Saturday, 2 April 2011

Unintended Consequences


A few years ago the good folk of Bridlington had a major headache; herring gulls were nesting on the old buildings of the town and causing a mighty mess. Their habit of dive bombing passers-by caused distress and loss of trade. So, to prevent this, long spikes were fitted to window ledges and roof tops. It was a great success, the herring gulls hated the spikes and left. 
However kittiwakes, the birds you see here, simply used the spikes to fasten their nesting material to the building and took over the place. I guess it beats trying to nest on a cliff. Kittiwakes are the smallest gull that we have around here and are much less aggressive and really quite pretty for a gull. In recent years the UK kittiwake population has plummeted and several colonies have been wiped out so it's good to see these birds thriving even if in unusual circumstances.





Friday, 1 April 2011

Edges


 It's April 1st, Fool's Day and the year a quarter over already!

For some reason or other City Daily Photo's theme today is "Edges" . To see what others have made of this the following instruction will help...  Click here 

Thursday, 31 March 2011

Wednesday, 30 March 2011

I do like to stroll upon the Prom, Prom, Prom!

In seaside resorts the Promenade is usually a path with views over the sea but not in Bridlington. Here the Promenade is a depressing rundown street set way back from the sea (what sea?) filled with decaying builidings and failing businesses. Charity shops are the only ones making any money down here.

For those of you not familiar with English music hall songs (and who is?) the title of today's post is from the classic "Oh I Do Like to Be Beside the Seaside"

Monday, 28 March 2011

Turnstones

These waders have become accustomed to people, probably due to being fed scraps by the anglers on the pier.

Sunday, 27 March 2011

Resident Woodpigeon


Today the clocks have been pushed forward an hour for reasons that I cannot fathom; why are they continuing with this wartime measure? There are strange people who say we should not only have BST (GMT+1) in Winter (!) but have double BST(GMT+2) in Summer(!!). This would, they say, "bring us into line with Europe"! Crazy, since the Europeans also put their clocks forward. It's some kind of vanity that they can have more hours of daylight by fiddling with the clock.
It is also Census day in the UK so I'd better fill out the form lest the interfering prodnoses come round and threaten me with a £1000 fine and a criminal record...
Enough, here's a woodpigeon on my garden wall, now shall I list it in the census...?