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Category: miscellaneous

Balance (#30 in “a shining moment” series)

 

For many birds, standing on one leg is entirely comfortable, even for extended periods.

When did you ever see any such bird lose its balance?

For Homo sapiens, it is another matter entirely.

However, our ability to stand on just one of our own two feet is very much more telling/predictive than most of us realise.

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Non-falling leaves, in a different autumn (#29 in “a shining moment” series)

If the tree in question were a deciduous, Northern Hemisphere species, its autumn leaves would be the “right” colour, but otherwise all “wrong”.

These autumn leaves are young and growing, not old and preparing to fall.

They will soon change colour – from red to green, not vice versa.

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“Upside down” trees (#28 in “a shining moment” series)

 

The “skin” of almost any tree will reward your close attention.

There are just nine recognised species in the genus Andansonia the baobabs.

One is Australian.

Two live in Africa and the Arabian Peninsula.

The other six – this one included – are Madagascan, only.

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Chital, Rajasthan (#26 in “a shining moment” series)

 

Widely regarded as the loveliest deer, the chital has a connection to the cheetah; it is not a predator-prey connection…in the present, at least.

Axis axis was also, in 1803, the very first deer species to be introduced to Australia.

The chital is one of the island continent’s longest-established feral animals.

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Fishing Expeditions (#24 in “a shining moment” series)

The featured image’s recreational fishers are at a location which is ever-shifting, but quite easy to reach.

The mouth of Australia’s longest river system is just a day trip away, if you live in Adelaide.

This is where the River Murray, the Coorong and the Southern Ocean meet…although the much-abused Murray-Darling system’s outflow is often so un-mighty that only dredging keeps its mouth open.

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Ojos Negros (dark eyes), real highlander (#21 in “a shining moment” series)

 

This post’s soulful, dark-eyed beauty is a domestic yak, Bos grunniens.

To the best of my knowledge, not one of Scotland’s emblematic domesticated bovines – its highland cattle – has reached the summit of Ben Nevis.

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