escape wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 08:36:14 -0600, dt opined:




Hundreds of dead grackles???

Sounds like either:
a. a good start
b. a drop in the bucket

DT
http://www.thehungersite.com/



You have no idea how horrendous this makes you sound as a human being. How
void are you to say such a thing like this. My heart goes out to such hatred.


My apologies at offending anyone. No hatred, necessarily, but it certainly seems like the songbird population takes a beating whenever you've got large flocks of grackles around. Not to mention the stench of a large urban roost.

"According to George Simmons’ Birds of the Austin Region, great-tails
were considered rare and local summer residents in 1921 from early
March to July, reaching their northern limit in Central Texas. Today,
great-tails have pushed their home range as far north as southern
Canada." http://www.tpwmagazine.com/archive/2004/nov/legend/

Another bird that's greatly extended its territory is the white-wing dove. 30 years ago you'd *never* see one this far north; now there's neighborhoods in Austin that have hundreds, if not thousands.

DT
http://www.thehungersite.com/

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 22:05:00 GMT, escape
wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 08:36:14 -0600, dt opined:
Hundreds of dead grackles???

Sounds like either:
a. a good start
b. a drop in the bucket

You have no idea how horrendous this makes you sound as a human being. How
void are you to say such a thing like this. My heart goes out to such hatred.

There are many organisms in the world that are vermin. I would
personally consider grackles to be vermin and I suspect I am in the
company of many folks. Although I would not say I hate them, I
certainly have no use for them and it is OK with me if a "drop in the
bucket" number of them croaked.

Rusty Mase

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 16:20:46 -0600, dt
wrote:


Another bird that's greatly extended its territory
is the white-wing dove. 30 years ago you'd *never*
see one this far north; now there's neighborhoods
in Austin that have hundreds, if not thousands.

"A Bird Finding and Naturalist's Guide for the Austin, Texas Area
(Kutac and Caran, 1976) lists White-winged Doves as occurring as
"Accidentals" in the Austin areas based on a sighting in May 1973.

I moved into my home in 1976 and the only doves I noticed were Inca
Doves and an occasional Morning Dove. Now I have only White-winged
Doves, and those, abundantly.

Rusty Mase

There are many organisms in the world that are vermin. I would
personally consider grackles to be vermin and I suspect I am in the
company of many folks. Although I would not say I hate them, I
certainly have no use for them and it is OK with me if a "drop in the
bucket" number of them croaked.

Rusty Mase

Are grackles the same thing as starlings? THEY rank somewhere in the same
level as cockroaches in my book.

Cindy

escape wrote:
On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 08:36:14 -0600, dt opined:



Hundreds of dead grackles???

Sounds like either:
a. a good start
b. a drop in the bucket

DT
http://www.thehungersite.com/


You have no idea how horrendous this makes you sound as a human being. How
void are you to say such a thing like this. My heart goes out to such hatred.





Need a good, cheap, knowledge expanding present for yourself or a friend?
http://www.animaux.net/stern/present.html

I think I recall you mentioning you leaned toward Buddhism. I did a
little searching to help me understand your position:

"Buddhism, from its inception, enjoined treating all animals with
kindness and compassion as well as required the observance of a
vegeterian diet cannot be denied. The first or basic precept of
Buddhism, that of Ahimsa or Non-harming, decively prohibits the killing
and infliction of suffering on sentient beings, whether men or animals.
Needless to say, this precept cannot be reconciled with the eating of
animals flesh any more than it can with hunting, fishing, or the
butchering of animals! From the Buddhist perspective, the killing and
eating of animals not only violates Buddhism's basic ethical principle
of Ahimsa, but also creates a negative psychic atmosphere and
perpetuates karmic bondage."

If this philosophy is to be taken seriously then it is possible you went
too far in your verbal butchering of dt's comments and proclaiming him a
flawed person. It reminds me of a Mad Magazine 'Lighter Side of Growing
Up' when the mother is beating the son while saying," Don't (smack) hit
(smack) your sister (smack)!

Since I have lived way too close to several grackle roosts I can at
least understand dt's feelings. A couple of thousand crapping, shrieking
birds can get on your nerves after three or four weeks. I know people
that have seen "The Birds" movie that pretty much freak out when they
pass a big roost. Once I went shopping at Highland Mall and came out to
find my car was encased in grackle poop since I had parked under some
trees. It took 45 minutes to get the windows clean enough to see to get
to the nearest car wash. The sun had "cured" the droppings to dismay :-(

On the other hand, Victoria, your feelings of compassion toward animals
are also familiar and understandable to me. Who is right? Both of you
and neither of you --- cryptic comment

By the way and on-topic, the new Home Depot on RR620 close to 2222 has a
bigger garden center than most. They have a few interesting finds there
plus they are not very busy most of the time.

