We used to have a pear tree in the back garden but it fell foul of the dreaded honey fungus. I'm not sure if I have ever seen a Turtle Dove and it seems unlikely that I will do so in future as they now faces extinction in this country, apparently shortage of weed seeds and a loss of nesting sites are to blame. Conservationist are trying to convince farmers to grow weeds and as farmers everywhere from Afghanistan to Australia will grow anything if the money is right they might well be in with a chance. Victorian ornithologists would have taken a different view and simply shot and mounted the remaining birds in order to complete their collections. There used to be a museum in Brighton dedicated entirely to the stuffed specimens that an Edward Booth decimated with his punt gun. The Booth Museum must be somewhat of an embarrassment to Brighton's Green commissariat but I suppose that while they are worrying about environmental correctness they won't be pissing off the bin-men for Christmas. Noel, Noel.
1 comment:
My grandad told me that during his grandads day it was the done thing to crush the eggs if you found a birds nest. Birds were purely seen as pests that ate crops and seeds.
Post a Comment