wordsfromanneli

Thoughts, ideas, photos, and stories.


by 28 Comments

L is for Ling and Lunch

I used this photo in a post early this summer, about catching two fish in place of one, but it also works for a picture of a ling having lunch.

The Captain wasn’t wanting to catch a ling. It was salmon he was after. But here is how it happened, many, many years ago.

A salmon is jerking the fishing line. The Captain checks his lines  and  pulls up what he expects to be a coho. But it is not only a coho he has hooked.  A ling has been attracted to the wriggling coho and has swallowed him for his lunch. Unfortunately for the ling, the same hook that the coho bit has caught the ling somewhere down his throat and both fish were hauled aboard the fishboat together. The coho was not easily retrieved, and the ling could not be freed of it because of the ling’s teeth. He has sharklike teeth around his jaw, and another three sets of pharyngeal teeth farther back in his mouth (555 of them)! Not a place anyone would want to reach in with his hand while the ling was still thrashing about.

 

L is for the ling’s lost lunch.


by 22 Comments

K is for Kalamata

The Greek city of Kalamata could quite rightfully be called Calamity that day.

When the bus gets a flat tire in the main intersection of town, everyone needs to find an alternate method of transportation. Even the bus driver is gone, leaving his tools on the ground as he most likely is looking for help. That would be quite a heavy tire to change, assuming he had a spare to put on there.

The coffee store roasts the coffee  right there in the front of the store, but I don’t think they serve coffee. They just sell the beans. Next to the yellow Pepsi crate, is the container of coffee beans that looks like the top part of an old-fashioned washtub. That tub full of beans is heated from underneath to roast the beans while some mechanical arms constantly turn and stir them so they don’t burn. The smell is delicious.

I wonder if the bus driver will get a cup of coffee nearby while he waits for help with his flat tire.

K is for Kalamity. Oops! No, I mean Kalamata where the olives for your Greek salad are grown.


by 29 Comments

J is for Jellyfish Lookalikes

These sea salps are tiny jelly-like creatures (but they are not jellyfish) that glom together to make a bigger mass. They are a nuisance to commercial salmon fishermen when the fishing lines pass through areas where the sea salps are floating.

Some years, warmer southern currents come farther north and the salps float along with the currents into colder waters where they are not usually common.

When they coat the gear, the fish can’t find the lures (and the hooks), so the salps have to be cleaned off the gear constantly or no salmon will be caught.

They are harmless otherwise. Unlike some jellyfish they don’t have any sting when they are touched.

J is for “just a jellyfish lookalike.”


by 31 Comments

I is for Ice

Ice on the fennel plants looks pretty, but the songbirds that pick at the fennel seeds are dismayed when they see this. Their food source that would otherwise bring some heat to their little bodies is  covered in ice.

The deer, too, can suffer when this happens out in the woods. The small twigs on the shrubs of deciduous trees get a coating of ice, and it is very hard on the deer who rely on the twigs to browse on in the winter. Imagine thinking you’ll get a meal of twigs and you get a mouthful of ice instead.

Only sunshine or a warm current of air and maybe some rain can bring the seeds back to an edible condition.

Here is another version of ice in nature – a frozen creek surface.

While it is a pretty design, it reminds me of how easily animals can get into trouble walking on thin ice. If you have a dog who likes to be by the water, be especially careful not to let him/her go onto the thin ice of ponds or creeks that look safe but can be deadly.

Please keep an eye on your pets near thin ice.

I is for ice – sometimes pretty, but not always nice.


by 28 Comments

H is for Horses, Home on the Range

Not a bad life for a horse while the weather is warm enough. These horses in Montana, even in October, find that it’s still great to have wide open spaces in the sunshine, for  romping around on top of a field full of food.

But when the owner calls them to come home, it’s a treat to get a decent meal and a safe place to sleep for the night.

 

I listened in on the horses’ conversation:

Ready for another day on the range. Our owner said, “No horsing around now,” but we’ll do what we like. What would you do?

Whenever a vehicle stops by our gate, we line up and look as smart as we can. You never know when someone will point and say, “I’d like to have a better look at that one.”

While we wait for someone to buy us, we stand at the fence looking pretty — like girls in a beauty contest.

But shh!  No one needs to know that we’re full of beans. They’ll find out soon enough after they buy us.


by 26 Comments

G is for Goose

This photo is from February, a few years ago, when we had a sudden snowfall. These Canada geese were probably wintering here, rather than flying farther south, but I’m sure they didn’t expect it to snow.  Even the five or six snow geese in the foreground were probably not expecting snow. I think their name comes solely from their colour, not from any love of snow.

Most of the geese have their head in the snow, trying to work their way down to the roots of the crop that was harvested a few months earlier. They may find some nourishment there, and possibly the odd worm might be lurking just under the ground.

