The Subaru tribe?

What constitutes a community? Definitions vary, but surely common interests, along with geography, can play a role.

I attended my first Nebraska Subaru Owners' Club meet over the weekend. There were over 40 Subarus present, most of them turbocharged Imprezas. (Mine was the only Outback.) Naturally, I neglected to bring my camera. But this video, I think, captures the spirit of the local Subaru community:



My wife (who happens to drive a Honda) is skeptical about the notion of a Subaru community, and even more so about the notion of a Subaru culture. ("Soon you'll be your own race," she muttered sarcastically.) But obviously many of us enjoy associating with like-minded people, be it for a leisurely cruise, a spirited drive, or a day at the track. (All three of which were features of my weekend.) Some of us make a point of waving at other Subaru drivers, or, more interestingly, of parking next to other Subarus. To improve our chances of meeting the other drivers? So the cars themselves can "hang out together"? Just because they look good together? I preferentially park next to other Subarus, but even I can't tell you why. Maybe Susan's right, and it's sheer madness—albeit a harmless, shared, community-minded madness. Like many other groups, Subaru enthusiasts have their own terminology which, while serving primarily as shorthand, also distinguish insiders from outsiders: As someone put it recently, "Every group has its Muggles."

I think some car brands (Subaru, Jeep, arguably Volkswagen) inspire a sense of group identity, while other companies (Honda, Toyota, Chevrolet) are perhaps too big, too anonymous to do so. (Though individual offerings from these companies, the Chevrolet Corvette for example, may have their own followings.) For many drivers, a car is just a car. But for others, a car makes itself so useful that it seems to take on a personality of its own, becomes familiar in the full meaning of that word.

Why I'm choosing to write about this, I'm not sure. Perhaps this is just the blogging equivalent of a slow news week. But a weekend of motoring has me musing on the nature of community and the origins of tribalism, so I'd be glad to hear some thoughts from readers.

Grace under pressure

When angry, count four. When very angry, swear.

—Mark Twain

Obviously someone at the Lancaster County Sheriff's Department is doing well with their training. Here, Deputy Ryan Schmuecker counts more than four (about ten, I reckon) and manages not only not to swear but even to be polite: "You want to pull your vehicle forward so that it's not on top of mine anymore, please?"



HT to the Lincoln Journal Star, kudos to Deputy Schmuecker for his incredible composure, and best of luck to all of us who have to share the road with the idiot in the SUV.

(PS to the Journal Star: the GL series is built by Mercedes, not BMW.)

Another eagle

Speaking of Ellie and eagles...

Shortly after our return from Idaho, she took this shot of an adult bald eagle perched in a small tree not far off a lightly-traveled dirt road.


Why here? She zoomed back out for context:


It was calving time—we had already seen several tiny newborns on our drive—and the eagle was doubtless hoping for (or may have already found) a stillborn calf. Of course, some ranchers seeing an eagle dining on a calf might assume the eagle was the author of the calf's demise rather than merely the beneficiary, so we didn't feel bad at all that the eagle flew off, apparently made nervous by our stopped vehicle.

Meeting Luigi

This is a harpy eagle, Harpia harpyja. Harpies, among the the largest raptors in the world, are native to the rainforests of Central and South America, where they hunt monkeys, sloths, and other arboreal mammals. Their stout, powerful feet can exert over 500 pounds per square inch of pressure; their largest talons are roughly the size of grizzly bear claws. They can lift approximately three-quarters of their own body weight and, like many raptors, routinely kill animals many times their own size.


This is a smallish primate (who also happens to be my daughter) tidbitting a harpy eagle. Don't try this at home, kids.


Ellie is under the watchful eye of Peregrine Fund biologist Jim Willmarth, who I first met over a decade ago when I was doing some summer work with the P-Fund in Montana. He kindly gave us a behind-the-scenes look at The Peregrine Fund's World Center for Birds of Prey in Boise.

This eagle, Luigi, is an eight-year old male, raised at a captive-breeding facility in Panama and originally slated to be a breeding bird. Things didn't work out with his intended mate, a particularly aggressive female, and due to his own exceptionally easygoing temperament he became an educational bird—an ambassador for his species, which has been threatened by shooting as well as habitat destruction. [Learn more about The Peregrine Fund's work with harpy eagles here.] Luigi is exceedingly well-manned, playful and very cognizant of his own strength; we watched him gently push Jim's hand aside where another raptor (my redtail Stekoa, for example) might have footed in earnest. Jim also told us of tidbitting Luigi with a piece of liver; Luigi refused to take it, apparently believing Jim to be injured, until Jim showed him by moving it around that it was separate and not a piece of his own flesh.


Ellie, always an admirer of raptors, is now positively smitten with harpy eagles, thanks to Jim's generosity and Luigi's approachability. I'm sure there are plenty of Panamanian and Belizean kids who will grow up with an appreciation of harpies thanks to their own early encounters with Luigi. It's easy to become discouraged about environmental education when it's done badly—and trust me, I've seen it done badly—but done right, it just might be the silver bullet.

photoblogging: Snake River

Ellie and I visited the Morley Nelson Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area near Kuna, Idaho—600,000 acres of mostly BLM land encompassing the Snake River gorge and surrounding plateau. This is high-desert country dominated by winterfat, sagebrush, and sparse grasses (along with, unfortunately, introduced Russian thistle or "tumbleweed", Salsola spp.) and supports a large population of Townsend's ground squirrels and black-tailed jackrabbits, which in turn support large numbers of raptors as well as a notable concentration of badgers.

View from the canyon rim.


