Zander Pike?

On a whim, Marge and I ventured to Niles yesterday for an early-evening dinner at one of our favorite restaurants, the Riverfront Cafe.

One of the nightly specials was billed as “zander pike.” Bemused at the strange name, and curious about the true identity of this new menu item, I queried the waiter, “What kind of fish is zander pike, exactly?” The stammered reply was, “Um, it’s sort of like walleye, prepared with a special cream sauce.” Being suckers for any kind of well-prepared, fresh fish, we both ordered it.

Well, it was delicious! I initially presumed that zander was a misspelling and mispronunciation of Sander, the genus name for walleye (Sander vitreus), a popular food-fish native to the Great Lakes. In fact, I ate the fish think that it WAS walleye, which it certainly resembled in flesh and taste. Only when I returned home and did a Google search did I realize that zander is actually the common name for Sander lucioperca, a closely-related fish native to Europe that is sometimes called pike-perch.

Lame Duck

Have you ever wondered about the origin of the ornithological (or not) term, lame duck? Philologist Marina Orlova, the brains behind HotForWords, has investigated this age-old question and offers this explanation (click on video below):

Philanthropic Winery is for the Birds

A freak event in which a hawk electrocuted on power lines created a blaze that destroyed a California vineyard in May 2008 inspired Resolution Wines and Windsor Vineyards to team up to launch Burning Hawk wine, a charitable brand that will help prevent bird electrocutions and collisions. As described more fully here:

10% of total sales of Burning Hawk wine will be contributed to organizations working to prevent raptors and other birds from being killed through electrocution or collision with power lines, windmills and other elements of the energy system.

Photo: Golden Eagle on power pole, by Nick Dunlop.

Read more about the Burning Hawk venture here. Are you suddenly feeling thirsty? Then here’s your chance to enjoy a fine bottle of wine while doing your part to promote raptor conservation at the same time. Go online and purchase a bottle of Burning Hawk today!

Cornell Promotes Bird Blogging

In an announcement that could be a year or more old (it carries a copyright date of 2007), Cornell University Cooperative Extension promotes blogs as a great way to Celebrate Urban Birds! Given the spate of new bird blogs that have come online since the first of the year (at least 41 by my count), it appears that many people have taken this suggestion to heart. I’m honored that this humble blog was included among Cornell's appended “examples of some bird blogs.”

Addendum added 8/25/08: In a comment on the initial post, cyberthrush of Ivory-bills LiVE!! pointed out the obvious, that there is “no need for the emphasis on ‘urban birds’ – blogs can be about rural birds, pelagic birds, tropical birds, bird behavior or biology, or perhaps even birds of the remote southeastern bottomland swamps :-),” a point very well taken. Your blog should obviously reflect your personal views of the avian world. That's what makes perusing the myriad of bird blogs now available so much fun!

Josh Hartnett wallpapers and photos

Check out these hot wallpapers and photos of Josh Hartnett. Harnett was born 21st July 1978 in San Francisco and his film roles include Lucky Number Slevin, Sin City, Pearl Harbour (Oh dear very bad choice Mr Hartnett!), The Virgin Suicides and The Faculty. He is an insanely good looking guy as these pictures attest:















In arrested development:



Looking very tough here:



Hartnett has had relationships with Scarlett Johansson and Helena Christensen and last year with the singer Rihanna pictured below:



Wallpapers:



















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Inactive North American Bird Blogs

In an attempt to clean up my list of known North American bird blogs (see blog roll at right), I’ve decided to consolidate all of the inactive bird blogs into one file (i.e., hyperlink). Inactive blogs are defined as those to which nothing has been posted in the last 12 months, but which remain available online.

The 35 inactive blogs listed here will also appear at the bottom of the list of known North American bird blogs (the last posting date for each blog is shown in parentheses as month/day/year):

“Witchities” World Series of Birding Blog (5/12/06)

A View from the North (6/5/06)

Alan's BirdCam Blog (3/7/06)

Bay Area Birding (2/12/06)

Bird Notes from West Houston (5/2/06)

Bird Watching for Birders (6/18/06)

Bird Watching in Westcliffe (2/15/07)

birdDC (12/25/06)

Birds on the Brain (6/6/07)

Birdspotting (4/2/07)

Birdwatch (8/5/06)

BirdWatching (7/28/06)

Citizen Science Projects - Ornithology (6/8/07)

East Bay Birders (9/18/06)

For Elect Eyes Only (5/19/06)

Home Bird Days (5/7/06)

IBWO - News from the 2007 Search (8/15/07)

Ivory-bill Skeptic (now known as Tom Nelson; the last significant post about IBWOs appeared in mid-September 2007--see here)

migrateblog (3/18/07)

My Backyard Birds (8/-/06)

Ocellated (Birding) (5/18/07)

Omar's Birding (4/26/07)

Ornitholature (5/20/06)

Ornithology (6/29/06)

Osprey Project (5/22/07)

rkbirding (4/22/07)

Southwestern Birding Tales (8/20/06)

The Chronicles (4/6/06)

The Incorrigible Birder (6/5/06)

The QUBS Review (3/28/07)

The Rookie Birder (3/23/06)

Thoughts of an Iowa Birdwatcher (2/9/07)

Towhee.net Birding Blog (12/27/06)

Veracruz Hawkwatch (6/29/07)

Windy City Birder (11/11/06)

Ben Affleck wallpapers and shirtless pictures

Affleck has had a huge number of early film roles including School Ties (with Matt Damon and Brendan Fraser), Dazed and Confused, Mallrats and Chasing Amy.He has worked closely with Kevin Smith and has appeared in every film Kevin Smith has made (apart from Clerks).

The fantastic film Good Will Hunting really took his career to new heights in 1997.

Unfortunatly Affleck has made some bad choices such as the reprehensible Pearl Harbor, Daredevil, Gigli and Surviving Christmas but this is balanced by other great films like Changing Lanes.



It seems bizarre that the man induces such hatred in people but love him or hate him he's here to stay and he does make reasonable eye candy. Check out the wallpapers and pics:




















Affleck on the cover of GQ magazine



Ben Affleck wallpapers















More photos infoandvideos at Male celebrities HERE

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Corey Reese wallpapers black actor and model

Corey Reese was born April 17 1980 in Atlanta, Georgia. He is perhaps most well know for his modelling and 'The Today Show' although he has done a number of commercials. His modeling work includes Cosmopolitan Magazine amongst others. Check out these hot wallpapers:







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Free hot dudes toolbar

I've been toying with a few ideas for this and my other sites and ways to make them more interactive and get blog updates of all the hot guys to you more quickly and so I set up this free browser tool bar you can download HERE.

You can almost endlessly customize it's features (radio player, weather, email alerts, chat, search etc), it will keep you updated with all the latest hot guy pics from the following sites and it's installed or un-installed in just a few clicks!

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At the moment it's just for internet explorer or Firefox. Try it out (it's free and can be uninstalled in a click) and never miss a post or hot dude again! Let me know what you think or if you would like anything added to it by leaving a comment, thanks guys and gals. TOOL BAR HERE



GET FREE TOOL BAR FOR YOUR BROWSER CLICK HERE

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Photos of male model Kerry Degman

Let Kerry Degman is a male model with a very distinctive look. He is represented by Major Model Management and has rapidly become one of the fashion world's top male models.

























See more photos of Degman at:

Fit sports men HERE
Male models HERE

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