The Lemon Fool

UncleEbenezer wrote:

scotia wrote:And what are you going to do with the midges?

Be inventive with recipes?

Disgusting......
I'm coming up to midgie country this weekend and will keep my mouth firmly closed.

GoSeigen wrote:

swill453 wrote:

GoSeigen wrote:

swill453 wrote:At Sanna Bay in Ardnamurchan today, almost as far west as you can get in the UK.

Pretty place. Will be great when global warming comes along and we can put some hotels up there with beach umbrellas and some jet skis!

Might need something better than a 30 mile long single track road with passing places then.

Scott.

Could always upgrade it to a motorway. Maybe with a bridge crossing to Northern Ireland at the same time?

GS

GS...You are Boris in disguise....rumbled!

Was out at my local reserve to see returning Pink Footed Geese, kind of coincides with Dod's Autumnal Equinox.

Anyway, no geese but this lump of machinery passed by, very very slow and very low.

Apparently its 'Stingray01' on it's return to Lossie.

Kind of makes today's financial doings pale into insignificance when these guys are taking care of us.

Kunga cake...


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunga_c ... or%20flies.

"Kunga cake or kungu is a type of dish found in the African Great Lakes region, specifically countries surrounding Lake Malawi (Tanzania, Malawi and Mozambique), made of millions of densely compressed midges or flies. American entomologist May Berenbaum discusses the situation where large swarms of midges can cause significant problems for local populations. She cites an example of how Chaoborus edulis swarms form near Lake Malawi and how the local people turn them into kunga cakes as a "rich source of protein" which is eaten "with great enthusiasm"."

Yum yum, put some gravy on mine!

Here's a video recipe.

https://youtu.be/AHmd6XJqyko



I think I'm going to need extra gravy!

Nice trip to Arran last week, climbed Goat Fell (874 metres) and had a few good coastal walks as well. No rain, and very few midges. Saw 4 out of the supposed "big 5" of Scottish wildlife - red deer, common seal, red squirrel, golden eagle, unfortunately no otters.









Sorry no pics of eagle or squirrel, either too far away or too fleeting.

Scott.

Snorvey wrote:

scotview wrote:Was out at my local reserve to see returning Pink Footed Geese, kind of coincides with Dod's Autumnal Equinox.

Anyway, no geese but this lump of machinery passed by, very very slow and very low.

Apparently its 'Stingray01' on it's return to Lossie.

Kind of makes today's financial doings pale into insignificance when these guys are taking care of us.

I got out the car last night to ear popping jet noise.

F35s. 2 of 'em. Real noisy buggers too. Dont stay too long chaps.

This is the plane, a Boeing Poseidon, and it's route to Lossie. I saw it beside Rattray, a bit of a surreal sight.

monabri wrote: She cites an example of how Chaoborus edulis swarms form near Lake Malawi and how the local people turn them into kunga cakes as a "rich source of protein" which is eaten "with great enthusiasm"."

The photo certainly isn't a midge, more like a beetle of some kind. Cute how it has an 'eyes on the back of it's head' pattern to deter predators. I wonder how long it took to evolve that cleaver feature.
Meanwhile, here is a full-on swarm of African midges [pic]: https://eol.org/pages/747230

DiamondEcho wrote:Meanwhile, here is a full-on swarm of African midges [pic]: https://eol.org/pages/747230

I got some pics like that of swarms of midges in Iceland. Around a big, shallow lake called Midgewater.

Only those columns were white in appearance, and show as white in the photos. I suspect the colour depends on the direction of the light.

Sorry, this was back in pre-digital times (late 1980s), so can't upload.

This is kinda amazing - remote cameras in the path of Hurricane Ian to give you an idea of what it's like as a hurricane hits. Cameras 5 & 9 get hit by the storm surge as it makes landfall, about 4-4.5 hours after the start of the livestream, they reckon the surge was at least 13' as camera 9 was 10-12' off the ground.

They also have two guys live near the eye who were driving around before it hit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2aticerEcs

Hallucigenia wrote:This is kinda amazing - remote cameras in the path of Hurricane Ian to give you an idea of what it's like as a hurricane hits. Cameras 5 & 9 get hit by the storm surge as it makes landfall, about 4-4.5 hours after the start of the livestream, they reckon the surge was at least 13' as camera 9 was 10-12' off the ground.

This is the last 2 hours of camera 9's life, condensed into < 2 minutes :

https://twitter.com/pattrn/status/1575200627273220097

The danger of living on a sandbar in the tropics.
The highest altitude in Florida is a rubbish tip, affectionately know as Mount Trashmore.

Snorvey wrote:Florida sounds a horrendous place to live.

I've not lived there, but have visited quite a few times, and it's not all bad. Fort Myers Beach gives access via a bridge to Sanibel and Captiva Islands, which are idyllic.

Unless you have children, the received wisdom when visiting Florida is to give the Mouse and surrounding areas a very wide berth.

WrenChasen wrote:Fort Myers Beach gives access via a bridge to Sanibel and Captiva Islands, which are idyllic.

"Underwater" I think is the word you're looking for....

My main memory of Florida is the most horrendous thunderstorm when we tried to go to Cape Canaveral, ended up turning round.

Snorvey wrote:Florida sounds a horrendous place to live.

Stifling Heat, crushing humidity, zillions of pensioners, zillions of tourists, a fair chance one of Musk's rockets could land on your house, tacky Disneyland tat and not forgetting....hurricanes!

I've never been of course. I did watch Top Gear when they were there though. That told me enough.

And Trump as a neighbour
doolally

Florida...30 years ago. Stopped by the police because I was out walking ( yes..w.a.l.k.i.n.g) from the hotel to a McDonald's. Hearing my accent they told me to be on my way but to be careful. I must admit, I was slightly perturbed by folk shooting up outside McDonald's in plain view. I was staying in a 4* hotel but it was near Miami airport...Nice area...not!

I probably won't go again!

monabri wrote:Florida...30 years ago. Stopped by the police because I was out walking ( yes..w.a.l.k.i.n.g) from the hotel to a McDonald's.

Walking? In America?
in 2003 when I and a few Brit colleagues were working in the outskirts of Boston, we decided to walk to a restaurant about a mile from the hotel, we dinnarf get some funny looks.

V8

88V8 wrote:

monabri wrote:Florida...30 years ago. Stopped by the police because I was out walking ( yes..w.a.l.k.i.n.g) from the hotel to a McDonald's.

Walking? In America?
in 2003 when I and a few Brit colleagues were working in the outskirts of Boston, we decided to walk to a restaurant about a mile from the hotel, we dinnarf get some funny looks.

V8

When I was in Boston just a couple of years later (2005 I think) I recollect it as a walking-friendly city, and did a lot of walking. Indeed, there was a designated trail taking in the city's history.

The contrast was Silicon Valley: not a pleasant place to walk, and indeed not somewhere I could ever want to live. But even there I never got aggro for walking.

Whooper Swans return from the far North. The Pink Footed Geese have also arrived in numbers.

Nature eh?

The Season turns. Glad I got a few photos.

How's this for what greeted me on the NC500 trip

That reflection is the bonnet of my car where I stayed safely inside

Snorvey wrote:Ach, they're just coos. I still prefer a fence between us though.

They may be to you
but they are monsters to a Londoner
I lost count of the number of sheep on the wrong side of fences, just on the verge by the road
It was an amazing trip, loved the driving, the places we stayed at and the people we met.