The first step's a doozy.


Ellie, also shooting scenery.


Were I a serious photographer, I could have spent the better part of the day shooting this one sculpted volcanic rock.


The view downstream.


I managed not to get any usable hawk photographs, but we did see red-tailed hawks, ferruginous hawks, golden eagles, American kestrels, and of course several prairie falcons. The largest concentration of nesting prairie falcons is here in the Snake River NCA. (The largest wintering population, incidentally, is in the northern Sandhills around Valentine, Nebraska.) Prairies dine almost exclusively on ground squirrels when they are available, switching to horned larks and other birds at other times of the year. Other notable sightings included a number of ravens and Say's phoebes. And I feel obliged to take note of a population of what, in other circumstances, I would simply call pigeons; in this place, living on cliffs and surrounded by such deadly neighbors, I will accord them their formal name of rock doves.

Here, on or just outside the NCA, is a ferruginous hawk nest: bulkier than a redtail nest, in a mere twig of a tree that redtails would never use. This nest is conveniently located in the middle of a large prairie-dog town—"close to shopping", as a real-estate agent might say.


This is Mecca, a pilgrimage that every falconer should make at least once in his or her lifetime. I hope to make it back before too long.

The brick

No storyline, just a few snapshots of a big female gyr x peregrine at play.

The better to see you with, my deer

The Nebraska Department of Roads (in any other state it would be the Department of Transportation) plans a deer fence along a four-mile stretch of I-80 between Lincoln and Omaha in order to reduce deer-vehicle collisions. Everywhere else, of course, motorists (and deer) will have to take their chances as usual.

Another approach: kill 'em all. (Fortunately, this proposal has been modified extensively following an outcry by deer hunters and others with values that go beyond the purely economic.)

I just want to see the critters. To that end:


That's a pair of Hella 500 driving lights (packaged as "sport activity lights" for the Subaru Baja) and a pair of Hella 550 fog lights on a Rally Innovations lightbar. When everything's switched on, the road is lit up like Memorial Stadium. (A big thanks to Chris Cook at PTC Factory Outlet, Chase at RI, and Lael Cleland at Lael's Import Performance.)

[Tom Ford at Top Gear describes Hellas: "think tiny suns trapped in glass".]

It was twenty years ago today...

The Specials perform "Free Nelson Mandela" on Top of the Pops. I defy you not to dance in your seat to this one.



Hugh Masekela, "Bring Him Back Home".



Tracy Chapman, "Freedom Now".

NFA field meet, February '10

I'm starting to wonder why we (Nebraska Falconers' Association) have field meets in February, as each one is smaller than the last. (If the trend continues much longer, the meet will consist of me walking around talking to myself—in other words, a normal day's hawking.) This year's count was three birds flown: two redtails and a merlin.

[Ed Fitch with one of his gyrs. Regrettably, we didn't get to see them fly, as Ed arrived rather late on Saturday, but it was good to see Ed. Photo by Pat Stull.]

Nick Morris, a first-year apprentice from Fremont, lost his first redtail earlier this season when it was chased off by a bald eagle. (No telemetry.) Undaunted, he trapped another redtail, this one a nice-looking and strong-flying tiercel, in December. They had already caught nine rabbits before the meet, and on Saturday added number ten. (And yes, he has telemetry now.)

[Nick trades Ted off the rabbit. Photo by Pat Stull.]

Stekoa also caught a rabbit, and then I made a mistake. I tossed him a small piece of food to trade him off the rabbit, then took a bit too long to put the bunny away and offer him another piece on the fist. Done with his snack, he flew up into a cedar and refused to come down for the second installment...so we were forced to keep going. (Oh noes!) Eventually he caught a second cottontail, got two more chunks of meat, and was done for the weekend.

[Stekoa. Photo by Pat Stull.]

But the highlight of the meet for me was flying Wakulla. We've done quite a bit of training in the field by now, but she'd had limited opportunities to fly at birds, and I was feeling a bit frustrated. In truth, she didn't seem that much faster than a kestrel. Where was the vaunted merlin speed? Had I allowed her weight and condition to slip too low? Those worries have now gone away.

[Wakulla and me. I'm in the sunglasses; Wakulla is the good-looking one in the full hood. Photo by Eric Johnson.]

We set out Saturday afternoon (before bunny hawking, actually) to find some quail. Local falconer Chris Podraza, currently without a hawk, was serving as the guide and obtained permission for us to walk a farm just west of Grand Island. We ambled along a creek lined with cottonwoods, Wakulla hooded on my fist, until Nick flushed a covey of eight or nine bobwhites. Marking the put-in, we then unhooded Wakulla and kept walking. When a pair of hidden bobs flushed, she dropped off my fist, leveled out just above the ground, and turned on the jets. She soon disappeared around a corner, but some of the others had a better view of the flight and told me she had pitched up immediately above the spot where the birds had dumped into cover. Encouraged, we continued to work the brushy cover upstream, letting Wakulla fly mostly from the trees; as singles, pairs, and trios flushed, we were rewarded with several hard flights, quail rocketing through the trees with Wakulla in hot pursuit. Each time they escaped by the narrowest of margins, and finally I called Wakulla down to the lure for a well-deserved reward. She wasn't even breathing hard.

