Painting Ivory-bills

As Sharon madly prepares for her trip to Arkansas, I'm working on a painting set at Bayou de View. The painting here is an earlier one, and though I've painted more ivory-bills than any other North American bird, I haven't done many good paintings of it. This is one that turned out about like I wanted it to. The one I'm working on now will be similar, but not as unequivocal. There's to be an ivory-bill in it, flying away, giving you the kind of look you get when you're not exactly sure what you've seen. I've been thinking and reading and writing a great deal about the bird lately, and this painting is coming out of all that. We're all hanging in limbo, waiting for that photograph, that video, that confirmation that means we don't just have to take someone's word for it that the ivory-bill is back. Until then, all I can paint is ambiguity, because that's really all we have. I've watched David Luneau's famous video clip 900 times, and I thoroughly believe that's an ivory-bill, but there are plenty of people who don't think so. The questions swirl and the undertow of disbelief is stronger with each passing month. We're hungry for more.

Still, it thrills me that friends of mine are there as we speak, slogging around in the bayous, waiting, listening silently behind veils of camouflage. And it delights me that Sharon will have a chance to do that. When the Zeiss search commenced in the Pearl River region in 1999, I stayed home and painted ivory-bills. With two sweet kids, a husband and home to hold down, it's pretty much all I can do. Carving two weeks out of their lives for a search just isn't in the cards. Do I sound wistful? Oh, yeah! But I'm determined to get some good paintings and writing out of that longing.

Warning Guts!

"Arrrrr, matey, let ye be warned that thar be a gross photo at the end of this here post. Arrrrrrr! If ye want to scroll down and get a quick peak, see if ye can identify what exactly is in the gross photo. Arrrrrrr!

Meet Bud, the pirate eagle!

Bud is not a pirate, he is one of the education bald eagles at The Raptor Center. He lost his eye to a bad case of sibling rivalry. Some banders went to an eagle nest in Wisconsin to band the chicks and discovered that the larger nestlings had pecked out the smallest one's eye. Gross? Yes! Uncommon? Not really. Older eaglets will pick on younger ones and if the adults don't bring in enough food the youngest chicks usually get eaten. And you thought you didn't get along with your siblings!

Spent another wonderful, funderful day catching up on training at TRC. The California Condor is still in clinic, however it should be heading back to Arizona towards the end of this week. The wing injury is healed and the bird needs to spend time in a flight pen to work its muscles and then back to the wild. We do not have an outdoor mew to accommodate this size of bird and it's too cold outside for the condor now anyway. I'm glad that the injury healed. It will be nice to be able to talk again down in the clinic area. Right now volunteers and staff are pantomiming everything like a bunch of tacky Marcel Marceaus because talking is prohibited anywhere near the condor to keep it from acclimating to humans. I gotta tell ya, it's not easy to mime "I need 110 grams of rat, tail and intestines removed." Speaking of which, 110 grams of rat is the contents of the cup, the top half of a rat--tail and intestines removed. This particular cup of food was meant for a red-tailed hawk. Mmmmmm, yummy.

Julie's Test Post

Here is a picture of my dog Chet Baker violating a Barbie doll. He is not as staid or disapproving as Cinnamon. I am delighted to be bringing dogness to Sharon's blog. It is currently full of birds and rabbits.

I hope she finds what she's looking for in Arkansas. Until then I will keep you warm.

Julie

God of Cookery

Milk River Blog is trying to compile a list of obscure movies and is inviting bloggers everywhere to participate. Since Non Birding Bill and I frequently host Bad Movie Nights we have a whole list of movies that people have never heard of (or should have heard of for that matter).

One obscure movie that is my absolute favorite movie of all time is God of Cookery (also known as Sik San). It's an early Stephen Chow movie that pokes fun at the whole Hong Kong fighting genre mixed with some Iron Chef. Everyone that we show this movie to ends up falling in love with it. Come to think of it, if you know of someone who enjoys Jackie Chan movies or Hong Kong movies in general, they will love this movie as a gift. NBB gave it to me for Christmas a couple of years ago.

