Pollenatrix

I thought it was Northern Dancer...

Did you know that racehorse named Eclipse, born in 1764, is considered the greatest racehorse in history and his bloodlines are found in 80% of all modern thoroughbreds?

And he was just an average guy.

Galleria Carnivora

Here's a lovely for my carnivorous-plant loving friends: A virtual art-gallery of carnivorous plant photography.

Just in Thyme for the bees

According to a BBC article, the U.S.'s $2.5 billion almond industry depends mightily on the health of the humble honey bee. And those honey bees are in short supply because of a mite problem.

The mighty mites have developed resistance to chemical solutions, and now scientist have come up with a new solution, in the nick of thyme:

Developed by Vita Europe, the thymol-based treatment is derived from thyme, and vapours from oil extracted from the herb have proved useful in killing the varroa mites.

...In tests, thymol had been able to knock out more than 90% of the mites in a colony, said Dr Watkins.

It's kind of satisfying to know that in this day and age, the captains of industry owe so much to bees and a common herb.

Stoat encounter

I saw one of these cute little creatures on my way through the graveyard the other day. It's a shortcut to the subway station... Anyway, a movement caught my eye, and at first I thought it was a mouse but then I realized that the teeny tiny little critter poking it's head out from under a tombstone was a Stoat, also known as an Ermine. He obviously had places to go and people to see, but though I stopped and stood very still he wasn't too happy with my rubbernecking. He finally gathered his courage and made a dash across the snow to find cover under another stone.

He was really cute, and much smaller than I imagined.

Snow much to say today

We got a doozy of a snowstorm yesterday - 70 cm, I don't know what that is in inches but I can tell you it's about hip deep. We took Jake out this morning and I had so much fun in the snow I found an excuse to stay outdoors. I started to clear some paths, and was soon joined by a few more apartment dwellers who just couldn't stay indoors. The rest of 'em watched us out their windows, enjoying the comical sight of us trying to clear snow with one old-fashioned wooden shovel, a garden edger, and a yellow plastic bucket. The housemeister from the building next door eventually took pity on us and took over with his fancy snowblower, so we turned our attention to knocking snow off the tree branches and garden shrubs. I sent more than a couple of mini-avalanches down the back of my neighbours' necks, a brought a bird down too. The poor thing's wings were frozen to its back, but everyone was nervous about touching it because of the bird flu. I reluctantly left it to Mother Nature to deal with, and filled up the bird feeder as penance instead.

Speaking of penance, it's Lent, and last Tuesday was Faschingdienstag - Germany's version of Mardi Gras - in the market. What a hoot. Check out the pictures...

Football madness

The soccer hooligans were in town today for a big match between FC Bayern and Hamburg. Actually there was more noise than hooliganism, and maybe more police than fans. The police were an intimidating presence as they followed the rowdies through the walking streets in their vans, or stood back to back in circles in the main square like Roman legionnaires ready to do battle. They meant business.

It didn't seem to dampen the high spirits, though. Our subway line happens to be on the way to the Allianz arena, so on the ride home from shopping our car was full of fans from both sides. They were on their way to the game with open bottles of beer in hand and many more in their bellies, and their necks wrapped in scarves bearing the club colours. Now THAT was interesting. It was like being on a school bus full of very large children on the way home from a school outing. The noise of the singing and shouting and yelling of insults back and forth ("Scheiße FC Bayern!") was so deafening that I couldn't hear what Laird was saying in the seat across from me. The entire subway car was actually bouncing along the track as people jumped up and down in time to their songs, bouncing me in my seat along with it. A Hamburg fan by the door seemed to be carrying on a bellicose conversation with whoever was on the other end of the intercom, while his buddy threw obscene gestures at FC Bayern fans on the other side of the car. It didn't take much of a grasp of the language to figure out what the response was to that ("come over here and show me that finger...").

Oh boy.

And this is just a small taste of what the World Cup is going to be like in June...

Horticultural funk

I have to admit that I'm really tired of winter. Sunshine and green growing things feel so much like a part of the past, I hardly even think about gardening lately. So I had a pleasant jolt out of my horticultural funk this morning when I saw this:

Beautiful Botany

It's snowing outside... but I remember summer now.