With all the hawks flown, we retired to El Toro restaurant for a Mexican dinner that couldn't be beat. After trudging through the snow all afternoon, we were beat. But the most exhausted member of the hawking party had to be Maxine, who had not only accompanied Stekoa on his double-rabbit hunt, but also helped the rest of us flush quail! She's turning out to be quite an enthusiastic bird dog—not that I ever expect her to point, but she can sure flush like a spaniel. She really is the best hawking dog I could have asked for: she loves to hunt, and truly respects the hawks—not just the redtail, who could hurt her if they ever came to blows, but also the merlin. My trust in her is complete, extending to leaving her alone with Wakulla both in the car and in the hotel room. I certainly wouldn't try this with most dachshunds! (Including Anya, which is why she was left at home.)

[Travel buddies: Max and Wakulla. Photo by yours truly.]

As for Sunday, there's not much to tell. Nick and his hawk had already gone home, and Stekoa was too heavy to fly, so we took Wakulla out in the afternoon for another go at quail. Chris spotted a covey huddled under a cedar in a small woodlot, and Wakulla got two chances: one on the initial flush, and then a reflush on some birds that had put in on the edge of the woods. But once they were gone, it was pretty much over. Chris correctly pointed out that it would be a mistake to continue hunting too late into the afternoon, especially with colder weather moving in (bobwhites rely on each other to keep warm, and once busted, a covey needs time to regroup), so we called it a day.

Fallout

A stressful drive along US-34 from Lincoln to Grand Island this afternoon, thanks to a snowstorm last night and this morning—not that the highway itself was snowed in. Indeed, the fact that it was so well cleared was the problem, as flocks of horned larks (Eremophila alpestris, known in Europe as the shore lark) had abandoned the open fields to congregate on the shoulder of the roadway. I drove past—or rather through, as they flushed for every approaching vehicle and darted every which way—literally hundreds of flocks, each composed of hundreds of birds. I slowed for each flock, which made the trip longer and no doubt annoyed the drivers behind me, but evidently not everyone did slow down: the highway was littered with dozens of roadkilled larks. The carnage reminded me, strangely enough, of Christmas morning, after the kids have opened their presents but before anyone has cleaned up all the little bits of brightly colored paper.

It might seem odd to some that the larks would keep returning to the roadway when it is so obviously dangerous, but the fact is that life is dangerous for larks. They are birds of wide open spaces; merlins and prairie falcons hunt them every day, and there is no avoiding them, no place to hide except in the anonymity of the flock. I suppose they must perceive cars as just another predator. The difference, of course, is that a falcon must expend a great deal of energy and effort to secure a lark, and once successful, bears away its prize to dine. Cars and trucks can kill larks wholesale, and to no good purpose.


Because of their tendency to flock and their preference for open country, horned larks are vulnerable not just to traffic, but also to collisions with wind turbines, cell phone towers (and their supporting guylines), and fences. It's a good job they're so plentiful, because death by misadventure—in bulk quantities—is a common fate.

With all this death at the hands of humanity, it's interesting that should my merlin happen to catch a lark—one—I could conceivably be charged with a felony. Happily, that is changing: the new federal falconry regulations recognize that trained hawks are birds, free agents with minds of their own, not remote-controlled airplanes under the direct influence of the falconer. Strict liability will give way to considerations of intent, which is as it should be: deliberate poachers can still be prosecuted, but falconers will no longer live in fear of an unintended but completely natural event being blown out of proportion.

Empty cage

I hesitated to write about this when there are so many larger tragedies about, but Susan persuaded me it would be worth noting: we lost our parrot, Spot, yesterday. The phrase "our feathered friends" is overused, but Spot truly fit the bill.

[Spot as sketched by my dad]

He's been part of our family for so long that we can't remember exactly when he came to live with us. I think it was the summer of 1992 when, after a year or so of keeping estrildid finches, we decided to try our hands at a psittacine with whom we might interact more directly. At the quarterly bird fair in Forest Park, Georgia, we met a breeder with a cageful of maroon-bellied conures (Pyrrhura frontalis), one of which particularly appealed to us for the playful curiosity he displayed in what could have been a bewildering environment of strange birds and people. The breeder warned us that he could give no guarantees as to personality; the bird and his siblings had been hand-fed for a time, but a subsequent clutch of parrots (a rarer and more economically valuable species) had placed new demands on his time and the conures had received less attention. In light of that, he was prepared to cut us a deal, and we were prepared to take a chance. It was the best $50 we ever spent...

We named our new conure Spot™ (the TM was silent) partly because he was 7-Up green, and partly because despite the name's alleged popularity for canines, neither of us had ever met a dog named Spot—and as long as they weren't using it... Evidently the hand-rearing he had received was sufficient; he was not just tolerant of of human company, he craved attention. He used to travel with us a good deal, and came to love the McDonald's drive-through window, because he knew we would give him a French fry—and then another when he accidentally-on-purpose dropped the first for later retrieval. (We knew we were being played, but it was impossible to resist.) The drive-through at the bank, on the other hand, was a huge disappointment from Spot's point of view.

It was also on these trips in the car that we came to realize that Spot had a sense of aesthetics: he loved to ride in the car at night because he enjoyed watching the streams of white headlights and red taillights on the highway. After this realization, we often made a point of taking him out around town at Christmastime to see all the colored lights. On these chilly December nights, Spot was in his glory, happily clicking and squeaking his delight.

[My stipple drawing of Spot helping out at pumpkin-carving time]


Spot never learned to imitate human speech, which was more than fine with us. Instead, we learned a bit of conure language, greeting him with a bow and neck-stretch and imitating his clicks and squawks. Most of the time, of course, we had no idea exactly what we were saying, but he apparently understood our intentions were good. We weren't his only people, in the way that some parrots choose one or two favored companions and treat the rest of the world with contempt. He got on well with my dad, adored Susan's mom, and was popular with most visitors (especially those bearing treats). Things weren't so harmonious, though, between Spot and Susan's sister, Christy: I believe Spot did like her, but he delighted in tormenting her because she offered such excellent drama rewards.

