Picture of the Day for February 24, 2013

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I bet these Red and Black Angus cattle are happier in the summer than winter, at least I would prefer looking at green grass again.

The naturally polled Angus were developed from cattle native to the counties of Aberdeenshire and Angus in Scotland. Hugh Watson can be considered the founder of the breed as he was instrumental in selecting the best black, polled animals for his herd. His favorite bull was Old Jock, who was born in 1842. Another of Watson’s notable animals was a cow, Old Granny, which was born in 1824 and said to have lived to 35 years of age and to have produced 29 calves.

The pedigrees of the vast majority of Angus cattle alive today can be traced back to these two animals so I wonder how many of these Angus are from Old Jock and Old Granny. I can’t say that having Old Granny on a pedigree makes an exceptional sounding pedigree!

Old Granny’s Kids?

Old Granny's Kids

 

Picture of the Day for February 22, 2013

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Scientists in Scotland announced the July 1996 birth of the world’s first successfully cloned mammal, Dolly the sheep, on February 22, 1997. Even though Dolly was not the first animal to be cloned, she gained attention in the media because she was the first to be cloned from an adult cell.

I always figured if they were going to clone a sheep, they could have picked a nicer looking breed of sheep than a Finn Dorset or one of the rare Scottish breeds, like the Boreray as it is the most endangered breed of sheep in the United Kingdom.

Cloning is even less profitable than normal ranching since it took 277 attempts to get Dolly but researchers have tried cloning extinct animals and may open doors for saving endangered and newly extinct species by resurrecting them from frozen tissue.

I just hope that doesn’t mean any Tyrannosaurus rex will show up in my backyard since I have enough trouble with the bears destroying my bird feeders!

Grazing Sheep

Grazing Sheep

Picture of the Day for February 19, 2013

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It appears that Paul Bunyan hasn’t straighten out this river like he had done with the crooked river that was causing log jams for the loggers. Besides straightening rivers, the mythic folk hero Paul was also responsible for creating the 10,000 Lakes of Minnesota when Paul and his blue Ox Babe left footprints when they wandered blindly in a deep blizzard. The Great Lakes were also formed by Paul to have a watering hole big enough for Babe to drink from.

When Paul Bunyan dragged his axe behind him one day, he created the Grand Canyon and when Babe and Paul were roughhousing and shoving each other around, they created the Grand Tetons. And when Paul needed to get clean afterwards, he made a shower but forgot to turn it off when he finished and it is still running as Yellowstone Falls.

From the five storks that took to deliver Paul to the Mississippi River running backwards when Babe took a big swallow, the mythic legend and stories live on. What is mythic or a mystery to me is how a river doesn’t freeze over in below zero temperatures like last night when the river doesn’t appear to be flowing very fast. But then maybe Paul is upstream washing his feet as they could be hot from his wool socks and lumberjack boots.

Crooked Creek

Crooked Creek

 

 

Picture of the Day for February 18, 2013

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Many people have the day off for Presidents’ Day but I’m celebrating a different event. February 18 is also the Elm Farm Ollie Day which the National Mustard Museum in Middleton, Wisconsin celebrates every year. They even have a three mustard set as  tribute to the three most famous cows in history — Elm Farm Ollie, Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow, and the Cow That Jumped Over the Moon. The mustard connection? According to their web site,  “Here in Wisconsin, we have a saying:  ‘A cow who cuts the mustard is a cow who can be trusted.'”

Who is Elm Farm Ollie?  Elm Farm Ollie (known as “Nellie Jay” and post-flight as “Sky Queen”) was the first cow to fly in an airplane, doing so on February 18, 1930, as part of the International Air Exposition in St. Louis, Missouri, United States. The two year old Guernsey cow was also the first cow to be milked in flight in the Ford Tri-Motor airplane. Wisconsin native Elsworth W. Bunce milked her, becoming the first man to milk a cow mid-flight.

Elm Farm Ollie’s milk was sealed into paper cartons which were parachuted to spectators below. Charles Lindbergh reportedly received a glass of the milk. Ollie’s stunt proved so popular that a large crowd, apparently thirsty for milk, gathered on the field where her plane was to land, forcing it to be diverted to another site.

In addition to having her praises sung in such works as “The Bovine Cantata in B-Flat Major” (from Madame Butterfat) and the stirring “Owed to Ollie,” she has been the subject of stories, cartoons and poems. E. D. Thalinger even painted her portrait for posterity.

So grab your glass of milk (or the jar of mustard) and raise a toast to Ollie.

Celebrating Elm Farm Ollie Day

Grazing Dairy Cows

Picture of the Day for February 16, 2013

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The Great Backyard Bird Count is an annual four-day event that engages bird watchers of all ages in counting birds to create a real-time snapshot of where the birds are. The 16th annual GBBC is Friday, February 15, through Monday, February 18, 2013.

The visitors to my yard the last two days have been Mourning Doves, Chickadees, Red Polls, Pileated Woodpecker, Nuthatch, Purple Finch, Downing Woodpecker, Hairy Woodpecker, Crows, Red Bellied Woodpecker and the Gold Finches but the Gold Finches aren’t so “gold” right now with the male displaying its dull olive winter plumage.

The Gold Finch molts its body feathers twice a year, once in late winter and again in late summer. The brightening yellow of male goldfinches each spring is one welcome mark of approaching warm months so I’m looking forward to the ‘gold’ color again.

‘Golden’ Gold Finch

Golden Gold Finch

 

Picture of the Day for February 15, 2013

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I don’t think these Mourning Doves like the new snow either as now their perches in the trees are snow covered again.

Mourning Doves is one of the most abundant and widespread of all North American birds with population estimated at 350 million. They are the most frequently hunted species in North America with more 20 million shot each year. But I only shoot the doves with my camera and not with a gun. But since the Mourning Doves feed on the ground, approximately 1 in 20 will ingest lead shot in the heavily hunted areas and lead poisoning is another threat to the doves.

The nesting pair will have one to six broods a year with normally two eggs in each brood. Mourning Doves eat almost exclusively seeds, but the young are fed crop milk by their parents which is a secretion from the lining of the crop (enlargement of the esophagus) of parent birds that is regurgitated to young birds. It resembles and smells like cottage cheese.

Its plaintive woo-OO-oo-oo-oo call gives the bird its name and the wings can make an unusual whistling sound upon take-off and landing. The bird is a strong flier, capable of speeds up to 55 mph.

Primarily a bird of open country, scattered trees, and woodland edges, the Mourning Dove can survive in the desert as they can drink brackish water that is almost half the salinity of sea water without becoming dehydrated the way humans would.

The Mourning Dove was named Wisconsin’s symbol of peace in 1971.

Chilly Doves

Chilly Doves

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