Stephen starts out as the brilliant but corrupt God of Cookery and then gets publicly humiliated by an underling working with the local Triad. He must rediscover the heart of cooking by participating in violent street cooking and eventually going to Chinese Cooking Academy which turns out to be the kitchen of the ancient Shaolin Monastary. The movie builds up to a final cooking/fighting battle between Stephen and the underling who humiliated him as they via for the true title of God of Cookery--Sik San!

This movie is better than Kung Fu Hustle and ten times better then Shaolin Soccer. It makes a great date movie.

Birdchick Gift Guide...and confession

I had Non Birding Bill help me set up a Gift Guide if you are looking for some ideas for the birder in your life.

I just realized that I forgot to include a couple of items, one being a binocular harness--okay, I know, I know--friends of mine are reading this post and saying to themselves, "Did Sharon just recommend a binocular harness...after making fun of mine for years?!" YES! Yes, I am now wearing a binocular harness, it's sad but true. I can't help it, they make your binoculars so much more comfortable, I was a foolish, foolish girl for poking fun at my friends and saying that they were wearing a "bino bra". For those that don't know, a binocular harness takes the weight of your optics off of your neck and places it on your shoulders--it's really, really comfortable. Anyway, if you know someone who loves their binoculars and they are always complaining about how heavy they are, a harness is a great gift. It fits most binoculars and can be used for cameras as well. The straps are elastic and stretch to fit your needs and body shape.

Another thoughtful and easy small gift is a set of hand warmers. These things are so awesome for gold weather birding. They warm up when exposed to air and can be tucked in gloves and boots. I also have used them tucked along my pant line on my lower back when sitting in a blind to avoid a sore back. These things are a cheap (I've seen them anywhere from $1 - $2 a set) and thoughtful gift for any birder. I've seen them all over from Gander Mountain, Cabela's and even Walgreen's.

Do These Chest Waders Make Me Look Fat?

I leave for the ivory-billed woodpecker Arkansas search a week from tomorrow so Non Birding Bill and I headed to a new Cabela's that opened up in Rogers to load up on the supplies for the swamp. The photo on the left is me trying on some chest waders. I asked NBB how my butt looked in them and he said, "Brown and shapeless." I guess that's better than gigantic.

I had no idea there were so many styles of chest waders, some are for fly fishing and some are for duck hunting. The pair I went with are brown neoprene that you wear hiking boots over the little footies on the bottom. It was difficult finding a pair that fit because I am short and have small feet so the maker of the chest waders assumes that if you are a size 7 shoe your hips should match that. I'm what you would call gifted in the hip department so I ended up having to go with a bigger size for bigger feet. I think it will work out since I intend on wearing thick socks and stuffing the toes with hand warmers (one of the best inventions ever). I can see these having some very practical application for some cold weather birding and banding in Minnesota when I'm done in the swamp. I did like the supportive feel of the neoprene waders and if they keep me warm and dry I can live with a brown and shapeless butt. Of course, if I take to wearing this clothing when birding on a regular basis, I will no longer be able to make fun of birders who tuck their pants in their socks.

I also had to pick up some required "mesh camo bug cover". I showed my Cornell list to the staff at Cabela's and they looked at me blankly. I said, "I think they mean a gilly suit." Then they knew right away what I needed and NBB went to town trying to see how many accessories he could fit on me (pictured at right). I got very giddy and told NBB, "Look, I'm just like Brian Wheeler!" (who also dresses in a gilly suit when photographing hawks). NBB told me to calm down, that I was sounding a little too Single White Female. I think the pants are really cool and I kind of wish I could find a way to work them into my day to day wardrobe. They shimmy and shake as you walk, I would love to take them out clubbing and see what they do on the dance floor.
Here is a photo of Non Birding Bill getting into the spirit of things by trying on some of the camo! I think staff and some customers got a kick out of NBB and I clowning around in the camo--and people say married couples don't have any fun! I did make it a point to mention to Cabela's staff that I was using this stuff for birding--they should know that there is a whole crowd of customers besides hunters that can use their stuff. I also mentioned that they should thank Cornell University for recommending them as a resource for our supplies in the swamp.