Ellie was born soon after we moved from Georgia to Nebraska, and Spot was her first friend. But inevitably the family dynamics changed, with Spot no longer the primary center of attention—fewer showers together ("visits to the waterfall"), fewer shared Cokes, fewer rides in the car. I'm sorry to say he was further relegated to the sidelines with the arrival of the dachshunds several years ago; an uneasy détente existed between Spot and the dogs, and the door to Spot's cage was often left open so he could come and go as he pleased, but we were never entirely confident that the dogs could be trusted.

Conures don't live as long as the larger Amazons and cockatoos, and we had begun to idly wonder how much longer we would have this bird in our lives. I had always expected somehow that when Spot's time came, we would have some warning, would be able to cradle him and say good-bye. As it happened, I was eating lunch at the dining room table with the dogs at my feet when I heard a soft thud—Spot had abruptly fallen to the floor. To my surprise, the dogs didn't pounce, but sniffed tentatively at the fallen bird. One of them mouthed him gently as I got there, but immediately surrendered him to me; I held him as the light went out in his eyes. Heart failure? Stroke? I have no idea.

The harder questions are these: How do you thank a friend who's been there for over fifteen years, followed you from house to house and brightened each one? How do you express your appreciation for someone who remembers every kindness and (eventually, perhaps in response to a bit of bribery) forgives every slight? How do you say good-bye to a bird who always wanted to stretch hello?

Old habits die hard, and I suspect that for days we'll go to open Spot's window blind first thing in the morning, talk to him as we walk through the dining room, listen for the contended grinding of his beak at nightfall. Sad as we are now, it will probably be sadder when those impulses fade, when we finally realize that our friend is really gone.

The importance of ground truthing

Chas Clifton at Southern Rockies Nature Blog has hit this meme a couple of times lately (here and here), but you've got to love the visual here by Gary Wise and Lance Aldrich of Real Life Adventures:


GPS can be a useful tool—I have a Garmin as well as several DeLorme atlases in the Subaru—but don't forget to pay attention to the actual road, kiddies!

Vic Chesnutt, 1964-2009

What cave have I been in? I just learned today (HT Paste magazine) that Athens, Georgia, musician Vic Chesnutt died on Christmas Day. Paste have posted a memorial playlist, which I would encourage Flyover Country readers to listen to, but let me post two more which I would consider glaring omissions:

"Degenerate", from 1996 major-label release About to Choke. Great lyrics, but it was the layered guitar that first induced me to put this song on single-track repeat.




A live performance of "Rabbit Box", originally released on Vic's first (1990) album, Little. This is a field-sports song, sort of: as he explains in the liner notes...

Rabbit Box is an illegal (in Georgia) live trap
very unsportsman-like
I don't do the hunties anymore
Truly Pike County nostalgia
you don't hunt doves with a 20 gauge
single shotgun and you don't aim shotguns
and you don't shoot birds off powerlines
but I was a stupid little kid

Vic's paralysis, the result of a drunk-driving car crash, is often cited as an influence in his music. Certainly it affected his guitar playing; he has been quoted as saying that while he could play simple chords, the "jazzier stuff" eluded him after the accident. It may also have contributed to his lyrical style, as many of his songs ("Tarragon", for example, or "Soft Picasso") are written from the perspective of an observer of relationships—and confinement to a wheelchair might certainly afford opportunities for in-depth people-watching. His music may not have been everyone's cup of tea—my wife could never get past the mock-Spanish accent he adopted for his rendition of "White Christmas" (on Flagpole magazine's Christmas album)—but he always reminded me a bit of Neil Young: insightful "outsider's" lyrics, sung in a reedy voice, often with stripped-down arrangements, very different from most "commercial" music. Or maybe Vincent van Gogh would be a better comparison: troubled but brilliant, far ahead of his time and gone far too soon.

I never met Vic, but I have always enjoyed his music, and I extend my sympathies to all his family and friends in Athens.

Okay, maybe one more: the appropriately funereal "Threads", again from About to Choke.

Ginger binger

He's the colour of nutmeg and the heat of ginger.

—William Shakespeare, Henry V

Exactly when and how the tradition started I no longer remember, but for years our family's New Year's Eve ritual was to stay up late, playing Monopoly and drinking ginger ale or ginger beer. My dad, whose usual beverage of choice was Coca-Cola, may have started this, or it may have originated with my grandfather, but in any case I have become the keeper of the flame and do my best to uphold the family tradition.

This year's year's twist: Throw caution to the wind, sample as many different brands and varieties as I could get hold of, and post tasting notes for the benefit of the ginger-loving public—or at least such of them as may read Flyover Country.

I was fortunate in this endeavour to have the assistance of Damian Barton, owner of Rocket Fizz, Lincoln's new and very impressive soda shop. It's a good place to find "vintage-style" candy (clove-flavoured chewing gum, even!) as well as toys (for example, Jesus and Albert Einstein action figures), but carbonated beverages are their mainstay. I discovered several new brands here, and they carry several of my old favourites, which saved me an infinity of driving.

There are three basic types of ginger soda. Ginger beer (hereafter GB) is the most "authentic" (as with ethnic food, that can be a positive or negative attribute depending on one's tastes) and usually has the strongest ginger flavour. In its most traditional form it is brewed from a live culture of yeast and/or bacteria, but may also be produced with pressurized carbon dioxide as are, for example, most colas. Traditional GBs are cloudy, as small particles of chopped ginger root are suspended in the liquid; when artificial flavouring is used, artificial colouring will often be used as well to attain the cloudy GB appearance.

