British police apologized on Wednesday for using a stun gun on a blind man after officers mistook his white cane for a samurai sword. <National Post>
The officers are expected to be issued with their own white canes soon.
Justice … ?
He tracked his 20-year-old former girlfriend to the Gold Coast after she fled Adelaide in 2010. Where …
And then he tried choking her.
Judge Katherine McGinness refused an application by the prosecution to declare Tahir a serious violent offender. He will be eligible for parole from September 12, 2013.
Hummingbird …
Far more exciting than little brown jobs and more diagnostically challenging than waders the Hummingbirds provide the birdwatcher with plenty to enjoy and plenty to learn.
They form the family Trochilidae, often placed somewhere close to the Swifts in traditional classifications and depending on how they are lumped or split there are somewhere between 325 and 340 species.
They tend to be small, most are in the range 7.5 to 13 cm. They are the only birds that can fly backwards when they want to. Their energy requirements are very high, their payload isn’t so they run on a very tight energy budget. They have some special adaptations, such as the ability to enter a state of torpor, to bridge non feeding periods. Despite the challenges some species make long migration flights. They meet their energy requirements from a diet of nectar and the remainder of their nutrition is from insects.
Humming birds are only found in the Americas, a few make it as far north as Alaska and as far south as Southern Chile but the species diversity is highest in tropical central and South America. Colombia alone has more than 160 and the small country of Ecuador has about 130 species. Ber van Perlo lists 80 for Brazil.
Part of the challenge in identification of Hummingbirds is due to the way their colours are made. Much of their colour is structural in origin, the play of light on the prisms within their feathers can turn a dull bird into a blaze of glory. They pose a considerable problem for the illustrator.
Here are a few that I photographed in Brazil …
Hello, ducky …
That would be Scargill, New Zealand, eh.
Oddly enough homosexuality is well known in ducks.
And, ironically, here’s a touching story concerning Blue Ducks, native to New Zealand, although this pair are in exile.
World temperature …
Arctic ice at record lows, Antarctic ice at record highs.
All to be expected in a warming world says Seth Borenstein …
Shifts in wind patterns and the giant ozone hole over the Antarctic this time of year — both related to human activity — are probably behind the increase in ice, experts say. This subtle growth in winter sea ice since scientists began measuring it in 1979 was initially surprising, they say, but makes sense the more it is studied.
Of course it makes sense, warmer water more ice. That must be why the experts predicted the opposite, as catalogued by Jo Nova …
The IPCC Experts in AR4 prediction (thanks to Bishop Hill)
“In 20th- and 21st-century simulations, antarctic sea ice cover is projected to decrease more slowly than in the Arctic (Figures 10.13c,d and 10.14),”
See also IPCC #15.4.4where they discuss the impact of decreasing sea ice, but not of the possibility it might increase.
Ice shelves are retreating in the southern section of the Antarctic Peninsula due to climate change. This could result in glacier retreat and sea-level rise if warming continues
British Antarctic Survey:A thaw of Antarctic ice is outpacing predictions by the U.N. climate panel and could in the worst case drive up world sea levels by 2 meters (6 ft) by 2100, a leading expert said on Wednesday.
Byrd Polar Research Center at Ohio State University:
Most models predict that both precipitation and temperature will increase over Antarctica with a warming of the planet.
What happens to the rest of the world as that frozen water is released, at ever increasing rates, as a result of the rising temperatures caused by climate change?
[In 1988] Scientists expected that as climate change accelerated, Antarctica would be one of the fastest warming areas of the planet. This prediction has proven true
Well not according to the …
Latest ICEsat estimates thanks to Zwally et al:
“During 2003 to 2008, the mass gain of the Antarctic ice sheet from snow accumulation exceeded the mass loss from ice discharge by 49 Gt/yr”
Latest GRACE satellite data also shows Antarctica is gaining ice mass.
And how quickly are we warming, take a look at the latest Hadcrut 4 data …
Over the last 15 years you’d have a lot of trouble picking a signal out of the noise.
Oh, why won’t the climate do what the models tell it to?
A Vic Spring …
Spent a very pleasant weekend at my little farm in Victoria’s Goldfields.
The Flame Robins are long gone back up into the high country. The summer visitors are returning. The very welcome song of the Rufous Songlark was music to my ears on Saturday. It seems a little late this year but the weather has been a bit cold.
Grass is growing well, must have the firebreaks cut by the end of the month.
Slow and steady …
Fair Work Australia takes yet another slither forward …
The FWA, which spent three years investigating Mr Thomson’s lavish spending as HSU national secretary from 2002 to 2007, said it will be seeking “pecuniary penalties, as well as compensation” from the embattled MP.
Mr Thomson is accused of misusing his union credit card for cash advances without receipts, while the FWA also found the MP had splurged hundreds of thousands of dollars on prostitutes, air travel and other personal spending without authorisation. (Herald Sun).
In response Mr Thomson …
“Clearly Fair Work Australia has felt pressured into responding this way given the political process which it is part of.”
The proceedings against Mr Thomson will begin in the Federal Court in December.
We await with bated breath.
Security revamp …
On August 23 a man got within touching distance of Ms. Gillard.
It won’t happen again …
Juxtaposition …
Greg Combet told ABC television on Sunday.
People outside politics would ‘prefer politicians to get off name-calling and get on with the business of government’, he said.
Asked whether he thought Mr Abbott was a misogynist, Mr Combet said: ‘He’s a very aggressive, arrogant sort of fellow and he likes to lead a lynch mob.’
Hello possums …
As a scion of Moonee Ponds once said.
The Liberal state council has called unanimously for the Baillieu Government to investigate birth control for the “destructive, costly, dirty pests”, no not members of parliament who use their allowances to run their hardware businesses, possums.
You’ve got to hand it to Ted, big cats and possums … corruption will have to wait.
bobmcgee 