Attack of the killer starlings !
Discussion
Our head cow man Charlie, and one of our labourers,
went fishing at a nearby lake on Wednesday.
Both of them, and another pair of anglers about a hundred yards away, were attacked by separate flocks of starlings that had gathered nearby in a clump of sycamore trees. At one time they reckoned that about fifty to sixty adult and young birds attacked each man. The anglers had little choice but to lay on the ground and cover their heads with their arms. This may seem unbelievable, but old Charlie is not given to flights of imagination. I did learn afterwards that Gimpel, the labourer, had fired stones at them using a bait catapult, but even so !
The men were not injured, other than being coated liberally with guano.
went fishing at a nearby lake on Wednesday.
Both of them, and another pair of anglers about a hundred yards away, were attacked by separate flocks of starlings that had gathered nearby in a clump of sycamore trees. At one time they reckoned that about fifty to sixty adult and young birds attacked each man. The anglers had little choice but to lay on the ground and cover their heads with their arms. This may seem unbelievable, but old Charlie is not given to flights of imagination. I did learn afterwards that Gimpel, the labourer, had fired stones at them using a bait catapult, but even so !
The men were not injured, other than being coated liberally with guano.
MOBB said:
Did they need tweetment?
No, just a high pressure hosing and a scrub down with a yard broom. An agricultural student from Russia is working with us at the moment. He saw this and asked if this is what is done at the end of each day. I told him that it wasn't, but was merely a harvest tradition. He insisted he wanted to participate in the tradition. Gimpel turned up the pressure and blew Yuri into the slurry pit . I didn't think it would be long before Yuri got his revenge on Gimpel for being hosed into the slurry pit.
When finishing a days harvesting, the men on our farm often take one of our tractors over the fields to the pub about two miles away. The only have to cross a couple of minor roads to get from one field to another and then the pub. This means they come home well bladdered, and why not ? I then let them crash out on camp beds in the hayloft. Because Gimpel chews tobacco and then spits it out in a long brown stream of very tainted spit, he gets the camp bed next to the stair well, and so gobs down the stair well into the yard below. He won a fishing holiday to Alaska three years ago and picked up this foul habit. He also picked up a pair of Canadian logging boots that go right up to his kneecaps. He doesn't do up the laces because they take so long ; he generally just winds them up the boots and ties a knot at the top. Some times he just slides into the boots and just tucks the laces into the tops.
Yuri has observed this. Last Friday, when they crashed out after a nights serious boozing, Yuri waited until Gimpel had fallen asleep, and then he tied Gimpels boot laces together around one of his camp bed legs. Some hours later Gimpel slips into his boots to get up to go down into the yard for a leak. Taking one step forward he finds his progress slowed by dragging the camp bed, then plunges down the hay loft stairs, only to find himself swinging by his boot laces attached to the camp bed, which had lodged itself across the stair well open hatch. Honestly, you couldn't make it up !
When finishing a days harvesting, the men on our farm often take one of our tractors over the fields to the pub about two miles away. The only have to cross a couple of minor roads to get from one field to another and then the pub. This means they come home well bladdered, and why not ? I then let them crash out on camp beds in the hayloft. Because Gimpel chews tobacco and then spits it out in a long brown stream of very tainted spit, he gets the camp bed next to the stair well, and so gobs down the stair well into the yard below. He won a fishing holiday to Alaska three years ago and picked up this foul habit. He also picked up a pair of Canadian logging boots that go right up to his kneecaps. He doesn't do up the laces because they take so long ; he generally just winds them up the boots and ties a knot at the top. Some times he just slides into the boots and just tucks the laces into the tops.
Yuri has observed this. Last Friday, when they crashed out after a nights serious boozing, Yuri waited until Gimpel had fallen asleep, and then he tied Gimpels boot laces together around one of his camp bed legs. Some hours later Gimpel slips into his boots to get up to go down into the yard for a leak. Taking one step forward he finds his progress slowed by dragging the camp bed, then plunges down the hay loft stairs, only to find himself swinging by his boot laces attached to the camp bed, which had lodged itself across the stair well open hatch. Honestly, you couldn't make it up !
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