Golden ginger ale (GGA) is darker in colour than GB, but usually clear. Again, it may be either brewed or artificially carbonated, naturally or artificially flavoured, and may contain any of a variety of sweeteners. The ginger taste of a GGA is usually not as strong as that of a GB, but more pronounced than that of a dry ginger ale (DGA). DGAs are lighter in flavour as well as in colour, and are the most familiar to Americans, Canada Dry and Schweppes being representative brands. The most recently developed of the three ginger sodas, DGAs are much likelier to be artificially carbonated than brewed, but may contain any combination of flavour and sweetener types. As most readers will already be familiar with DGAs, I did not expend great effort to seek them out for the binge.

Yes, by Saint Anne, and ginger be hot i' the mouth.

—Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

On to the tasting notes...

AJ Stephans Jamaican Style Ginger Beer hails not from the Caribbean but from Boston, where the brand has apparently existed since 1926. At first glance, this looks authentic enough: brown glass bottle, GB cloudy to the point of being opaque, decent heat. But I can't help noticing that the label makes a big deal out of "pure sugar & pure water" without mentioning pure ginger. A glance at the ingredients list tends to confirm my suspicions: just "flavor", without reference to origin; I therefore assume that someone in Boston has been playing with their chemistry set. Overall, okay but not a standout (though my second impression was more favourable than my first).

Blenheim Ginger Ale, I'm told, comes in several varieties, all in clear glass with a white-painted label (extra point for style!) bearing an American eagle-and-shield design. The one we sampled, with the pink bottle cap, is supposed to be the hottest, and indeed it was nicely spicy. The clear glass shows off the nice, almost crystalline, colour of this South Carolinian GGA. Sucrose, natural flavour.

Buderim Ginger Authentic Australian Ginger Brew is excellent. Slow-brewed using an open-kettle process, cane sugar, and locally-grown ginger (extra points for that), then bottled in brown glass with a kangaroo on the label. (I think there must be a law requiring that all Australian foodstuffs produced for export bear a marsupial on the label.) Good heat, but very smooth.

Bundaberg Australian Ginger Beer is another outstanding and very traditional GB. "Naturally brewed to be better", using cane sugar and ginger root—in fact, the label advises that the bottle be inverted before opening in order to get all the little bits of ginger back into suspension. It's a great little bottle, too, short but stout ("shrub bottle", I think I've heard it called?) in brown glass, with a unique peel-off cap and, of course, the obligatory kangaroo on the label. Unfortunately, my one "local" source (actually an hour away in Omaha) has gone out of business, so I'm hoarding my dwindling supply, but Rocket Fizz may be able to order it in. Cross fingers for me...

Capt'n Eli's Ginger Beer, made by the Shipyard Brewing Co. in Portland, Maine, seems to have everything going for it: cane sugar, natural ginger flavour, brown glass bottle with a nautical scene on the label. But it's very clear, with mild spiciness at best. In fact, what it reminds me of most is a slightly punched-up Canada Dry. ("Not that there's anything wrong with that," he hastened to add.) A DGA sheep in wolf's clothing.
The DG in DG Genuine Jamaican Ginger Beer stands for Desnoes & Geddes, the makers of Red Stripe lager. Actually, DG started out in soft drinks and only later began brewing beer, so this might be a better candidate as a flagship product. In any case, it is a wonderful example of a Caribbean-style GB: cloudy with a fiery but smooth ginger bite. Made with Jamaican ginger extract (extra point for local ingredients) as well as natural and artificial flavours. Sweetened with high-fructose corn syrup—a concession, I suppose, to volume. Bottled in brown glass, but in a longneck bottle rather than the short bottle associated with Red Stripe. (Thanks to my brother Greg for sending a couple of these along.)

From the same brewer comes DG Old Jamaican Ginger Beer Twist. This one comes in a green glass bottle, the better to harmonise with the lime slices on the label. Quite a few GBs contain citrus flavour, but this one comes right out with it, and it's a refreshing difference. Still plenty spicy, as one would expect of a Jamaican GB. (Actually, my bottle says "Product of Canada", but it is bottled for a Jamaican company to their standards, so let's agree it's Jamaican.) No high-fructose corn syrup in this one; the label lists simply "sugar".

Dr. Tima Honey Ginger Ale is a DGA from California. And in case you missed the name, the honeycomb on the clear glass bottle's label highlights its claim to distinction, along with two textual reminders (both with exclamation points!) in addition to the ingredients listing. All natural, "from an old European recipe", this does have a bit of a citrus zing.

Empire Ginger Beer comes from the Empire Bottling Works in Bristol, Rhode Island. Made with pure cane sugar and "natural and/or artificial flavor extracts". The indecision strikes me as odd—perhaps it reflects seasonal availability of ingredients?—but this is a pretty good DGA. In a unique pale-green glass bottle, reminiscent in colour of some old Coke bottles.

Filbert's Old Time Quality Ginger Ale is distributed by the Filbert Root Beer Co. in Chicago. I hope their root beer is more distinctive. There's nothing really wrong with this one, but apart from its slightly darker colour, this is a garden-variety DGA. Sugar and/or corn sweetener—more indecision—with natural and artificial flavour in clear glass.

Jackson Ginger Beer is made by the Jackson Hole Soda Co. in Wyoming. Batch brewed with cane sugar and natural flavours, bottled in brown glass, all as nature intended. Pale, ever so slightly cloudy, good flavour without being noticeably hot. A mild GB, this might be a good stepping-stone for the GB-curious drinker more accustomed to DGAs.