In article ,
Rusty Mase wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 22:05:00 GMT, escape
wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 08:36:14 -0600, dt opined:
Hundreds of dead grackles???

Sounds like either:
a. a good start
b. a drop in the bucket

You have no idea how horrendous this makes you sound as a human being. How
void are you to say such a thing like this. My heart goes out to such
hatred.

There are many organisms in the world that are vermin. I would
personally consider grackles to be vermin and I suspect I am in the
company of many folks. Although I would not say I hate them, I
certainly have no use for them and it is OK with me if a "drop in the
bucket" number of them croaked.

Rusty Mase

I think I'm going to keep out of this one. ;-)
I have mixed feelings...

Yeah, I think Grackles are cute and I don't wish them ill,
but they DO tend to get a bit overpopulated and drive out
other species! The only things that seem to be able to
compete with them are doves and mockingbirds! Noisy as heck too,
and the babies are a bitch to keep alive in rehab. I've learned
to dread getting them in and pass them on to wildlife rescue in
Kendalia asap.

OTOH, they make good falcon food!

I was blessed with a wonderful early morning experience a couple of
months ago in the parking lot at our local HEB! I saw a pretty little
hawk on the ground in one of the parking lot islands and on closer look,
of all things, it was a PEREGRINE FALCON!!!

Probably migrating.

It had just caught it's breakfast and flew off with it as I approached.
Appears to have been a female grackle.

Oh well! ;-)

--
K.

Sprout the Mung Bean to reply...

There is no need to change the world. All we have to do is toilet train the world and we'll never have to change it again. -- Swami Beyondanada

,,Cat's Haven Hobby Farm,,Katraatcenturyteldotnet,,

http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...user id=katra

In article ,
Rusty Mase wrote:

On Wed, 30 Mar 2005 16:20:46 -0600, dt
wrote:


Another bird that's greatly extended its territory
is the white-wing dove. 30 years ago you'd *never*
see one this far north; now there's neighborhoods
in Austin that have hundreds, if not thousands.

"A Bird Finding and Naturalist's Guide for the Austin, Texas Area
(Kutac and Caran, 1976) lists White-winged Doves as occurring as
"Accidentals" in the Austin areas based on a sighting in May 1973.

I moved into my home in 1976 and the only doves I noticed were Inca
Doves and an occasional Morning Dove. Now I have only White-winged
Doves, and those, abundantly.

Rusty Mase

I have all three.

All the time and in mixed numbers...

They come into my hen yard to get free food. ;-)

I adore the little inca doves! They are so cute!

Unfortunately, all three species also carry pox which
does a number on my baby pigeons every spring. :-P
--
K.

In article ,
"Cindy" wrote:

There are many organisms in the world that are vermin. I would
personally consider grackles to be vermin and I suspect I am in the
company of many folks. Although I would not say I hate them, I
certainly have no use for them and it is OK with me if a "drop in the
bucket" number of them croaked.

Rusty Mase

Are grackles the same thing as starlings? THEY rank somewhere in the same
level as cockroaches in my book.

Cindy



Same family, blackbirds, but no, they are not the same bird...

Grackles are larger and have dark eyes.
Starlings are smaller, quieter, and have those bright yellow eyes.

I don't really see that many starlings around here.

Probably due to the abundance of grackles filling that niche. G
--
K.

Katra wrote:
snip

I was blessed with a wonderful early morning experience a couple of
months ago in the parking lot at our local HEB! I saw a pretty little
hawk on the ground in one of the parking lot islands and on closer look,
of all things, it was a PEREGRINE FALCON!!!

Probably migrating.

It had just caught it's breakfast and flew off with it as I approached.
Appears to have been a female grackle.

Oh well! ;-)

I'd swear I saw a Peregrine Falcon diving toward a flock? of pigeons near last week near S. Congress & Ben White. It was a fast bird with the
long tail and tapered wings and the pigeons were going every different direction! It dove steeply then leveled off and seemed follow one pigeon over
the top of a building and out of view.

I got a rush out of seeing it, whatever kiind of bird it was. )

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 05:49:22 GMT, jOhN
wrote:

"Buddhism, from its inception, enjoined treating all animals with
kindness and compassion as well as required the observance of a
vegeterian diet cannot be denied.

