version you come up with here. 

The itsy bitsy xxxxxxxxxx
Climbed up the waterspout
Down came the rain
And washed the xxxxxx out
Out came the sun
And dried up all the rain
And the itsy bitsy xxxxxxxxxx
Climbed up the spout again

10. ‘The Bat’ by Theodore Roethke (one of my favourite poets btw). You can read the whole thing here.

His fingers make a hat about his head.
His pulse beat is so slow we think him dead.

He loops in crazy figures half the night
Among the trees that face the corner light.

But when he brushes up against a screen,
We are afraid of what our eyes have seen:

Not in the least spooky….(Photo One)

Dear Readers, it’s that time of year again, when small children keel over from chocolate overdose and tired parents make costumes out of tin foil and cardboard toilet roll centres because their little ones want to walk the street dressed as a robot. At least that was what used to happen in our house. Not that we had trick or treating in my day! Halloween involved, at the most, a ‘party’ where my peers gathered to scare the wits out of one another before retiring for a sleepless night at their own houses. Bonfire night was the big night, what with the baked potatoes and, in my house at least, the hotdogs. But more of that next week.

What I’d like you to do this week is peruse the lyrics below, and decide which creature they relate to. Some are from poems, and some are from songs. Extra points for the title of the aforesaid master/mistress work and for the artist/poet/author (so there are 30 points available in total). Several of the extracts below refer to the same animal, so be careful!

Answers in the comments by 5 p.m. UK time next Friday (5th November). The results and accolades will be posted next Saturday (6th November). I will disappear your answers as soon as I see them, but as usual if you are easily influenced write them down old school on a piece of paper first (though then you will need to rely on your own strength of will to avoid changing anything). I’m sure you are all made of stern stuff however, so you would never be tempted.

Let’s see how we do!

1.

Twinkle twinkle little XXXXX
How I wonder what you’re at
Up above the world so high
Like a tea tray in the sky

2.

She seems to hide all looks that have ever fallen
into her, so that, like an audience,
she can look them over, menacing and sullen,
and curl to sleep with them. But all at once

as if awakened, she turns her face to yours;
and with a shock, you see yourself, tiny,
inside the golden amber of her eyeballs
suspended, like a prehistoric fly.

3.

Look, he’s crawling up my wall
Black and hairy, very small
Now he’s up above my head
Hanging by a little thread

4.

For he seemed to me again like a king,
Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,
Now due to be crowned again.

And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords
Of life.
And I have something to expiate:
A pettiness.

5.

But when the day is done
And the sun goes down
And the moonlight’s shining through
Then like a sinner before the gates of Heaven
I’ll come crawling on back to you

6.

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and nothing more.”

7.

She doesn’t give you time for questions
As she locks up your arm in hers
And you follow ’till your sense of which direction
Completely disappears
By the blue tiled walls near the market stalls
There’s a hidden door she leads you to
These days, she says, I feel my life
Just like a river running through
The year of the xxxxxx

8.

In touch with the ground
I’m on the hunt I’m after you
Smell like I sound, I’m lost in a crowd
And I’m hungry like the xxxxxx
Straddle the line in discord and rhyme
I’m on the hunt I’m after you
Mouth is alive, with juices like wine
And I’m hungry like the xxxxxx

9.

The itsy bitsy xxxxxxxxxx
Climbed up the waterspout
Down came the rain
And washed the xxxxxx out
Out came the sun
And dried up all the rain
And the itsy bitsy xxxxxxxxxx
Climbed up the spout again

10.

His fingers make a hat about his head.
His pulse beat is so slow we think him dead.

He loops in crazy figures half the night
Among the trees that face the corner light.

But when he brushes up against a screen,
We are afraid of what our eyes have seen: