Beautiful Animals

Some very cute baby sheep...

Some Merino lambies (click on to see source):

That's a gorgeous peacock, Vonny!

And cute lambs, too, Osso!

I've my own one or maybe two pics when sheep and lambs were crossing the road in tuscany. It's not my business, y'know, but I like to see.

Thank you, FBM - my inferior photography doesn't show it to full advantage, but it was truly beautiful. Next time I go to the garden centre, where he lives, I'll try and get a shot of him with his tail feathers fully extended - breathtaking!

Yacare Caimans, Brazil

Cooling off. A Sri Lankan mahout hoses down his elephant at Gangaramaya temple in Colombo. The Sri Lankan elephant is listed as endangered as the population has declined by at least 50% over the past three generations, with the species threatened by habitat loss, degradation and fragmentation.
Photograph: Ishara S.kodikara/AFP/Getty Images/via Guardian
(I've gotten more interested in Sri Lanka since I'm reading Michael Ondaatje's book, The Cat's Table. He was born in Colombo. I'd already read some about fairly recent history, now want to know some more.)

Not cuddly, but who is to say what true beauty is? Mitsukurina owstoni, a deep sea creature that's been sighted less that fifty times since its discovery. They're the only living representative of the family Mitsukurinidae.

vonny, Cute kitten. Roar away, kitty. Is that black and white water fowl a goose or a duck? I recognize the peacock. Don't need any help with that. There were peacocks roaming around the Bronx Zoo. Just wandering around--making a lot of noise. They are major beauties. Thanks. The baby caiman pic is superb. Thanks, again.

roger, What you say about big cats and roaring is true. However, try to convince the kitten that it isn't roaring. Big is not always measured in decibels.

Reg, Beautiful pic. Mudder PC and baby. Sigh.

firefly, I coulda used a thud alert. Too cute. Too beautiful. Thanks mucho.

osso, I recover from one thud and then rethud. The merinos are tres gawgeous. Thanks, kid. Glad to see a happy and wet pachyderm.

edgar, I'm fascinated by the other-worldly look of deep sea creatures. This one is a major doozy. Thanks muchisimo.

Swordfish:

Edgar, that looks like a cross between a swordfish and a purple dachshund what overdid it on lipstick.

First time I've ever got a look at elephant teeth. They look like ripple chips.

Another steal from Facebook,without a nod to the poster Ed

A goose - a cheeky one that came up to me in the quest for bread!

That picture looks just like a Canadian Goose, I looked it up and subspecies live in Europe. Do you know what kind of goose this one is? Canadian geese are always "cheeky". Especially if you go between them and their hatchlings. We find them a lot here on the golf course and must beware. They can also do a lot of damage to the greens and leave behind a nasty little reminder.

They're actually Canada Geese, not Canadian Geese--that's their name. When I was a kid in Michigan we used to drive up into Ontario to Jack Miner's
Bird Sanctuary, where flocks of Canada Geese would come for the summer. In the winter, they'd fly south. They're almost waist high, big birds, very regal bearing, and at the time really exotic. Then when I moved to Boston, I found that Canada Geese live here year round. Somewhere in the interim the climate warmed up enough that they discovered they could eke out a living here all year, so why make that tiring flight. There's a bunch that live on the Fenway, near Fenway Park. In the last coouple weeks, this year's chicks have started feeding with the big folks, they're feathery-fuzzy little butterballs maybe a little smaller than basketballs now. As the flock moves around, a couple males stand watch at the edge on the moms and the chicks, so no predators, a.k.a. humans, get too close. They brook no **** if we do.

There's a nice movie out on DVD called "Fly Away Home", a 13-year-old Anna Paquin finds orphaned Canada Geese chicks. they imprint on her as their mom, and she ends up flying them safe to their winter home in the south in an ultralight plane painted to look like a huge goose, which they think is their mother and follow. It's a sweet movie, but a little dated now, since they hang out in the north all the time. I'm kinda surprised Roberta isn't familiar with them in NYC--I'd think there'd be a few enterprising flocks of them there by now.

Canada Goose chicklets

CANADIAN GEESE.
Every once in a while the question "Canada goose or Canadian goose?" is used as yet another pedantic shibboleth, and I am pleased to find a birding page by Lisa Shea that addresses the issue with good sense and as scientific an attitude as any linguist could ask:

The vast majority of English speaking people call the goose that is large and has a black head—Branta canadensis—a Canadian Goose. However, its original name was a CANADA Goose.

Remember, the official name for any bird is its Latin name. So the "real" name for this creature is Branta canadensis. That's because the bird probably has 200 different names in 200 different languages, based on its colors, its sounds, its habitat or many other reasons. Birds get named after people, after habits, after all sorts of things. The Latin name is the same around the world for that bird.

So it's true that at one point in time the Branta canadensis was called a Canada Goose, because it was often seen flying towards Canada and living there. You could now just as easily call it a North American Goose since it is found all over North America and lives just about anywhere. It has adapted to live all across the US and into Mexico too.

So over the years, the name has changed to be Canadian Goose in English. Just like people in the 1600s used to call pumpkins "Pompions" and call vegetables "potherbs", we have changed what we typically call the Branta canadensis to Canadian Goose.

In Canada, by the way, francophones call it bernache du Canada. (Via a typically thorough and well-informed comment by Dan Hartung.)


I have always called them Canadian Geese and will continue to do so. I don't remember ever hearing them called anything else. As in many names, both are acceptable. Have a very pleasnat day!

I have always heard them called Canada Goose. That's what they were called in Michigan and Ontario. That's what they're called in Boston. That's what Wikipedia calls them. As it says:
I'm not going to change either. You have a pleasant day too.

Leave me out of any arguments! I love the goosey things - whatever their names are - Latin or otherwise. These darlings are resident in England and eat from my hand - have gorgeous young ones - and are very photogenic. I've never seen any aggression from them - in fact, when the Moorhens become territorial, the big fellows just calmly paddle out of the way. They get on well with the Mallards and Swans too. Oh, and I've seen the film referred to - 'Fly Away Home' - terrific for any animal lover.