René Seindal

There aren’t many reptile species in the lagoon of Venice. The lucertole are all over,there are snakes on some islands, and apparently one species of pond turtle, though I’ve never seen one of the those.

Yesterday, however, I saw what looked like a different kind of turtle.

We were paddling across the Canale delle Navi, between the Arsenale, Murano and le Vignole, which is a place with a lot of traffic, when I spotted something different in the water. It didn’t move but it had a too weird shape to ignore, so I returned back into the canal to find it again.

It looked barely alive when I picked it up, it hardly moved, but I took it to a more sheltered and shallower place and let it go, and it started swimming again.

I have no idea which species it is. The size matches the European pond turtle, but I have never seen one of those with spines on the back like the one has.

I met a grey heron the other day when I walked along the old fortifications near my home.

Its not all that unusual, they’re getting quite common around here, even in the centre of town. Most often we see them wading in the low water under the brink or sitting in the top of small trees, and they usually take flight if you get closer than about ten meters or so.

This one had settled on the fence of a viewing platform near the main path along the ramparts, which was a bit unusual, so I sat down to watch it for a while. Not only had it picked an unusual place to rest, it also seemed very reluctant to leave it. A man feeding the ducks went all the way down to it, and all it did was to take a few steps along the fence to keep more distance, and two children ran down to it, shouting, and it hardly moved.

After watching it for some time I too walked down to take a few photos with my mobile phone, and it allowed me as close as one metre without showing signs of distress. I took a few pictures as close as I could and walked on. From the next bastion I could see it was still sitting there.

I have never been that close to a grey heron before.

The Danish press has reported on a narwhal massacre in Greenland recently, where 42 narwhals have been killed, for their tusks and a limited amount of flesh. The rest of the whale were left to rot on the shore.

The remains of the whales were discovered by a boatful of tourists on August 17th.

The discovery has raised much fear of Greenland’s image as a place of sustainable hunting, where the whole animal is used.

There are more pictures and coverage in Danish at Sermitsiaq.gl.

It seems spring is on its way around here.

Flowers in the forest

New leaves

My beagle Jamil is taking a mud bath

Look how beautiful he has become

Not everything is beautiful in the forest. Somebody is preparing for another year’s crop of organically grown couch potatoes

(all photos are taken with my mobile phone, hence the pathetic image quality)

It’ll be a busy day in Venice today.

The day did, however, have a less auspicious start. As I was having breakfast at the camping at little thing dropped on the table just beside me. It was …

… the severed head of a bee!

There must have been some really nasty business going on up there between the leaves, but as I was busy too, I didn’t crawl up there to investigate.

I’ll have my temporary passport today if all goes well. I have the photos ready, and everything should be ready at the consulate too. I’m off to the vaporetto for the city in a moment.

The battery of my Nokia N800 Internet Tablet has died. It is not the new one sponsored by Nokia Nseries, but the one I have had for quite some time. I had it recharging all day yesterday and its still flat. Apparently its a slightly special battery, because the shops here on the Lido don’t have it. I hope I can find one, I’ve gotten so used to always having it with me.

Then I have to rent a car with a roof rack so we can transport the kayaks on the roof, book the ferry to Sardinia and pick up Wendy at the airport. Then tomorrow, we’ll be paddling together in the lagoon and in the city.

Then, lets hope the bees back at the camping have had their internal affairs sorted out before we’re back.

I know most of the sea birds species in Copenhagen from my daily walks with the dog, but since I started paddling I have seen other species you don’t normally see in town.

In the city we have Mallard, Coot, Tufted Duck, Great Crested Grebe, Mute Swan, Grey Heron, Greylag Goose, and several species of seagulls.

The “new” birds I have seen are the Common Eider (they breed in large numbers on Saltholm), the Great Cormorant, the Canada Goose and the red beaked wading bird I saw yesterday might have been a Eurasian Oystercatcher though I remember the colours a bit differently.

There’s also a particularly large species of gull at the beach park but I don’t know which species it is. I found one dead in the water one day, it must have had a wing span of over a meter.