Login | Register
The Engineer's Place for News and Discussion®


Engineering News

Latest news of interest to engineers. Sourced from GlobalSpec's Engineering News

Previous in Blog: Start-Up Sunglass Sets Out to Disrupt the CAD Industry   Next in Blog: Nissan's Easy Fill Idiot-Proofs Tire Inflation
Close

Comments Format:






Close

Subscribe to Discussion:

CR4 allows you to "subscribe" to a discussion
so that you can be notified of new comments to
the discussion via email.

Close

Rating Vote:







9 comments

Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

Posted May 25, 2012 9:06 AM

From New Scientist - Online News:

Flocks of cedar waxwings died en masse outside Los Angeles after overdoing it on berries from the Brazilian pepper tree

Read the whole article

Reply

Interested in this topic? By joining CR4 you can "subscribe" to
this discussion and receive notification when new comments are added.

Comments rated to be "almost" Good Answers:

Check out these comments that don't yet have enough votes to be "official" good answers and, if you agree with them, rate them!
Guru

Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: Cd. Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico.
Posts: 654
Good Answers: 42
#1

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/25/2012 5:20 PM

OK, what about the fish?

__________________
No hay conocimiento ni herramienta que sustituya al sentido comun.
Reply
Guru

Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: at the beach in Florida
Posts: 5505
Good Answers: 271
#2

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/25/2012 7:52 PM
__________________
The relentless pursuit of pacification....
Reply
Guru

Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: at the beach in Florida
Posts: 5505
Good Answers: 271
#3
In reply to #2

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/25/2012 8:11 PM

This hawk, after consuming several drunken birds, was attracted to Nicolas Cages hair, which evidently resembled a female hawk....

__________________
The relentless pursuit of pacification....
Reply Score 1 for Good Answer
Guru

Join Date: Dec 2008
Location: Cd. Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico.
Posts: 654
Good Answers: 42
#7
In reply to #3

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/29/2012 1:53 PM

What the f...!!! absolutely funny, ALL the Nicolas Cage-fan wives should get this picture !

__________________
No hay conocimiento ni herramienta que sustituya al sentido comun.
Reply
Guru
Hobbies - Fishing - New Member

Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Raleigh, NC USA
Posts: 9195
Good Answers: 329
#4

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/26/2012 8:32 AM

I'm not a drunk......................I have a yeast infection.

__________________
If you expect what you've learned to outlive you............give it away.
Reply
Guru

Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: Etherville
Posts: 13174
Good Answers: 83
#5

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/27/2012 9:07 AM

I'm not completely convinced. About 2 years back we had a spat of 'bird crashes' in Blighty. Just posting here to remind myself to check. Though the cited case may be correct, other phenomena can cause bird crashes. It sticks in my mind because in that year I saws several crashes, and demented birds pecking at windows and car wing-mirrors.

Drunk critters - you have to be kidding ! They all do it. Last night's TV featured Lemurs. OK, this isn't drunk, but it's related. They grab millipedes and coat their fur with the secretions. This deters mosquitoes. Side effect is the alkaloid poison that millipedes gives off. Yep, them Madagascan critters are stoned out their heads. Droopy eyes, dribbling...it's straight out of The Freak Brothers. More amusing than the usual Youtube drunken elephant type stuff.

Interesting anatomical stuff on the species cited. (I'm trying to be constructive, after reading some right twaddle on blogs). Whowever blogged this - thanks. Job well done (it's far too easy to criticise ).

__________________
These nuts may contain traces of post.
Reply
Guru

Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 916
Good Answers: 74
#6

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/28/2012 5:32 PM

Doesn't surprise me. While growing up in San Francisco, every spring we would watch the robins get drunk from the fermented berries on the neighbor's pyracantha shrub. The cats on the ground really enjoyed the side effects of this. --JMM

Reply
Guru

Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 550
Good Answers: 22
#8
In reply to #6

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/29/2012 2:09 PM

I had the same experience with my pyracantha. It was about 12 tall and by early November the berries had fermented. I could watch the birds stumbling about on the lawn after they had had "a few too many". When flying it was a case of "Here they go loopy lou, here they go loopy lie".

__________________
Spinco
Reply
Power-User

Join Date: Aug 2009
Posts: 366
Good Answers: 5
#9
In reply to #8

Re: Drunk Birds Had One-Too-Many Berries to Blame

05/30/2012 2:00 PM

I bet the neighborhood cats loved that! Or should I say, "relished" that.

Reply Off Topic (Score 5)
Reply to Blog Entry 9 comments
Interested in this topic? By joining CR4 you can "subscribe" to
this discussion and receive notification when new comments are added.

Comments rated to be "almost" Good Answers:

Check out these comments that don't yet have enough votes to be "official" good answers and, if you agree with them, rate them!
Copy to Clipboard

Users who posted comments:

jmueller (1); kramarat (1); Kris (1); Passerby (1); SolarEagle (2); Spinco (1); Yahlasit (2)

Previous in Blog: Start-Up Sunglass Sets Out to Disrupt the CAD Industry   Next in Blog: Nissan's Easy Fill Idiot-Proofs Tire Inflation