I first bought Maine Root Ginger Brew, more or less out of desperation, on an occasion when my late lamented Bundaberg supplier was temporarily out of stock. I was very pleasantly surprised to discover that this Yankee GB was actually a worthy substitute. Brewed, as the name implies, using real ginger extract and cane sugar—in fact, extra points for using fair-trade certified organic cane sugar! Great cloudiness, fine carbonation, great spicy flavour. In green glass rather than brown, but then nothing's perfect.

One drink I couldn't round up in time for the binge, but will review from memory, is Old Tyme Ginger Beer. The pirate on the label serves as fair warning regarding the take-no-prisoners style of this GB. Hot! Hot! Hot! There is good flavour here as well as grab-the-back-of-the-throat heat, but it may not be accessible to those who prefer a less fiery brew. Work up to this one...

In Atlanta, Georgia, in 1885, a soft drink with purported health benefits was the original product of what later became a more diverse company, and eventually one of the world's most recognised brands. Not this one, however. Unlike its neighbour and contemporary, Coca-Cola, Red Rock Golden Ginger Ale has remained relatively obscure, and in fact disappeared for several decades before being revived. It's fortunate that Red Rock has returned, for it lives up to the slogan "Just the Right Bite!" Carbonated water, pure cane sugar, natural flavour. A very good GGA, nicely presented, as the clear glass bottle with painted label (style point) highlights the clear, deep amber colour.

Reed's Original Ginger Brew is a Jamaican-style GGA brewed (key word) in Los Angeles. As the label on the green glass bottle notes, it is all-natural, with 25% fruit juice (pineapple, lemon, and lime) as well as fructose and fresh ginger root. Unsurprisingly, this one has a distinct citrus character to it; otherwise it is a GGA with DGA leanings.

Reed's Premium Ginger Brew is, by comparison, a GGA leaning toward GB. Also in green glass, with similar ingredients (the ginger content is identical) except for the sweeteners: Canadian white clover honey and raw cane sugar. Again, the 25% juice content gives it a genuine citrus taste.

Big brother to Reed's Original and Reed's Premium (closer to Original than Premium) is Reed's Extra Ginger Brew, which adds more ginger (did you guess?) and again tweaks the sweetening formula: fructose and honey (no information on origin) in addition to the standard one-quarter juice. Hotter, but definitely a GGA and not a GB. Like its siblings, a good drink that nevertheless suffers somewhat in comparison to the genuine Caribbean GBs.

By the way, Reed's also offers several fruit-flavoured GGAs: Reed's Cherry Ginger Brew, Reed's Raspberry Ginger Brew, and Reed's Spiced Apple Ginger Brew. Juice content varies from one to the next (anywhere from 20% to 60%), as do the ginger content and sweetening formula, which to me indicates a craftsman's approach as opposed to blindly throwing in new flavours and changing the labels. It is difficult, however, to make direct comparisons with the more traditional flavours—like apples and oranges, if you'll forgive the obvious play on words.

Next up is Regatta Authentic Bermuda Stone Ginger Beer. Regatta has a zesty character with strong notes of ginger and secondary notes of citrus, apple and banana. The finish has a ginger bite without the burn. Does this sound a bit too stereotypically food-critic-y? Sorry, it's a direct quote from the label, easily the wordiest in the lot. The label also mentions the use of GB in the Dark 'n Stormy ("Bermuda's National Drink") and the Moscow Mule, alcoholic concoctions I won't be mentioning again; our purpose here is to see how our GBs stand on their own. This, however, Regatta does quite well. Traditional GB cloudiness, Caribbean-style flavour but with a bit less bite than the Jamaican versions. Fructose, natural ginger extracts in green glass bottle. (This is Damian's favourite, by the way.)

Sioux City Ginger Beer might be better classified as a GGA: darker in colour and stronger in taste than a DGA, but not cloudy like a traditional GB. Made with high-fructose corn syrup and natural flavour. Not really a standout, but pleasant enough, and as the Sioux City brand is widely distributed it has the virtue of being easily obtainable. My primary suggestion, should anyone from Sioux City ever happen to read this, concerns not the drink but the packaging: Re-work the bird on the label! I think it's supposed to be an eagle, but it's awfully hard to tell...

Sprecher's Ginger Ale hails from Glendale, Wisconsin, and comes in a stout 16-oz. brown glass bottle (as opposed to the 12-oz. servings of the competition) with a penguin-in-hell motif on the label. Ooookay... I would re-classify this as a GB, pale and slightly cloudy—honestly so, as it's made with real ginger. The fire-brewing process gives Sprecher's a very nice, fine carbonation readily discernible from its pressurized-CO2 counterparts. Interestingly, Sprecher's seem to have hedged their bets on the sweetener, as this GB contains both high-fructose corn syrup (boo!) and raw Wisconsin honey (yea! and bonus point for local ingredients). A very good ginger drink, and one that I find popping up in more and more places, even somewhat out-of-the-way places.

Thomas Kemper Ginger Peach, like the fruitier offerings from Reed's, defies easy comparison with most of the other entries. (I'm sure Kemper has a standard GA, but somehow or other I missed it.) But I don't want to dismiss it too easily, because it stands well on its own. Brewed with cane sugar, peach juice, northwestern honey, and natural flavour; bottled in brown glass. Certainly fruity, almost feminine, but the ginger doesn't get lost.