One of the groups espousing Buddhism are the Janists and as I recall
they extend this reverence for life to both plants and animals. In
their view, reincarnation can be in the form of both plants and
animals. So it is possible to be reincarnated as a turnip and,
egads!, end up in the produce section of your local super market.
Janists are thus relegated to finding their sustenance in the trash
can. It is not their fault that discarded food was prepared from a
living organism. Something like that, but I probably put some western
influence in the interpretation.

As gardeners, we are involved in growing plants. Many garden
vegetables and fruits have been genetically modified by selecting for
suitable food production and we end up creating real genetic
monstrosities like broccoli. Then we go out and eliminate a nice
native prairie and replace it with monocultures of these genetic
aberrations, then decapitate them when mature and haul them off, still
alive, to the local market where they are displayed, fatally injured,
waiting for someone to haul them off, cut them up, possibly boil them,
and eat them.

I have always been at a loss as to why this scenario is acceptable but
raising and then killing a chicken for food is not acceptable. It is
based on the fallible concept of "sentience", the human sense that a
living organisms mentally responds to you. The less you sense this
capacity to respond, the less you grant an organism the right to be
revered. This argument seems a little too self-serving to me and I
have always had difficulty conversing with people who espouse a more
or less religious view of vegetarianism.

As gardeners we are better off revering everything, whether we
considering it to be alive or not.

Rusty Mase

Same family, blackbirds, but no, they are not the same bird...

Grackles are larger and have dark eyes.
Starlings are smaller, quieter, and have those bright yellow eyes.

I don't really see that many starlings around here.

Probably due to the abundance of grackles filling that niche. G
--
K.

Yeah, I learned to despise starlings in Montana, where they're in aBUNdant
supply. They're really pretty birds, though.
I went to an exotic pet store not too long ago, and they were selling three
different color varieties of African starling. They all had the bright
yellow eyes and iridescent plumage. They were beautiful!

Cindy

In article , hayduke
wrote:

Katra wrote:
snip

I was blessed with a wonderful early morning experience a couple of
months ago in the parking lot at our local HEB! I saw a pretty little
hawk on the ground in one of the parking lot islands and on closer look,
of all things, it was a PEREGRINE FALCON!!!

Probably migrating.

It had just caught it's breakfast and flew off with it as I approached.
Appears to have been a female grackle.

Oh well! ;-)

I'd swear I saw a Peregrine Falcon diving toward a flock? of pigeons near
last week near S. Congress & Ben White. It was a fast bird with the
long tail and tapered wings and the pigeons were going every different
direction! It dove steeply then leveled off and seemed follow one pigeon over
the top of a building and out of view.

I got a rush out of seeing it, whatever kiind of bird it was. )


Well, I did call Wildlife rescue to ask about peregrines, and they said
that they were occasionally spotted in this area. Due to the time of
year, the one I saw was most likely migrating and I have not seen it
since, so it's very possible that you DID see one!

They are not very large, blue-gray body, speckled chest and a mask on
their eyes.

And their prey of choice are pigeons and other medium sized birds.

If Austin wants to control grackles, introducing peregrines would be a
very good way to do it and they happily nest on skyscraper window
ledges. ;-)

Yes, seeing a hawk stoop to the kill is a rush isn't it?

--
K.

Sprout the Mung Bean to reply...

There is no need to change the world. All we have to do is toilet train the world and we'll never have to change it again. -- Swami Beyondanada

,,Cat's Haven Hobby Farm,,Katraatcenturyteldotnet,,

http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...user id=katra

In article ,
Rusty Mase wrote:

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 05:49:22 GMT, jOhN
wrote:

"Buddhism, from its inception, enjoined treating all animals with
kindness and compassion as well as required the observance of a
vegeterian diet cannot be denied.

One of the groups espousing Buddhism are the Janists and as I recall
they extend this reverence for life to both plants and animals. In
their view, reincarnation can be in the form of both plants and
animals. So it is possible to be reincarnated as a turnip and,
egads!, end up in the produce section of your local super market.
Janists are thus relegated to finding their sustenance in the trash
can. It is not their fault that discarded food was prepared from a
living organism. Something like that, but I probably put some western
influence in the interpretation.

As gardeners, we are involved in growing plants. Many garden
vegetables and fruits have been genetically modified by selecting for
suitable food production and we end up creating real genetic
monstrosities like broccoli. Then we go out and eliminate a nice
native prairie and replace it with monocultures of these genetic
aberrations, then decapitate them when mature and haul them off, still
alive, to the local market where they are displayed, fatally injured,
waiting for someone to haul them off, cut them up, possibly boil them,
and eat them.

