Jack’s Walk

©voyager, all rights reserved

It might not be immediately obvious, but Jack is fishing in this photo. Sometimes he just wades in and then stands very still staring at the water for a very long time. The first few times it happened we wondered what the heck he was doing, but then one day several years ago Jack suddenly plunged his head underwater and came up with a fish in his mouth. We took one step toward him and Jack, not wanting to give up his catch, threw his head back and swallowed the fish whole. It was about 8 cm long and thankfully he swallowed it head first, but that fish was still alive and moving when it hit his stomach. His facial expressions told the story. Ever since then, Jack wants to repeat the trick. Like all good fishermen, he’s after the bigger one that got away.

A is for Ambush and Aranha.

We have a new Alphabet Challenge from Nightjar: For every photo there will be two words, one in English and one in Portuguese, meaning the same or different things (with a few exceptions for genus names and K, W and Y which are not part of the Portuguese alphabet).

Ambush. Aranha, Portuguese for spider.

Flower crab spiders belonging to the family Thomisidae do not build webs, they are instead ambush predators. Some can change colour to match the flower they are on to blend in, then they wait for insects to visit the flower and catch them. In this case, a fly visiting a Paris Daisy (Argyranthemum frutescens) was not so lucky.

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© Nightjar, all rights reserved.

Scandinavian Letters: Öga.

Öga.

Öga is Swedish for eye. Jackdaws have light-coloured irises which makes their eyes look more eye-like for the human eye. Jackdaw is naakka in Finnish and kaja in Swedish. This jackdaw was on the quay of Helsinki Market Square in November 2016.

The letter Ö, used in German, Estonian, Finnish and Swedish is the last letter in Finnish and Swedish alphabets and so this post concludes the series.

This has been a fabulous series, and I hope everyone has enjoyed it as much as I have. Many thanks to Ice Swimmer for meeting a tough challenge with such flair and ease. Click for full size!

© Ice Swimmer, all rights reserved.

Jack’s Walk

©voyager, all rights reserved

It’s another beautiful day here and I’m enjoying the freedom of being outside without being all bundled up. For the past few days Jack and I have been walking in a new area because our usual forest path hasn’t been cleared yet of several large fallen trees. Jack thinks this new route is pretty swell. It runs close to the river and he’s been able to frolic in the water every day. I don’t think the route is swell and it’s not because of the wet dog. It’s because of all the dead trees. Several years ago my area was hard hit by the emerald ash borer beetle. (Agrilus planipennis) It destroyed every tree in the park that connects with this path and many more were cut down in neighbouring areas to help to help prevent the spread. What was once a lush green park with mature trees is now riddled with decaying stumps and fallen branches. Our winters have become so warm that these critters can now survive this far north. One more victim of climate change.

Scandinavian Letters: Äng.

Äng.

Äng is meadow in Swedish. The sunset picture is a variant version of a picture from the Laajalahti Nature Preserve I’ve used before and sent to this blog. While there are trees in the picture, there’s open land that is used for as a cow pasture there, in order to restore traditional seashore meadowland.

The night time picture is from summer 2017. I was walking home from my cousin’s wedding and decided to take some night photos.

Ä is used in at least Finnish, Swedish, Estonian and German. In different languages, different pronunciations are used, but it’s generally a wovel pronounced in the frontal part of the mouth. In Finnish and Swedish it’s the second to last letter in the alphabet.

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© Ice Swimmer, all rights reserved.