Vernors bills itself as "The Original Ginger Soda—a Michigan Original Since 1866", and is in fact the oldest surviving American brand, but was not actually the first commercial GA in the States. It is, however, fairly widely distributed and was a frequent New Year's Eve selection when I was younger. While I have heard that Vernors is available in glass bottles, I've only ever found it in aluminum cans; presentation suffers somewhat accordingly. Still, an interesting GGA, aged in oaken barrels for three years, and with a unique note of vanilla. Made with a combination of natural and artificial flavours, as well as the high-fructose corn syrup you'd expect of a mass-produced brand (now owned by Dr. Pepper/Snapple).

Zuberfizz Rasberry Ginger Ale is made in Colorado by the Durango Soda Co., known mainly for cane-sugar sodas. Had I read the label carefully enough, this one would have been disqualified before purchase—not because of the fruit flavouring, but because it is a "zero calorie soda" sweetened with "ZSweet" (erythritol, described as "a natural sweetener" but evidently highly derived). I had a hard time getting past the ZSweet aftertaste, but will concede that the raspberry bouquet (natural flavours throughout) was rather more delicate than expected. Otherwise, the most notable quality (not apparent in brown glass) is the exceedingly pale, almost watery appearance. Might be someone's favourite drink...and they're welcome to it. I'll pass from now on.

The one major shortcoming of this first annual (?) ginger binge is that it didn't include any drinks from England, the historic home of GB. With that caveat, however, some regional observations: Australia (Buderim, Bundaberg) and the Caribbean (DG in either formulation, Regatta) have the most consistently excellent GBs, with a couple of American entries (Maine Root, Sprecher's) breaking into the top tier. If the quality of ginger drinks from the States seems spotty, it should be borne in mind that there may be selection bias at work—Australia and the Caribbean could have their share of mediocre drinks as well, but those are far less likely to be imported to the States. And GB is, after all, an acquired taste for Americans, who are far more accustomed to DGAs and may find the very notion of a spicy soft drink unsettling. (This may also go some way toward explaining the identity crises posed by GAs labeled as GBs and vice-versa.) Still, the States can lay claim to some very good GGAs (Blenheim, Red Rock, Vernors) in addition to the two GBs cited above.

Well, it's been fun. Time for some sleep, and possibly a shot of insulin. : ) A happy New Year to all...

And had I but one penny in the world, thou shouldst have it to buy ginger-bread.

— Shakespeare, Love's Labours Lost

Merlin update

Between work, bunny hawking, training the new bird, holiday preparation, and shoveling snow, there hasn't been much time for writing lately. I hope to get back to active blogging again soon, but for now a quick update on the new merlin.

Several years ago, when I first trapped Stekoa, I had been flying small hawks for several years: most recently a passage sharpie, prior to that a series of kestrels. The new redtail seemed huge, and I marked it down as a female. Evidently it had been a very good hunter, as it was in high condition—higher even than I had realized. By the time the hawk was at a workable weight, and my perception of size had readjusted, it was apparent that Stekoa was likely a tiercel.

Now it seems I've done the same thing in reverse: After several years away from micro-raptors, the new hawk seemed smaller than it actually was. Of course the initial weight ("trap weight") would have been meaningless, as the hawk had been stuck inside a building for a week without food, and for the first few weeks the only training attempted was basic manning and hooding; the first priority was simply to get the bird to eat as much and as frequently as possible without jeopardizing its health or making it overly fearful as hawks in excessively high condition can be. We've now moved on to actual training (calling to the fist and to the lure) and the merlin has been responding well in the 190-gram-plus range—much more typical of a columbarius merlin (female) than a jack. So Wakulla (named for a river in Florida near which many columbarius merlins are trapped on passage) will hereafter be referred to as she.

(For what it's worth, neither my friend Karl Linderholm nor the two Game & Parks biologists who assisted with the banding questioned the initial ID, and there's enough overlap in size that it's still not definite, but the etiquette here in the West dictates that a hawk of unknown gender is generally regarded as female.)

For various reasons, I've been in no hurry with Wakulla's training. Hawks in general, and merlins in particular, usually progress more quickly than their trainers are ready to admit, and consequently are somewhat overprepared by the time they're brought to the field. But as this is my first merlin, and considering that passage merlins are notorious for carrying prey (this can be a major vice, and can even lead to the loss of the hawk), I see no harm in overpreparation. Certainly a raptor as pugnacious as a merlin isn't going to forget how to chase birds! I'll continue my deliberate approach for now, but I am starting to look forward to seeing Wakulla extend herself in pursuit of quarry. I'll be sure to write more when that happens, so please stay tuned...

Demotivation

From the good folks folks at Despair, Inc.

A bird in the hand

The phone's been ringing off the hook lately with bird-in-a-building calls from Raptor Recovery Nebraska: a Cooper's hawk in the secured hallway of a shopping mall, a kestrel in a hospital under construction, a Cooper's hawk in a warehouse. Most of these rescues have been up in Omaha, and the drive has become tiresome (surprisingly, it took three days to get the Cooper's hawk at the mall), so when I got the call Wednesday afternoon about a hawk (species unknown) inside an Omaha printing facility, I was more resigned than overjoyed at the prospect of another trip up I-80.

Upon arrival, I met the general manager and we went in for a look around. He hadn't been able to give me a great description, but I was more or less expecting another Cooper's.

Instead I found, and immediately trapped, a passage jack merlin. [Photos by Mitchell Renteria (1 & 3) and myself (2 & 4)]

After all the miles I put on my car this fall without trapping a merlin, it's so nice to have this jack fall into my lap. This he did almost literally—having been inside for nearly a week, he hit the trap as soon as I set it down and turned my back, but before I had a chance to walk away. Razor thin, but otherwise in good shape, I have high hopes for the little guy.