I have always been at a loss as to why this scenario is acceptable but
raising and then killing a chicken for food is not acceptable. It is
based on the fallible concept of "sentience", the human sense that a
living organisms mentally responds to you. The less you sense this
capacity to respond, the less you grant an organism the right to be
revered. This argument seems a little too self-serving to me and I
have always had difficulty conversing with people who espouse a more
or less religious view of vegetarianism.

As gardeners we are better off revering everything, whether we
considering it to be alive or not.

Rusty Mase

applause!!!
All life is sacred!
--
K.

In article ,
escape wrote:

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 00:36:38 -0600, Katra
opined:


I think I'm going to keep out of this one. ;-)
I have mixed feelings...

Yeah, I think Grackles are cute and I don't wish them ill,
but they DO tend to get a bit overpopulated and drive out
other species!

They are native birds.


Duh.
And humans are native to the planet (altho' there are some theorists
that say otherwise), but that does not make our overpopulation any less
destructive.

Native birds or not, that does not mean that an over-population of a
"native species" cannot do damage to the _other_ "native speices"!!!

Do you really want only ONE type of bird to inhabit the entire planet???

--
K.

Sprout the Mung Bean to reply...

There is no need to change the world. All we have to do is toilet train the world and we'll never have to change it again. -- Swami Beyondanada

,,Cat's Haven Hobby Farm,,Katraatcenturyteldotnet,,

http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...user id=katra

In article ,
escape wrote:

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 07:59:45 -0600, Rusty Mase opined:

On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 05:49:22 GMT, jOhN
wrote:

"Buddhism, from its inception, enjoined treating all animals with
kindness and compassion as well as required the observance of a
vegeterian diet cannot be denied.

One of the groups espousing Buddhism are the Janists and as I recall
they extend this reverence for life to both plants and animals. In
their view, reincarnation can be in the form of both plants and
animals. So it is possible to be reincarnated as a turnip and,
egads!, end up in the produce section of your local super market.
Janists are thus relegated to finding their sustenance in the trash
can. It is not their fault that discarded food was prepared from a
living organism. Something like that, but I probably put some western
influence in the interpretation.

As gardeners, we are involved in growing plants. Many garden
vegetables and fruits have been genetically modified by selecting for
suitable food production and we end up creating real genetic
monstrosities like broccoli. Then we go out and eliminate a nice
native prairie and replace it with monocultures of these genetic
aberrations, then decapitate them when mature and haul them off, still
alive, to the local market where they are displayed, fatally injured,
waiting for someone to haul them off, cut them up, possibly boil them,
and eat them.

I have always been at a loss as to why this scenario is acceptable but
raising and then killing a chicken for food is not acceptable. It is
based on the fallible concept of "sentience", the human sense that a
living organisms mentally responds to you. The less you sense this
capacity to respond, the less you grant an organism the right to be
revered. This argument seems a little too self-serving to me and I
have always had difficulty conversing with people who espouse a more
or less religious view of vegetarianism.

As gardeners we are better off revering everything, whether we
considering it to be alive or not.

Rusty Mase

I assure you my Buddhist Teacher is an ordained Nun and she eats meat. Not
all
Buddhists are vegetarians. It is believed that the animal is already dead,
so
eat it, but say mantras and make offerings before eating it is always nice to
do.

If you don't believe, that's okay. Buddhism is the only "religion" which
does
not tell us to take Buddha's word for anything. He always said to go out
and
check for ourselves. It all works for me.

We are always killing things every second of every minute. We breath
organisms
in and out always. We walk, crushing sentient beings with each step,
wherever
we walk. Serious Buddhist practitioners do purification practices to
eliminate
those karmic seeds from ever ripening.

I don't say you should believe in Buddhist philosophy, but I do say that
hatred
is so unkind and celebrating the death of any living thing is awful, IMO.

Victoria


Victoria dear, I think you took his comment out of context. ;-)
I personally found it to be humourous and I think he meant it to be such!

While I would NEVER "celebrate" the untimely death of thousands of
grackles, he did have a point! In some areas there are far, FAR too many
of them and as a result, the population is none too healthy and they can
cause a health hazard to other species in those great numbers.

--
K.

Sprout the Mung Bean to reply...

There is no need to change the world. All we have to do is toilet train the world and we'll never have to change it again. -- Swami Beyondanada

,,Cat's Haven Hobby Farm,,Katraatcenturyteldotnet,,

http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dl...user id=katra