I was outside having a drink and a sort of cigarette twenty minutes ago and was disturbed by the agonised squeaking of a small animal in the jaws of a predator, which went on, rising and falling, for about a minute until it faded away. Between the screams there were occasional growling noises of the sort made by a predator that can't open its mouth for practical reasons.
This wasn't in the forest where I live in Sussex, where wildlife of most sorts is abundant. It was from the balcony of my SiL's flat where we are staying tonight on the southernmost downhill end of the Islington ridge, 100 yards from Sadler's Wells Theatre which looms hugely over the view to the right. Below the balcony where I was getting quietly ripped after a tiring and very hot day is a dense and quite extensive shrubbery, on the fringes of which I saw two foxes sunning themselves a couple of months ago. I think they live there. Earlier today I saw a naive-looking young grey squirrel in the road outside, but heading for the wall, conveniently provided with trees on both sides, between the shrubbery and the small street outside.
I think the foxes had caught the (or a) squirrel. Later there was a sort of doggish whining and complaining, quite brief, down there. That I think was the junior fox griping about its lousy share of squirrel. Two blokes came out onto another balcony to see what all the clamour was about. But you couldn't see anything of course.
London. You can't beat it. 'All human and inhuman life is there'. Heh heh.
|
|
Maybe one day after much evolving, Mr Fox will learn to farm, slaughter, and butcher other animals, and even get the produce thereof delivered to nationwide collection points.
|
Squirrel alarm calls sound like guttural screeching, very much like an animal in distress.
I saw one up a tree at the Braid Hills in Edinburgh making a hellish racket, and when I went a bit closer I saw a cat nonchalantly licking its paw a few branches below the squirrel.
The icing on the cake was when the squirrel then peed on the cat which convinced moggie to give up the siege.
|
|
Grey Squirrell or Cat. A zero sum game.
|
That made my morning:)
....and a very good reason nature should be left to it's own devices.
Pat
|
>> made my morning:)
I thought you would dig it Pat.
Bet you wouldn't have liked the noises though.
As for the hellish screeching of rabbits caught by cats, I first heard that in Pembrokeshire in 1949 or so, when I was ten, collecting free range eggs from the hedgerows and learning to milk cows by hand, as enormous rats appeared out of the cowshed walls and ran off with bits of cattle cake. Very free range it all was. A sort of hill farm outside Fishguard where my parents took lodgings for a while.
|
>> Mr Fox will learn to farm, slaughter, and butcher other animals, and even get the produce thereof delivered to nationwide collection points.
Good idea Perro. If we allow animals to evolve sufficiently to supply us with the meat we crave, we will have an even easier time than we do already.
Will they be able to understand hygiene though? And will they be able to resist a bite or two of the produce? These things mount up you know. It may be more difficult than it looks.
|
>>Good idea Perro. If we allow animals to evolve sufficiently to supply us with the meat we crave, we will have an even easier time than we do already.
I was a'thinking along the lines of some futureworld Sire, say 1 billion years from now, when even you'll be long gorn.
:}
|
>> I think the foxes had caught the (or a) squirrel.
I wish the foxes which make holes in our lawn would catch next door's yappy dog.
|
>> I was outside having a sort of cigarette
Hmmm! You weren't hallucinating I take it ;)
|
>> You weren't hallucinating I take it ;)
Takes more than one drink and a toke or two to make me hallucinate. On the other hand, 'All is illusion.'
The squirrel-like screaming definitely wasn't the noise squirrels make when they swear at you or at each other. It was stricken, desperate, and fading. Quite sinister to hear, especially interspersed with those quiet chomping growls...
|
|
Worst animal attack we witness was when a huge seagull tried to swallow a pigeon whole! Chased the seagull off but he kept hanging around. Pigeon mortally wounded but we put it somewhere safe to die in peace.
|
Never heard a squirrel scream must be a horrible sound, they make angry aggressive chatters easily confused with magpies sometimes, had me searching in me sights for the maggie before now only to find a squirrel after all.
Rabbits scream terribly when attacked, its a dreadful sound.
In my previous life we had a small tabby, lovely little cat which i was given as a kitten by the Epicure (remember them?) warehouse in Kettering i transported from where its mum was employed on rodent duties.
That kitten was small but wiry tough and quick, when she eventually had kittens she would cross 2 walls, 4ft and 6ft and off into the allotments, grab a rabbit bigger than herself, then somehow dragged the thing back still struggling over those two walls and only then kill it in front of the kittens and they all fed from it.
The screaming was something else.
|
Our dog screams when the vet sticks a thermometer up his bum.
EDIT: before you start - up the dog's bum, not the vet's
Last edited by: Focusless on Fri 6 Sep 13 at 13:28
|
|
Could try warming it, i'd probably scream too.
|
|
Pigs take some beating for noise when in pain.. lots of very noisy squealing...
|
|
I saw that film too, "Deliverance", wasn't it?
|
Gah you lot, i've got the sound of banjos stuck in me head now, nearly started voicing the tune aloud then, SWM already reckons you lot have sent me potty.
|
>> Gah you lot, i've got the sound of banjos stuck in me head now, nearly
>> started voicing the tune aloud then,
www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tqxzWdKKu8
There, tht'l do it boy
|
This might dislodge it: www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxarPu5mgUk
But then you're stuck..............................
|
>> There, tht'l do it boy
>>
Remember the Father Ted episode where young Father Dougal is mesmerised by the red button labelled do not press on the airliner...thats me at present, i know i shouldn't click on that link but its pulling me in.
|
Tooth and claw again - Dog
