Tag: egyptian goose

Angry birds

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A clickbait-laden headline led me to a paywalled article from the M&G this morning:

More like… budgie constraints, amirite?

But hard luck, M&G, because I got all the information I required from your first (free) paragraph. Ha!

We know that there is no money available to help control or eradicate these pests, because
a) there’s no money available for anything, and
b) the entire department budget went on “don’t do this” signs in Struisbaai.

On the actual birds, we don’t see much of any of them in Cape Town (yet). Allegedly, there are Indian House Crow colonies here, but they are nowhere near as widespread as in Durban and KZN. There are more mallards in Bakewell than in Kaapstad, and the Mynas and Parakeets haven’t really got this far either.

It’s a bit concerning to see the parakeets described as “popular” above. Sure, they’re nice to look at, but they are still nasty invasives, destroying the habitats of our indigenous wildlife. This is the same thing that squirrels do, and it’s why I will happily take a catapult to any I see around our garden.

These parakeets are a problem worldwide. But who is responsible?

Paging Ian Betteridge.

That said, while these may all be terrible invasive avian species to have around, they’re still not annoying as some of our homegrown birds: the Egyptian Goose (not really from Egypt, not really a goose) and the F*****g Guineafowl being the worst birds ever to exist.

I’m less willing to take a catty to either of these two, because sadly, they do actually belong here, but I will (and have) happily taken the drone out of an evening to dislodge them from a prospective roosting spot within earshot of my bedroom.

Day 508 – Birds solution

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I posted yesterday about my issue with the local Egyptian Geese. They weren’t around this morning, but then it’s a school day, so I had to be up early anyway. They only like to mess up your (potential) lie-in days.

Bastards.

Anyway… today, amongst my suggested videos on Youtube was this 1 minute gem:

I’m not saying that Google is reading my mind, but if it is, it’s doing a damn good job and yes, I’m hugely tempted.

The TF-19 attachment allows user to “remotely ignite targets from up to several miles away”…

I don’t need the several miles range. The issue is that the geese are close to the house. But as a solution to my problem, this is definitely a good idea and I can’t see any down sides.

Day 204 – Surrounded

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It’s been a proper summer’s day in Cape Town.
Hot. Sunny. Blue, cloudless skies as far as the eye can see.
Hot. And sunny.

We made the most of it: I enjoyed a drink in the shade with Mrs 6000 before she headed off on her weekend away with the girls. And then we braaied some excellent and simple burgers, adding just enough of my delicious homemade coriander mayo. It truly is the King of Herbs. Don’t even dream about @ing me.

Perhaps because we were still outside as twilight fell, we heard the roosting of several birds around us. Doves (not that one) in the trees in the back garden; a Hadeda Ibis on the house behind; a pair of Egyptian geese on the chimney across the road.

Those last two species are not birds you want to be roosting anywhere near your house with a potential lie-in opportunity approaching (which is clearly what tomorrow morning is – both a lie-in opportunity and approaching). These are obnoxiously loud, early birds.

I’m going to have to get the drone up and do some close passes for the good of the neighbourhood. And sure, it only moves the problem of the obnoxiously loud, early birds elsewhere, but equally – and importantly – it moves the problem of the obnoxiously loud, early birds elsewhere.

Time to do some community service.
See you tomorrow (not too early).

Displacing Bob. Neighbourhood Service.

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It’s the last day of the school holidays today. That means that from tomorrow, all hell will break loose on the roads of the Southern Suburbs and (more importantly for the purposes of this post) I will have to get up an hour earlier than I have been for the past couple of weeks.

Ugh.

This is significant, because it means that I will no longer have to displace Bob.

Bob is our local Egyptian Goose (Alopochen aegyptiacus). He’s bloody annoying.

Egyptian Geese mate for life, but it would appear that within the last 12 months, something awful has befallen Mrs Bob. She is no longer with Bob. It could have been that she has chosen to fly off with a more handsome Egyptian Goose, but that does rather flutter in the face of that ‘one partner for life’ promise. So I think that it’s entirely more likely that she’s thrown a seven at some point recently.

RIP Mrs Bob.

Bob is either distraught or he’s too thick to have noticed anything except that suddenly, there’s no-one on his wing to do the rumpy-pumpy dance with.

Either way, he lets us know his feelings of sadness and/or frustration by honking very loudly early in the morning from his chosen roosting position on one of the local neighbourhood chimneys.

Bob is bloody annoying.

Tomorrow, Bob won’t wake me up. The combination of the later Autumnal sunrise and my enforced earlier alarm time means that his honks will be drowned out by the sound of the kettle and the kids getting ready for school.

It also means that this evening, I won’t have to take Florence the drone on a spin around our vicinity at dusk in order to locate Bob and then displace him, gently convincing him to select a more distant roost by using an advanced technique known as “flying relatively close to him”.
It takes a couple of minutes to locate him and then literally 20 seconds to get him to sling his metaphorical hook. Easy.

I’m fully aware that this might be classified as “disturbing wildlife”, but in my defence there are two important mitigating factors at play here:

Firstly, he has premeditated plans to disturb me in about 12 hours time, and:
Secondly, if I wasn’t gently moving him on with the drone, I would be throwing stones at him until he left the area. Dangerous to him, local residents and their windows.

This is a quick, easy, painless method of ensuring that everyone locally can get a extra hour in bed each morning. It’s a neighbourhood service that I’m more than happy to provide.