And damned if that drive didn't seem easier this time around.

NFA field meet, November '09—more photos

These shots courtesy of Mitchell Renteria. I'm really glad there are other (and better) photographers in the group, especially since I don't carry a camera when it's my bird in the air...

[Scott Backlund's redtail backlit atop a white pine]


[Stekoa in flight at Davis Creek]

[Donna Vorce's new redtail. She picked it up at Wal-Mart on the way to the meet. Seriously. She picked it up. At Wal-Mart.]

[Just hanging out: Maxine]

NFA field meet, November '09

Some notes and photos from the recent Nebraska Falconers' Association field meet in Burwell:

The meet started (for the early risers among us, anyway) in the pre-dawn quiet Saturday morning. We drove to a shortgrass prairie hillside where, as Eric Johnson advised us, sharp-tailed grouse lek in the spring and roost at almost any time of year. He pointed to the next ridge over and said that, due to subtle habitat differences, greater prairie-chickens were to be found there instead. (Rosehips on this hill for the sharps, a favored grass on the next ridge for the chickens.) Eric unhooded his gyr x peregrine hybrid, River, and after a short pause atop the truck, she took to the air.

[River's pre-flight routine]

Once she'd attained her pitch—five hundred feet or so this morning; Eric would prefer higher but River favors her gyrfalcon side and doesn't need much height to generate speed and power—Eric and I ran in for the flush, accompanied by Gunner, Eric's English setter. River stooped and hit a grouse, then stooped again after her pitch-up. We both agreed it had been a fatal hit, and found her on her kill under a lone cedar tree not too far from where the flight had begun. It turned out to be a prairie-chicken after all; the self-imposed segregation of sharps and chickens is incomplete, and hybrids are not uncommonly found.

[River and her chicken]

[Hero shot]

[Gunner cools off in a stock tank]



We flew bunny hawks in the afternoon. I had really been looking forward to an "easy" rabbit hunt in the Sandhills, where the cover tends to be more sparse than it is back home. What I got was a two-hour ordeal (maybe three) in heavy cover at Calamus Reservoir, as Stekoa followed cottontails running alternately through hillside cedars growing as dense as any southern Appalachian "rhododendron hell", impenetrable willow thickets growing at the edge of the lake, and enormous piles of driftwood bleached to silver by the relentless prairie sun. I would have gladly abandoned the hunt, but I had little hope of calling Stekoa down while he was seeing rabbits, and anyway Maxine and Anya were working so hard in the heat that they made me feel ashamed for even thinking of quitting. The crowd of beaters and onlookers was repeatedly split as we traversed the area, and eventually most of them set off to fly other hawks in a more congenial setting. Finally, after everyone but Donna Vorce had departed, Stekoa was induced to leave the cedar hell for a more open area of grassland dotted with individual cedars, adjacent to a small cattail marsh, and within a few minutes he had his rabbit.

[Wind circles on the beach at Calamus]

Karl Linderholm caught a rabbit with his Harris' hawk, Clarice, and first-year apprentice Nick Morris and his redtail took their first rabbit together. Scott Backlund bravely flew a new passage redtail, trapped just 18 days earlier, with a crowd of about twenty people in attendance. Surprisingly, only a single bunny was flushed for her, but she handled herself well and ought to be as steady a hawk as one could wish for. No rabbits were flushed for Clarice's brother Hannibal, flown by Bob Noble, and after three voles Bob decided to call it a day.

[Clarice]

[Karl and Clarice with her rabbit]

Sunday was another early morning, this time with Anita Johnson and her hybrid tiercel, Riddick. Riddick is River's brother, but he seems more peregrine than gyr—when he was at about six hundred feet, another longwinger in the party commented on his nice pitch, to which Anita responded bluntly, "That's shit; wait 'til he gets there." "There" was something like eleven or twelve hundred feet, and when Riddick came down those of us who had lost visual contact were able to find him again by the ripping sound made by the air rushing through his wings. He hit a prairie-chicken and disappeared over a hill, but despite the cloud of feathers that went drifting over Eric and Karl, both Anita and I knew that the chicken would keep going and Riddick would soon be back. He did return, and once again mounted into the sky, but a wild prairie falcon came in and crabbed with him; by the time that interaction was over, Riddick was spent and Anita called him in to the lure.

[Riddick in morning light]

The meet was more or less over by breakfast, except for a small party of us who adjourned to Davis Creek Reservoir for a last bit of bunny hawking. The hills above the lake, with their sandy soil, are characterized by healthy cottontail populations, large stands of densely-growing switchgrass, and an abundance of holes the rabbits can use for escape cover when the switchgrass isn't enough. But eventually both hawks flown, Clarice and Stekoa, caught bunnies and we all headed for home.

[No longer with us: This church near Davis Creek, photographed last winter, has since fallen down. A lot has changed since last year...]

The can-do, make-do spirit is alive and well

In some parts of the world, when a knob breaks, a hotel owner sends someone to the hardware store for a new knob. In rural Nebraska, the hotel owner is just as likely to run to the hardware store for a pair of Vise-Grip pliers.


It may or may not be elegant, but it worked great all weekend. This pair looks old enough to be Nebraska-made; the Vise-Grip was invented and, until recently, manufactured in DeWitt. Rubbermaid bought the company in 2002; last year they closed the factory in DeWitt and outsourced production to China. Word is that the quality has suffered.