Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
As I head home to pack (well, I’m nearly all packed anyway), I’ll leave you with two animal videos. The first shows the banding of peregrine falcon chicks on the Verrazano Narrows bridge in New York, where they’ve clearly installed nest boxes. The parents are flying about, deeply disturbed, and the chick kicks up one hell … Continue reading Two videos: banding peregrine chicks, and a cephalpod moves house
Reader Dom called my attention to this video showing a mated pair of peregrine falcons (Falco peregrinus) who seem to be nesting in Norwich Cathedral. I’ve never actually heard them call, but listen to the cacophony as they talk to each other. They sound like penguins!
I can’t recommend highly enough the new book by Helen Macdonald: H is for Hawk. It is up there with J. A. Baker’s The Peregrine as one of my favorite books about nature, but Macdonald’s book is very different. While Baker’s is about observing wild peregrines near his home, and is entirely lyrical writing about … Continue reading H is for Hawk
I really need to see the six-part BBC series Earthflight, which I gather has been picked up by PBS in the U.S. The show uses a variety of methods to photograph birds in flight, and some video clips I’ve seen (a sample is here) are stunning. Here’s one. We’ve seen roosting flocks of starlings before, moving in … Continue reading A murmuration of hunted starlings
. . . but it’s a bird, not an avocation. In fact, until yesterday morning I didn’t know what a hobby was until I got the following picture (I’ve cropped it a bit) from reader Christian with this note: It’s a bank holiday here in London, and I spent some of the afternoon on the … Continue reading I have a hobby
