Stuart Watt
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morungos.bsky.social
Stuart Watt
@morungos.bsky.social
1.3K followers 790 following 4.8K posts
Cognitive/social scientist and occasional coder. Umquhile Mancunian. Purveyor of Jurassic Park memes. Writes on modernization and technology. Consciously uncoupling from corporate shenanigans. Halifax, Nova Scotia
https://morungos.com/
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morungos.bsky.social
A delicious calm day on the coast today. But no otters yet.
A calm sea seen from a rocky coast, looking towards the sun. The rocks are almost black. The left half of the sky is patchy cloud and the right half is almost clear blue sky.
November 8, 2025 at 9:46 AM
morungos.bsky.social
Yay. Finally made it.
A coastal scene with a stone pier by grassy area with a small anchor. In the distance is a lighthouse. There is a pebble beach in the foreground. The day is cloudy with small breaks of blue in the sky.
November 2, 2025 at 4:28 PM
morungos.bsky.social
I am, briefly, for once in Hope.
A slightly dishevelled small railway station platform, with a large red sign “HOPE” and “561 FEET-171 METRES ABOVE SEA LEVEL”. There is a simple diagonally slatted wooden fence behind, and signs of agriculture beyond.
October 31, 2025 at 7:44 AM
morungos.bsky.social
Another bird🪶 thing from yesterday, the wee lake is temporary home to hundreds of ring-necked ducks. And I mean hundreds. Just a few shown here.

I never knew it, but ducks have "thumb" winglets, like a plane wing's slats, and the whoosh when a bunch of them slow down for landing is something else.
October 23, 2025 at 7:15 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Google AI doing terribly here. It appears to claim the osprey is actually a wader, because it eats fish. Not a raptor at all. For some reason the kestrel is too. The nuthatch is also wrong.

Ospreys with a long pointed beak. lol. 🤣
A tile of four images. Upper left is an osprey in flight, with a small hooked beak. Upper right is a lesser yellowlegs, a sandpiper wading bird with a long straight beak. Below the osprey, the text is a bullet point from AI reading “Osprey: The official bird of Nova Scotia, the osprey has a long, pointed beak used for catching fish” Below the lesser yellowlegs, is a screen cap excerpt from Google AI. The full text is as follows: “Al Overview Birds with long, thin beaks in Nova Scotia include the Great Blue Heron, which is a common and large wading bird, the Northern Flicker, a common woodpecker, and the White-breasted Nuthatch, a smaller forest-dwelling bird. Other birds with long, thin beaks include the American Kestrel and various other wading birds like the osprey.”
October 23, 2025 at 5:07 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Today our little local #halisky was honoured by a visit from (what I think is) a small flockette of lesser yellowlegs 🪶— a sandpiper that apparently has usually migrated through long ago.

Anyway, they flew in, flew in circles for about fifteen minutes, then flew out again. A wonderful experience.
About ten birds are flying above a lake, in unison. They are mostly grey above, with while bellies, and long yellow legs trailing behind. They have long dark beaks, about the same length as their heads. They are mostly grey above smart and elegant birds.
October 22, 2025 at 11:13 PM
morungos.bsky.social
I use one of these, fairly cheap online. HDMI in (and out), USB power and camera out. Works simply for me.
A small shiny metal box labelled “4K ULTRA HD. USB3.0 HDTV Video Capture”
October 9, 2025 at 1:40 AM
morungos.bsky.social
There were also probably 30 or so ring-necked ducks. Looks like they are gathering to fly soon. There were only about ten a few days back.
A distant view of a lake surface, with a lot of small ducks on it. They're distant and hard to see: some are more black-and-white, the others brown, and they have orangey-red eyes. Both have whitish rings around their beaks.
October 8, 2025 at 6:35 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Well. It turned out to be a raptor-filled 🪶 day, with:
1. Multiple ospreys, and watching one eat a fish in a tree
2. A juvenile sharp-shinned hawk
3. A juvenile bald eagle, rather scruffy
4. In the distance, a red-tailed hawk

