h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Just like a bloke . . .


az
(actually that was Noggin's quip)

Sounds like Icky with his bike if you ask me.

Maybe you put Peacock salt on their tails to stop them squawking ?

There used to be a salt which had a logo of a boy running after a bird to put salt on his tail - can't remember what make it was now - (No it wasn't Peacock.)

Unless it's like chicken grit which is needed for egg productione. Mind you why you'd have a bucket of the stuff at work is anyone's guess.

Peacok is supposed to be very tasty - they used to serve it at all the best banquets. All terribly authentic, and they're such a loverly unmissable target.

Mudhooks: Thanks for the links, will check em out at home. And yess, your description is far more accurate than just the mere grass whistle comparison I made!

Odo,
I think half the enjoyment of peacock as a meal is that of satisfaction that the d*mn thing ain;t gonna be annoying you any more! They really are remarkably noise. One can see why they are only popular on massive estates!

Ho yes, I know all about the noise. The village 'big house' had peacoks, and didn't we know about it! Got used to ignoring them though - the worst/strangest noise that scared my brother and myself when we took to camping out in our back garden was the familly of little owls. The adults hunted round the garden while their young sat on top of the tent (Dad's old 1950s style canvas scout tent) and let loose with a throaty hiss demanding to be fed.

Scared the daylights out of us until we worked out what it was.

I'll bet!
When I lived in Matlock Bath, The fflat I was in looked across a river and then to a huge cliff opposite. Proper cliff, people used to go climbing there at the weekends. anyway, there were a couple of Screech Owls living down the river somewhere and when they let rip, it echoed up an down the valley off the cliff face! That kept me awake a few times.

Mind you, nothing to compare to the first time you hear a vixen's call at night. Especially if you are in the middle of nowhere!

Or a couple of foxes fighting…… The peace and quiet of the country eh!!

<>

Goodness, did it upset you so much that you developed a stutter?


az

Nearly did the first time I was awoken at 2am by an unearthly screeching in the night!

Mind you, it was fun at the weekends, watching people trying not to fall off the cliff opposite. i often thought about buying an air rifle to make the ascent more interesting for them

The last time I went camping, at a Provincial park, there was a wild turkey (perhaps it was more) gobbling in the wood..... all night long. Apparently, there is also a turkey farm nearby. I don't know if this was an escapee or the real thing.

Actually, what really scared the sh!t out of me was the sound of something large rooting about in the underbrush a few feet from my tent. I was alone, so it was just a little rivetting. I didn't go and investigate (I seem to be more sensible than all the "victims in horror movies who seen inextricably drawn to the weird and unearthly noise eminating from underbrush/basements/attics). However, I am thinking it was either a rabid grizzly bear or injured Sasquatch. The fact that we don't have either of these in the winds of Ontario is moot..... that's what it was.

The one that always gets me is how much noise a hedgehog can generate in the undergrowth. They really do sound like somethinng the size of a hefalump is in there!

But a few feet from the tent? Yep, that could be worrisome!

It could have been a badger, they can make one heck of a noise in the middle of the night.

Indeed they can. One of the camp sites we used to use had a badger set on it, quite a large one as well. Could be most amusing, as well as rather dangerous, to go for a pee in the bushes at night as you never kjnow when you are suddenly going to disappear from view down a ruddy great badger-created hole in the ground!
Of course, if one was sober it probably wouldn;t be so bad. But what's the fun of camping without alchyhol?

Our Provincial parks aren't the likely place for badgers to be frolicking. Moose, bear, wolf or coyote, perhaps..... no badgers.

The (American) badgers, either "Taxidea taxus jacksoni" population in Canada estimated between 0 and 200, and confined to a few very small pockets around the Great Lakes. http://www.speciesatrisk.gc.ca/search/speciesDetails_e.cfm?SpeciesID=621 ; or "Taxidea taxus jeffersonii", population less than 200 as of the year 2000, and residing in the lower bits of BC http://www.speciesatrisk.gc.ca/search/speciesDetails_e.cfm?SpeciesID=622 are endangered, here in Canada.

http://www.speciesatrisk.gc.ca/default_e.cfm
For some excellent short videos on Canadian Wildlife: http://www.hww.ca/media.asp Doo check out the spoof ones, too.

" between 0 and 200"
So they don't actually know if there are any or not then?


Just off to try your links,

Well, it is a little hard to count endangered species, especially when they are nocturnal, and spread out over an area as large as they are spread out over.... Yes, they are confined to this small range (small when compared to the landmass of North America), but that range is 250km long and 125 wide (give or take a few km). Their ranges are between 2 and 500 km.

As well, that area of Ontario is rather more densly populated than, say Saskatchewan, and with the growth of subdivisions, their territories are fragmented, meaning that, not only is it more difficult to meet up with members of the opposite sex, but they are more at risk from getting squished on the roads.