Thursday 20 December 2012

Slab of meat


-11C in Maridalen today and treacherously icy roads - I saw one car being pulled out of snow from the side of a perfectly straight stretch of road after the driver presumably pressed too hard on the brakes and skidded off.
I tried for the Grosbeaks on foot without luck but this could have been my mistake - I seem to have far more luck finding them from a moving car!
At one of the feeding stations someone has hung up side of pork. This is what I will be eating on 24 December when we celebrate Christmas in Norway and I will be crunching my way through crispy crackling. This particular slab of frozen meat though, which must have been rock hard, had the attention of a male Great Spotted Woodpecker which was stabbing furiously at the meat to try to chip off a bit. People often hang up the fat which is very popular with birds but this particular bit had been hung up meat and all and with the fat against the tree – maybe it will prove tempting to a lynx ;-)
male Great Spotted Woodpecker feeding on pork

2 comments:

  1. passing by today(dec. 25) a goshawk was flapping about on the piece of meat. at first i thought it had taken a smaller bird but it turned out it was actually eating the pork, something i havent seen before. within seconds of flying off 20 or so passerines came down from the trees continuing ther normal behaviour as if nothing had happened.

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  2. Wow - did you get a photo? Golden Eagle next?

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