The sight of flocks of Waxwings continues unabated. We had been out to check on the allotment which is still covered in snow and came across a flock of about 200 flying from tree to tree across the busy A57. Certainly brightened up a dull winter’s day.
We had a trip to Potteric Carr yesterday and apparently so did Pete Mella of Sheffield Wildlife. Pete has an interesting blog about Sheffield bird watching. It was very interesting to compare our lists of the birds seen.
Potteric Carr was a little cold and muddy on the paths but watching Bittern hiding in the reed beds and the Kingfisher fishing made up for the slip sliding around the newer paths on Huxter Well.
We didn’t see a Water Rail which we had hoped to but did watch the Bittern and Kingfisher from close range for some time. The Caspian Gull was also seen but as rare as it may be I get much more enjoyment from seeing Bitterns.
The full list. Blue Tit, Great Tit, Long Tailed Tit, Moorhen, Coot, Blackbird, Dunnock, Wren, Robin, Bullfinch, Chaffinch, Reed Bunting, Bittern, Kingfisher, Magpie, Shelduck, Heron, Carrion Crow, Mute Swan, Shoveller, Mallard, Gadwell, Teal, Pheasant, Tree Creeper, Lesser Black Backed Gull, Black Headed Gull, Caspian Gull, Jay, Redwing, Starling, Pied Wagtail, Cormorant.
This article on the Swissaid website raises an interesting fact that it takes as much maize to fill a car’s petrol tank as it does to feed one person for a year. Swissaid has launched a campaign to stop agrofuel production. – swissinfo
Whilst in Sheffield the University is investigating the possibility of running cars on coffee! I don’t mean that as you make that first cupper in the morning to get you going you make another and pop it in your tank. Field studies in Nicaragua have shown that waste coffee beans produce an oil which can be turned into a biofuel. So a waste by-product that was of little value could be sold by the farmers. The research is being carried out by PhD student Annabel Townsend.
Localised pockets of biofuel production using waste products can have huge benefits but the global move to agrofuels still marches on.
Yes it did! Using the Live Writer desktop application to edit posts is easy enough and has most text editor features.
Simple to publish and has some interesting functions to explore.
Adding tags is very simple too.
Part of the reason for having this blog is as a test bed for website and in particular WordPress blog designs. Hence much of what is here is experimental.
This post for example is using Windows Live Writer to update the site. So far so good – standard Microsoft interface like word – but will the publishing be easy.
Here goes ……………..
Tags: Biofuels