Deaf or What?

Obviously small birds will hear sounds differently to humans or cats. On the end of the shed facing the bird feeders is a cat scarer which sits in a small shelter to keep the worst of the weather off the electronics.

It came as quite a surprise when I saw a Coal Tit investigate right inside the shelter when the unit was running.



I had to check that it was actually working. The red LED could be seen so it should have been. The only way for me to 'hear' it was to get the bat detector which tuned in to it OK and all was well.

Next was to get some idea of how loud it was that close to the unit. For that I used an iPhone app to measure the sound level



Peak 84dB and a maximum of 103dB.
84dB equates to city traffic noise inside a car,
103dB to  being about a metre away from a power mower.
So obviously it was either a deaf Coal Tit or, more probably, high pitched as the sounds are for us they may well have been too low pitched to worry the bird.




Penny's First Visit to the Vet
Madam went hurtling down the garden after some creature or other first thing this morning. I know she couldn't turn a corner fast enough as I hear her crash in to something. She came back with several cuts and scrapes to her back legs and feeling very sorry for herself. This is not the first time she has had the odd scrape as greyhounds have thin skin which is easily damaged. One cut looked worse than usual so I phoned the vets and she was checked over this morning. While there she had her booster jab and we came away with some concoction to bathe her wounds as nothing was serious enough to need stitching, just to keep infection out. She was fit enough for a short, slow walk at lunch time.

Uploading to Flickr and YouTube
Even with the change of  router I still had problems from time to time with uploads stopping part way through until I found Firefox Universal Uploader (FileUploader), an extension for the Firefox browser. It is not perfect in that it always shows 100%  as soon as the upload starts so I cannot tell how fast things are going. It does show a green tick once the upload is finished and the site returns a confirmation and it has never failed to upload a file for me.

A Cloudy Day

Only a bit cloudy from time to time really. The video was a test to see how long the battery in the 350D would last taking a medium quality jpg every 5 seconds while I made sure the Dream Hammock was still in good working order.  It was. Result 1632 shots in 2hr 16min..

As before ImagesToVideo was used to convert the single shots to an animation.
Soundtrack produced using the Korg IMS-20 app on the iPad:



At the end of the day there was a nice Sunset along with some nearby swirly cloud patterns:





Both the above were tweaked using ReDynaMix in Photoshop.

Harvest Time

Not a lot been going on here as far as nature photography goes, especially with a fumbling operator. A few days ago I though I had managed some good video of an adult House Sparrow feeding three youngsters. They all stayed out in the open and sat beautifully in shot for ages. When I went to check the video - nothing, zero, zilch, I either didn't press the start button far enough, or twice. Either way there was nothing to show. #@*$& or words to that effect!

Better luck today on the video front. While we were enjoying some chicken thighs, etc. for tea I could hear at least one combine strutting its stuff in a nearby field so we went walkabout in that direction. I could see one field had been started recently. Of course the combine was at the furthest end of the field where I couldn't get near it . The crop, wheat I think, was standing well after the heavy rain. In past years that sort of rain has flattened much of a field.





We had a gentle stroll up and down the lane while I waited for the combine to come back in my direction. With luck it was going to pass very close to my chosen spot. Penny is learning fast and waits very patiently when I want to use the camera. The combine was kicking up an almighty dust cloud. Fortunately the worst of it seemed to be blowing away from us.




I stood on the opposite side of the lane to keep away from the worst of the dust and managed some stills and video as it reached my end of the field. As soon as it had turned the corner we beat a hasty retreat to escape the worst of the dust. At first I thought it would be dry, dusty earth being sent up by the combine but what was landing on us was just like the fine ash you get from a bonfire so it must have been from the wheat itself. Of course, when I think about it, what was blowing about was the chaff from the seed husks which were being ejected from the back end of the combine.

 

The video will be a bit noisy as there was a fair breeze blowing and trying to keep the view still was difficult as most of the time the Sun was in my eyes and I couldn't see much on the LCD screen:



I won't be surprised if they are still combining well past my bedtime. Once they start they tend to keep going until the job is finished.

Mystery Photo - Revealed

It's a while since I showed this macro photo and asked if you could guess what it was:



Some wider views of the same object:





As should be obvious now I was looked at the underneath of a fern frond and the yellow blobs are sporangia - where the spores will be produced.

Congratulations to Wilma who deserves a  for spotting they were spores under a fern frond and my thanks to all who had a go and made a guess.

Measuring Rainfall

The other day Adrian asked how rainfall was measured with my weather station. It is easier to explain with a few photos taken with a similar 'gauge' from an old defunct weather station.

To look at the rainfall measurer it is just a plastic cuboid with a hole in the top. The top surface is sloped to allow the rain water to run down to the hole:



Inside is basically a sea-saw so designed that the rain water entering the device runs to the 'bucket' which is horizontal. When the weight of rain water reaches a pre-determined amount the sea-saw flips emptying that bucket and stays in that position until the opposite bucket fills.



The measuring device consists of a reed switch - a switch operated by a magnet - which is on one side of the upright support . The magnet is on the same side as the bucket and swings with the movement of the sea-saw . When the bucket swings one way the magnet closes the switch - the opposite swing opens the switch.



The reed switch is wired to the electronics board contained elsewhere. This counts the number of times the switch opens and closes and at some pre-determined count registers 0.01 inches of rain and starts counting again.

All the complicated counting and timing is done with the electronic circuitry.
Adrian - a good project for an Arduino based rainfall gauge!!

Tarka Challenge

A while ago I stumbled across a blog called Tarka Challenge. It is about an 8yr old boy, Rudi, whose favourite book is Tarka the Otter. He has set himself the challenge of seeing every creature and plant mentioned in the book. That is quite a challenge and Rudi has been doing well in his quest which is written about in the blog.

I thought it was fantastic that a youngster has got so interested in the natural world of this country and his parents have obviously been great in encouraging him and taking him to places where he can explore for all the things he wants to see.

I mention this as I have a look every now and then at the blog to see how things are going and thought it would be nice if a few more people could have a look and maybe leave a few words of encouragement for Rudi. You never know you may be reading about the future replacement for David Attenborough.

Stormy Day Updated

Adrian asked whether I had recorded the air pressure. Yes sir. See below.
A second storm has passed through bringing this afternoon's rainfall total to 2.5 inches (64mm) so far:



Air temperature dropped both times:



The pressure dropped overnight as some rain clouds passed through the area and there were some noticeable changes as the storms passed through.



With the rate of rainfall gutters just overflowed so my back lawn has begun to turn in to a lake.

 

By the looks of the sky there is more to come yet and this is the dry side of the country!