cuthound

That is interesting Ray, in recent years we have seen a growing gull population and a diminishing moor hen population on the cut near us.

That must be news to most of the ships crossing oceans... : )

It's called "the raspberry jam effect". I first heard the term used during a telecomms conference during the late 70's by an American speaker. He pointed out that quality programming is limited by the number of good screenwriters, producers, actors etc and thus quality programs are limited to x hours per week With only 4 channels the quality programmes on each channel will be about x/4. When the number of channels increase to say 100 the quality content will average x/100 per channel Sadly the amount of dross has to increase to fill the remaining air time.

Yes the survival rate is very low compared to cygnets and moor hen chicks, where most seem to survive. I once saw two ducklings out of a batch disappear vertically downwards never to be seen again. Presumably taken by a pike.

Saw our first duck with ducklings this year. She had 8. I wonder how many will survive?

I agree, IPA must be strong and heavily hopped. My wife once bought me a bottle of "Peaky Blinders IPA". It was black, like a stout! Obviously the marketing men didn't understand what the "P" stands for in IPA...

No I haven't seen any moorhens this year either and there are far fewer ducks about. I blame bird flu.

No. As far as I know it is still lurking in Stockton Top Marina (formally Blue Lias Marina).

When we had our first shareboat we swapped the original "Z" beds fortwo chair beds. They worked well until some idiot dropped one in the cut whilst transporting it along the gunwale to move it to the rear of the boat, rather than disassemble it and take it through the boat...

Another visit to our moorings tonight by our tame swans. They don't panic when we feed their cygnets. We are so lucky to live here. It is a pity some to**er emptied his grass cuttings into the cut.

Thanks for the update. Nice to know he is well enough to use his camper van.

If all else fails you can hammer a screwdriver through the filter and use that, but it's messy.

Try drying it out, however it out If the motor subsequently seizes up, Cox Auto Electrics of Atherstone, Warwickshire can refurbish it at competitive price. https://www.coxautoelectrics.co.uk/ They refurbished mine after is seized up following my failure to remove condensation from the BT compartment.

I use one of these, which neither slips or crushes the filter (provided you tighten it up correctly and not too much)/