why-animals-do-the-thing:

jhameia:

premierbonheur:

sententiola:

[Video of venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough standing amid vegetation.  On a near-horizontal branch above his head is a brown and yellow greater bird of paradise, about the size of a crow, with big floaty yellow plumage puffing out along its back.]

Bird:  Pwuk.  Pwuk.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  This, surely –
Bird (hopping along the branch):  WUKWUKWUkwukwukwukoooh.  Oooh.  Oooh.

[Cut.  Same shot.]

Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  This, surely, is one –
Bird:  Kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark kark.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  This, surely –

[Cut.  Same shot but the bird is on the other side now and venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough has his hand on the branch.]

Bird (hopping up and down on venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough’s fingers):  Eh-eh.  Eh-eh.  Eh-urrrr.  Eh-urrrr.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  Close up –
Bird (hopping away from him):  Tiktiktiktik.  Tiktiktiktik.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – the plumes –
Bird (hopping around):  Huek.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough: – are truly –
Bird:  Huek.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – exquisite.
Bird:  Huek.  Eh-eh.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  The gauzy –
Bird (hopping and spinning on the spot):  HukWUKWUKWukwukoooh.  Oooh.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  …

[Cut.  Same shot but the bird is back on the original side of the branch.]

Bird:  Aark.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  Of course, by the eighteenth century –
Bird:  Ehhh.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – naturalists realized that birds of paradise –
Bird (hops across to the other side of the branch)
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – did have –
Bird (hopping back again):  Krrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – legs.  Even so –
Bird:  WUKWUKWUKWukwukwukooh.

[Cut.  Same shot.]
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough (apparently trying to tickle the bird’s tummy):  – by about the eighteenth century –
Bird (hops away and spins round)
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – and so –
Bird:  AAAAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK AAAK aaak.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough (wearily):  …  Very well.

[Cut.  Same shot.]

Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – but Karl Linnaeus, the great –
Bird (vibrating rapidly on the spot and then flapping its wings):  PWAAAAAAAK.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – classifier of the natural world –
Bird:  AAAAAUUUH AAAUUUH AAAUUUH AAAUUUH AAAUUUH AAAUUUH AAAUUUH AAUUH.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – when he came to allocate a scientific name –
Bird:  …
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – to this bird –
Bird:  …
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – called it –
Bird:  Wooo-ooo.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – wooo-ooo –
Bird (surveys the surroundings with a dignified turn of the head)
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  ‘paradisia apoda’: the bird of paradise –
Bird:  Hoooo.
Venerable TV naturalist David Attenborough:  – without legs.
Bird:  Eh-eh.

[Close-up of the bird.]

Bird:  WUKWUKWUKWUkwukwukwukwukoooh.  Ooh.
Bird:  Ooh.

[Fade to black.]

Officially the only good post on tumblr

I’ve been planning to teach students how to describe videos and write transcripts and I shall save this post for this very purpose.

Sharing for the perfect transcript.

glumshoe:

argumate:

warpedellipsis:

glumshoe:

I hate when bird parents get mad at me for rescuing their children.

Don’t want me touching your kid? Fine, YOU crawl down there and use YOUR super-dexterous hands with opposable thumbs to gently lift your son out of this window-well. Oh, you can’t do that? Then shut up and stop swooping me, you ungrateful leftover dinosaurs.

when dinosaur is both an insult and accurate

I missed the fact you said bird parents and thought this was about the kids at summer camp

bird camp, which is for birds,

kedreeva:

The other day I got a bug up my ass about lake Natron, because I’ve seen the photos of the calcified remains of animals that took a dip in the lake on accident, but I’ve only seen those photos in black and white. I’m sure you’ve seen them.

I thought, you know, calcified remains should be really interesting to see in color, so I tried to find some that had been taken by others, in color. It was not nearly as visual stunning, they were just white rotting remains, I won’t scar anyone by posting them.

But what caught my eye wasn’t the dead. It was the fucking lake.

It’s BLOOD fucking RED.

It’s super alkaline (deadly), blood fucking red (terrifying), and oh, it gets to be 106F/41C in the water. Red spirulina algae thrives here and provides food for the main denizen of the lake…. fucking lesser flamingos.

Look at their fucking mud nests!

You need to leave!! You have found flamingo Silent Hill!! What are you still doing here!! I’ll tell you!! They’re still doing there because literally the death lake protects them from predators, nothing big enough to be a threat to them gets across the lake to get them. There are millions of them living there safely.

What the fuck. what the FUCK nature. This is some of the most amazing shit you’ve ever pulled and hardly anyone knows about it. I’m on to you. I see your blood lake with your pink goth bird decorations. I see you.

underappreciated bird species

le-poofe:

wanderingtycho:

lost-opium:

realmofthefirebird:

owltoastie:

the-eldritch-it-gay:

silverhawk:

silverhawk:

nicobar pigeon

golden pheasant

victoria crowned pigeon

kakapo

blue footed booby

long-tailed widowbird

greater bird of paradise

lesser bird of paradise

stork-billed kingfisher

frillback pigeon

@kyofudork

Bearded Vulture

Sooty Owl

Green Heron

Andean Cock-of-the-rock

Scissor-tailed Flycatcher

Superb Fairy-wren

Cedar Waxwing

Gray Catbird

Altamira Oriole

White-cheeked Turaco

Shit, I reblogged this on the wrong blog. Well, I hope my side-blog followers like birds.

@wanderingtycho don’t you have a friend who likes birds? Also I wanna those pigeons instead of the nasty usual one!

@le-poofe I do have a friend who appreciates birbs! And exotic birbs no less!

Omg!! Look at all the pretty birbs!!!

atomic-darth:

gryffon:

gryffon:

was driving with my girlfriend and spotted a vulture with a broken wing standing on the side of the road. there was an animal hospital nearby with a wildlife unit so we pulled over and picked it up and drove it to tufts. i think its got a good chance at survival and it feels good to have been able to make the call and help an injured wild animal out

the funniest part of this was showing up at the Tufts emergency room with all these average folks with their dogs sitting politely on leashes in the waiting room and us being two very sweaty, disheveled haggy dykes who are bursting in and nearly running up to the desk holding a vulture in nothing but our bare hands and the look of extreme shock and horror on everybody’s face

Gay culture is bursting into an animal clinic looking to get medical treatment for a carrion bird