The geese must be finding enough to eat there to make it worthwhile, or they would all be on the other side of the road (from where I took the picture) where there is an estuary that is a bit more sheltered and the water is shallow, providing nibbles of seafood just barely covered by water.

I’m guessing that another reason they’re not in that estuary just at this photo time could be that the tide was out and the mudflats are exposed. When there is a bit more water, the geese can swim  and be safer from predators, and they can dabble in the muck for their hors d’oeuvres.

In the field, they can’t swim and be out of reach, but the field is flat and provides plenty of oversight.  You will always see one or two geese acting as sentries while the rest have their head down, feeding.  Somehow, they manage to take turns at watch duty.

 

See the little bit of black near the tail feathers of the snow geese above.  Those feathers are actually their black wingtips that make the geese so easily identifiable when they fly overhead. White feathers reflecting the sunshine, and black wingtips adding special decoration.

G is for goose, but not Christmas goose for dinner.  Not here, anyway.


by 39 Comments

F is for Fawns in the Flowers

In nature, when a mother deer or its fawns need a break, the doe stashes her babies and tells them not to move until she comes back for them.

In the places near the outskirts of town, where houses have encroached on their space, the does bring the fawns to places like my herb garden to put them down for a nap.

“Here,” Mama says. “You lie down and have a nap by this lavender, or over by that big rosemary bush while I go find your brother. Now don’t move and you’ll be safe.”

“Okay, Mama. Ooh! This smells yummy.”

“Ah, there you are, little brother, having a nap by the lemon balm. Come on, my boy. Let’s go back and get your sister.”

“Okay, kids. Just eat the little dandelion leaves. The grass isn’t all that nourishing, but a dandelion salad is good for you.”

F is for fawns eating the weeds by the flowers in my herb garden.

Then I had an afterthought. F could also be for their father. So here you have the mothers and fathers of fawns in the days when they were very hungry and I fed them for a while.

 

F is for fawns, their fathers, flowers, food, and a fine day.


by 37 Comments

E has to be for Emma

 

When Emma was a baby, the ensuite bathroom was a good place for her to play. Nothing she could wreck in there, and a tile floor in case of accidents.

Be sure to turn on your sound.

When she had the run of the house, she liked to play around her dog bed, which was beside Ruby’s (our springer spaniel). Looking for something to chew on and destroy, as usual.

Later she even chewed the straps out of out nearly new Birkenstocks. Apparently she wasn’t sorry. The flavour must have been … irresistible.

 

Hey guys! Anneli told me a joke. She said she’d give me away if I didn’t behave myself.

That’s a doggone good one, eh?

 

She’ll keep me around. She can’t help herself. I’m just too darn cute to give away even if I misbehave sometimes.

 

And anyway, she needs me for her alphabet blogs because E is for Emma.


by 39 Comments

D is for Ducks

At first glance it looks like the farmer grew a crop of mallards.

On second glance we can see that there are widgeons among them.

At third glance, in a close look near the bottom of the photo we can see that the farmer actually grew potatoes. Some were missed and have been unearthed by the ducks to nibble on. It’s not their first choice of food but who knows what other seeds or insects may be hiding alongside the potatoes?

D is for duck, but when they sense danger, they don’t “duck.” They fly!


by 40 Comments

C is for Cowboy the Cat

Cowboy was a cat, probably the most special cat I’ve ever had. He loved me and I loved him. When he and his brother were only a few inches long, the two of them lay in their owner’s hand. The owner of the kittens told me, if you don’t take them … and he made a motion as if he would close his hand and squish them. Of course he wouldn’t really do that, but the cats’ lives were at stake.

I took the two cats and named them after two boys that I had taught back in those long ago days. Their mother had called her children by the nicknames, Cowboy and Shorty. I liked the names, and thought it would be perfect for these cat brothers too.

We may meet Shorty in a later post when I get to the letter S.

 

Cowboy thought he owned me. As you can see, he has claimed my knee in this photo.

When I brushed my teeth in the bathroom of our very small starter home, Cowboy would jump up onto the toilet lid and from there up onto my back as I bent over the sink. He got comfortable on my shoulders and then stretched his head around the side of my face so he could lick the toothpaste off my cheek and chin.

I guess it had that same minty flavour of the catnip in our garden that sometimes had him doing backflips out there.

He didn’t like to be left behind if I went for a walk down the field below our house. He would follow behind, trying to catch up, hoping for permission to come along, by calling out, “AllOW! … AllOW! … AllOW! (He had a bit of Siamese in him and was able to make that sound of a baby crying.)

So of course I would allow him to come along.

He lived for 13 and a half years, and it was nowhere near long enough. I still miss him.