I can see that birding and traipsing around in a swamp is going to be a challenge in this get up. Binos, spotting scopes and video cameras are heavy enough and now there are chest waders and layers of filmy camo added to the pile. If anything, I will surely work off all the eating I've been doing over the holiday weekend.

And you know what else? I don't even want to think about what's going to happen if there is a "potty emergency" in the swamp. As a woman I have always considered "going in the woods" in regular clothing was a triumph if I could do it without getting any on myself. Now there's awkward clothing involved that's not easy to whip on or off. Oh well, this will be a learning experience. I'm sure at the end of this I will come put a stronger and more resourceful outdoors-woman.

Downy Snow

I had intended to go look for one of the many snowy owls being reported around Minnesota today--someone reported one in Carver County just to the west of where we live on Thanksgiving Day. Alas, snow started at 5am this morning and was quite beautiful, however, that combined with people's mad dash to get to shopping malls for great holiday deals made me think about staying home and getting some writing done instead.

For giggles I set up the NovaBird Camera and got a shot of a downy woodpecker that decided to forgo the suet log and eat some peanuts and sunflower hearts from the seed feeder. Crazy woodpecker, did he bother to notice that I had put the fancy cashew suet in the log today? No!

Meanwhile, when not writing I'm brushing up on ivory-billed woodpecker stuff--I leave for Arkansas a week from Sunday! While reading up on ivory-bills in my bird library, Non Birding Bill created a super cool playlist on my iPod that includes calls and pecking of ivory-billed woodpeckers and even downloaded some tracks of similar sounding birds like blue jays and nuthatches. What a guy! Everybody should have a techno savvy Non Birding Bill.

Happy Naked Thanksgiving

Today is my favorite holiday, apart from hawk trapping. Non Birding Bill and I celebrate Naked Thanksgiving. It started when we first moved to Minnesota. Coming from a family of five sisters and two brothers I was used to a large gathering of family craziness and not a quiet holiday for two. When we moved up here and I worked at a bird retail store, leaving for Indiana during the busiest shopping week was just not a good idea. So, NBB and I developed our own tradition of not dressing up (or dressing at all), having our pie for breakfast (because you are always too full to eat dessert after the turkey dinner), and have only the bare essentials (NBB only wants turkey and stuffing, I like a fancy salad with my turkey and the jell-o like canned cranberry sauce). We watch whatever tv the two of us want which usually includes James Bond movies (I'm sucker for Octopussy, that was my first career choice--to be a woman who runs an island of beautiful acrobatic women who put on a circus as a front for jewelry smuggling, instead I turned to birding for a career). Anyway, this quiet Thanksgiving without the craziness of holiday travel is just so nice. I highly recommend it, however if you stick to Naked Thanksgiving literally, at least wear an apron when basting the turkey.

I have so much to be grateful for this year apart from the usual (NBB, my hilarious mother, my supportive siblings, my disapproving rabbits, a cantankerous cockatiel, do educational programs for The Raptor Center) but I have the coolest job on the planet and the fact that I work for Eagle Optics (a company that I actually used and recommended to customers before I worked there) is so surprising. The great friends that I made this year (has it really been less than a year since I met my convention birding and karaoke posse of Amy, Jeff and BT3), the ivory-billed woodpecker was rediscovered (which is reason enough to be grateful) and I'm going to live a childhood dream of not only having the opportunity to look for it, but to do it through Cornell University (I haven't been this excited since I got realize another childhood dream of riding in a cherry picker when I went osprey banding), getting to see a California condor up close and personal, Katie showing me a crested caracara, the list could go on and on.

So, I leave you with my favorite piece of advice that I found years ago on the inside label of Libby's Solid Pack Pumpkin (now known as Libby's 100% Pure Pumpkin): 

"Libby's Solid Pack Pumpkin is thoroughly cooked during the canningprocess so it is perfectly safe and acceptable to enjoy straight from the can."

Safe - I'm sure it is. Acceptable - I guess only you can be the judge of that.