This October no one could be bothered to clip the goats; and then it got too cold to do it, so we’re leaving them with long wooly coats until the spring. My daughter has trimmed the wool around their faces because it was beginning to be hard to tell which end was the front. They look quite elegant like this, I think. This one is Misty:
In contrast to their faces they’re very wooly around what the Guardian would probably call their paws, but I call their hooves. This is Holly:
She was chewing:
The birds are still living with the goats. They fly in and out during the day:
Vesla and the other bird, Cloudy, are spending a lot of time together:
A Bad Guide 
>A. J. P. Crown
“The birds are still…”
When I came home yesterday, I saw the cranes for the first time this autumn; there will be 75000 approx. in Extremadura.
Fantastic. Lucky you. How do they count them?
Sorry, I am not an ornithologist either but I think they use photos, for example. Everyday, as you know, cranes go through pass, etc. to lakes, reservoirs…at dusk to sleep.
I saw them in zone 8:
http://www.visit-western-spain.com/cubic/ap/cubic.php/doc/The-crane–Grus-grus–197.htm
All the pictures are great, but that first one of Mysty is out of this world!!
Do you what kind of bird is that litlle yellow one?
Do they go in the winter? Why do you say “The birds are still living with goats”?
I mean “Do you KNOW what kind of bird…?”
Thanks, Julia. I knew you would like them.
The bird is a Great Tit, they’re very common here (also in England). They are living in the ventilation hole in the wall of the goat house, and they fly in and out all day long. They stay through the winter. This family especially shouldn’t have any trouble finding food in the snow, but normally I think they must eat frozen berries and rose-hips (in summer they eat insects, hopefully mosquitoes).
Jesùs, magnificent cranes!
We had our first pheasant of winter visit our garden today.
From Patrick O’Brian’s The Far Side of the World”:
Here the goat Aspasia came running to Stephen for protection. Ever since the ship had reached the coast of Albemarle, small dark-grey finches with stout beaks had been persecuting her, landing on her back and plucking out hair to line their nests. She had faced the elements, thunder, lightning, two fleet actions, four between single ships; she had faced midshipmen, ship’s boys, and a large variety of dogs; but this she could not bear, and every time she heard their faint twitter come aboard she hurried to Stephen. ‘Come, come,’ he said, ‘a great goat like you, for shame,’ […]
We once had a pheasant in our neighborhood for a few days, about seven years ago.
The Norwegian name of this bird is kjøttmeis, starting with an ich-laut.
Have I told this before? In my children’s pre-school there was a teacher who was into ornitology (well, actually she was into someone who was into ornitology, but never mind), and this was one of the birds they were taught about. When he turned six the staff decided he was late to produce some sounds, so they called in a speech-therapist. The therapist had a large box of cards and had the boy look at them and tell what he saw. After a while she picked up a card with the picture of a great tit, wanting him to say the word fugl “bird”.
– Søttmeis, said my son.
– Yes, said the therapist, but if you don’t say ‘kjøttmeis’, what do you say then?
The boy thought for a moment and looked at the card again.
– The Latin name is Parus major.
We occasionally see pheasants and grouse.
Kjøttmeis are also called Titmice (sing. Titmouse) in English, and then there’s the German Meise. Apparently they aren’t cognates of mouse, so there ought to be the same sing. & plural awkwardness as with computer mouses except in the opposite direction (one Titmice).
Well done, your son, Trond. It’s good to see he’s inherited your linguistic skill.
Aspasia doesn’t sound like our goats, maybe she’s bigger. I can’t imagine them being tormented by small birds, they don’t have the large inaccessible surface area of a buffalo or an elephant. Kids get taken by eagles, of course.
It’s a very beautiful bird! I love the pictures I’ve found of it.
Thank you AJP & Trond (your son’s story is superb)
Yesterday my wife saw two small birds harassing a heron. We wondered if you chaps might be able to guess what variety the wee chaps were. Is there a scandowegian word for “heron chaser”?
A grey heron is a gråhegre, but I don’t know anything about chasing them. You certainly have a lot of wildlife near you, dearie. Can’t you make money off it somehow? How about a webcam with advertising?
The goats’ new look is quite elegant and stylish indeed.
Thanks. Actually he said ‘palus majol’, which adds to the story, but I don’t know if that’s a transparent speech error in English.
I’ll tell my wife. She really liked that story, Trond.
Thank you, Tom. I’ll tell them you said that. (I will.)
> Trond, yes, it adds a lot to the story :-)!
Oh, and now my wife reminds me that it was his fifth birthday.
That’s good, I was beginning to think he was a late developer.
I’m pretty sure that the following happened when I was, oh, maybe 9 or 10.
One day in school we all had to submit to exactly the sort of screening that Trond describes. When I named the young sheep it was clear from the reaction that I had raised some concern. They had me say the word again. Maybe I said it better the second time; in any case there was no followup. But I was sure that I had been forming the initial sound of “lamb” in the back of my mouth (the way some individuals and dialects do) and that this was what was bothering them.
I believe that I resolved from that day to say my initial ell sounds the “right” way, and that unlike many other resolutions I have made in my life this one met with total success.
Perhaps they were concerned that you had a Russian accent.