Wednesday, November 5, 2008

The Call Of The Wild

Having grown up in South Florida, wildlife in my mind was alligators and poisonous snakes. Both of which I'm terrified of. I then lived for thirty five years in New York's East Village where wild life consisted of rats, roaches, pigeons and the occasional feral dog (New Orleans where I spent time had packs of feral pooches roaming the streets of the Bywater at night, my late pal Kelly Keller got cornered by a pack one night that got between where she was living and where her car was parked, pretty damn scary). Now I live on the west side, in Chelsea and have a backyard with two giant black walnut trees, and in adjoining yards giant Maple trees, a tri-sected elm (one part of which grows over my yard) and tons of smaller trees and bushes. I now seem to have a personal relationship with urban wildlife, which includes a woodpecker (I'm not sure if you can see him in the top photo, it depends on how big your computer screen is, he's on the left branch with a red tuft on his head), a pair of cardinals, a red winged hawk (who eats mice alive, quite a show), robins, blue jays, various water fowl, six thousand sparrows and a family of squirrels. Reminds me of one of record that's evaded my grasp for years-- Nat Couty's Woodpecker Rock, one of the best black rockabilly records ever. I like squirrels, they're like lobotomized monkeys. Very much like the people I know. It started off with one malnourished kitten who lived off the paltry walnut output of the aforementioned pair of trees (they seem to be over a hundred years old and are covered in ivy six floors high, great for privacy, probably strangling the trees to death). I started feeding the squirrel, whom I named Peaches (after the brat in Gavin Lambert's Running Time who gets devoured by coyotes). Soon Peaches (bottom photo) had grown to normal squirrel size and became quite friendly, parking herself on the ledge outside my office window when she got hungry. Then Peaches found a mate-- Large Boy, who I once saw get attacked by a male cardinal (he now bears two talon scars down his back so I can tell him apart from other squirrels). Peaches and Large Boy, who maintain separate residences (Peaches lives on top of the carriage house behind St. Peter's Episcopal Church, right behind my house, Large Boy over a shed in a yard of a brownstone that faces 20th Street several doors east of Peaches abode). I think this is a good spot for one of my favorite records ever, from one of two guys to record for the two of the coolest labels ever Sun and Fortune-- Dr. Issiah Ross' (Doctor of what you ask? I dunno but one of his Sun records was called "Boogie Disease") Cat Squirrel. I know Cream covered "Cat Squirrel" but I'm proud to say I've never heard it. I hate Eric Clapton. By the way, the other guy who recorded for Sun and Fortune was Johnny Powers. He also recorded for Fox ("Long Blond Hair") the label that issued the above Nat Couty disc. Boy am I getting off the track... Back in my yard, nature took its course soon the squirrels had little duffer-- I call him Bingo. Bingo soon grew larger than his father and commandeered the entire yard as his turf. Peaches manages to hold her own when they fight over the food (I try and throw her food on one side of the ten foot stone wall that separates us from the church, and Bingo's on the other to keep them from killing each other) but Peaches is starting to show the scars from raising a brat, one of her ears is now in shreds. Large Boy is terrified of his spawn and shyly comes around begging for nuts only when Bingo is off doing what ever the hell he does. I forgot to mention, Bingo is retarded. I know this because I can throw a nut inches from him and it will take him a half hour to find it. Sometimes he sniffs around in circles for fifteen minutes, missing the nut that is inches from his snoot, then gives up and goes back to his post in the walnut tree. When he does find the nuts he hides them in places where Large Boy can easily steal them, which is good because otherwise the older squirrel would starve to death. Where my wife comes from in New Brunswick, Canada they have quite the wild life, mammals all over the place, some of them are gigantic. Once she was talking on the phone of the breakfast nook at her parents' house and a brown bear jumped out of the garbage can below the window. Moose hunting is big up there and the first moose bagged during moose hunting season of 2002 pushed 9/11 off the front pages of the local newspaper. Here's the best rock'n'roll record ever made about a moose, from the Specialty label Roddy Jackson's "Moose On The Loose". Above is a New Brunswick moose, I don't know his name. I imagine somebody shot and ate him by now as he's a pretty big target. If I can put that Moose together with Peaches I can live in a Jay Ward cartoon (I can be Boris!). These are the things that have occupied my mind since the election was driving me nuts and tv has been crappy lately (except the final season of The Shield which has been pretty good). Sure signs of brain damage....

15 comments:

Bob Pomeroy said...

Great Moose photo. Living in New England I've seen far more moose crossing signs than actual moose. Someday maybe. "Woodpecker Rock" is killer! Built on a riff kinda like Jr Parker's "Feelin' Good" & countless John Lee Hooker tunes too.

Anonymous said...

I saw a total of two bear this past summer when I was biking.

It's a thrill.

The Hound said...

My mind flashes on the scene in Grizzly Man when Timothy Tredwell is talking baby talk to the bear and expounding on how the bears share his human emotions and Werer Herzog breaks in as narrator in his deadpan German accent with "I beg to differ....".
My second favorite cinemtatic moment of the century so far (my first in the kid shooting scene in City Of God).

Anonymous said...

Is it safe to say now that bears aren't "mainly harmless party animals" as Treadwell once described
them

Philo

The Hound said...

But if you were a bear wouldn't you want to kill that guy too? In fact, if he moved in next door to you wouldn't you want to kill him? (maybe not eat him, but just shut him up...)
I think I have a photo of a dancing bear in a carnival somewhere, if I can find it I'll post it.

J.D. Hughes said...

Moose on the loose!

Anonymous said...

"I know Cream covered "Cat Squirrel" but I'm proud to say I've never heard it. I hate Eric Clapton"

Gotta confess the Cream version
was the first time I had heard that song. Didn't know it even had lyrics
till I heard Dr Ross & the Orbits sing it
on a comp many years later. The one to watch out for is the Jethro Tull
version. yikes.

Philo

Brendan said...

Jim, next time you are in South Africa... scotch the plan for me to come to Kaap Stad. Instead you take the hop to Durban, I borrow my mate's Land Cruiser and we head up to Maputaland, KwaZulu Natal(http://www.maputaland.net/). I promise to only play latter day Yardbirds on N2 heading north! Txs again for the VU material, appreciated, B.

The Hound said...

funny you should mention that, my brother in law is headed for JoHo tomorrow and my sister in law is in swaiziland at the moment. I think I should come and get a look at some real wild life while before it all gets eaten. How far is it from cape town?

Brendan said...

Durban is a 2 hour flight from Cape Town. I'll email you a map etc. ciao.

The Hound said...

thanks, I posted your link under Stuff I Read,
that's a pretty handy service you're running there!

Greg from Cronulla said...

I'd greatly appreciate it if you could tell me some of the words to Moose on the Loose, specifically what Roddy sings after "there's a bear on the chair." The accompanying sound could be a monkey, but I can't make out if he's singing monkey on the phone, mole on the pole or something totally different.

The Hound said...

I think he's saying "there's a monk on the bunk", someone than makes a noise that supposed to be a monkey, actually it's a chimp noise, is a chimp considered a monkey or an ape? great rock'n'roll songs aren't supposed to make sense...

Bob Pomeroy said...

"...is a chimp considered a monkey or an ape?"
Ask Dave the Spazz, he oughta know

Anonymous said...

A chimp is an ape. Apes do not have tails.

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