That's probably a record for me for one #halisky location.
A large bird of prey is flying above the point of view, and staring directly at the camera.Its wings are out wide, its body is mostly light and its wings in shade. The top of its head is white, and it has a ringed tail fan. A medium-sized bird of prey is flying into a small patch of woodland. Its wings and body are a chocolate brown, but patterned, and its legs are yellow. A large bird of prey is flying high, seen in silhouette it looks entirely black. It has a large, hooked beak, and the trailing edge of its wings are distinctly scruffy-looking and uneven. A distant and fuzzy view of a smaller bird of prey. Seen from below, its wings are fairly light, just catching some low and faint sunlight, as is its body and chest. Its head is darker.
October 8, 2025 at 6:20 PM
morungos.bsky.social
And here they are live and diving.
October 4, 2025 at 7:01 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Some pics of the 🪶 hooded mergansers from yesterday's #halisky hike. Glorious fall colour reflections into the bargain.
A small brown duck with a slightly flooffy head and sharp beak. She is swimming on a lake with concentric ripples and reflecting trees in colours of reds, browns, and greens. Three small brown ducks with flooffy heads, swimming on a lake with concentric ripples and reflecting trees in red and brown. A back view of a small brown duck on a lake, flapping her wings. She has a massive mohawk in an orange colour. Her wings are fairly light brown with darker edges.
October 4, 2025 at 7:01 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Google: just sign in so we can track you

Everyone: no *clicketty click*

Google: *removes close box*

This is not just a dark pattern. It is not consent. It is coercion.
A web site pop up from Google asking people to sign in with a “Continue” button. There is no close or cancel option.
October 1, 2025 at 4:23 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Here's a pic from there about 10 days back. Difficult light, but I'm sure of the wood duck, and on reflection, I think it's hanging out with a couple of hooded mergansers.
A rippled lake surface, strongly striped with looking into the light. Three ducks are swimming on it in a row, swimming from right to left. The front and rear ducks are low, brown, and have a distinct fuzz at the back of their heads. The middle duck is all fancy-pants, red beak and eye, and just the gist of a hood.
September 28, 2025 at 9:03 PM
morungos.bsky.social
From June this year -- and a belated picture post, but this is one of our beautiful hummingbird clearwing moths doing its thing.
A medium sized moth in mid air, with its proboscis in a beautiful spiral curl. Its wings are mostly transparent, with a reddish border to them. Its body is reddish brown fading to cream, and its tail splays out somewhat resembling a lobster tail. It is flying towards a cluster of delicate pink flowers on a background of green leaves.
September 28, 2025 at 7:50 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Finally got time to hang one of my mum’s art quilts: “Northern Lights”. Loved this the first time I saw it. So happy it’s now on one of my walls.
A small quilted artwork. The bottom is a skyline with silhouetted houses. Above it is a vertical painted fabric in reds, blues, greens, and purples, in washes, vertically. The top fades to black. Small glass beads are sewn in. Copyright Kitty Watt 2011.
September 27, 2025 at 8:05 PM
morungos.bsky.social
If you see this, post a bridge.

(I know I always use this pic, but what a bridge she is. Thanks to the EU for funding it.)
A beautiful streamlined narrow bridge passing over a sea loch with misty mpuntains in the background. It’s Drochaid a' Chaolais Chumhaing (Kylesku Bridge) and the mountain is Quinag.
September 26, 2025 at 1:30 PM
morungos.bsky.social
If you want something done properly, do it yourself.

I’m not gonna wait around to be raptured, I’m off into the wilderness to experience a small slice of heaven.
A figure with a white hat and hiking pants is seated on a small outcrop of granite in front of a mirror calm lake bordered by trees in the background. The sky is blue with a few wisps of cloud reflected in still waters.
September 23, 2025 at 1:09 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Yesterday's 🪶 birds, a #Halisky selection. We have here: a ruffled grouse, a great blue heron, a common merganser, a wood duck, and a northern harrier. A good day out.
A ruffled grouse -- a mottled brown member of the chicken family -- is hiding among long green gasses, her eye is just visible in the centre, and her small curved beak to the right. She is very well camouflaged. An extremely large great blue heron is standing in water at the edge of a small lake, water that was previously occupied a bunch of sleeping ducks. His wings ate stretched out, as if saying "TADA!!" Two different ducks are swimming on confusingly reflective and rippling water. On the right is a low, brown and white duck, with something of a fuzzy crest. It is a common merganser. Slightly to her right is a more ornate duck, with a smaller but chunkier red beak, mostly brown and white again (at this time of year) -- a wood duck. Almost in silhouette against the a blue sky, a large bird of prey can be seen, wings outstretched, small round head at the front, with just a hint of the kinds of eye disks that owls have. There is a distinctive white patch where her tail meets her wings, and her little feetses are hanging down, talons curled back a little, as if grasping air. She is a northern harrier, and she is looking for food.
September 20, 2025 at 2:59 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Celebratory bird pic, from yesterday. A turkey vulture sighting for #Halisky. Amazing to see these things here. 🪶
A large black bird soaring, seen from below against a blue sky. It has a small head, showing a tinge of red on his beak, and his wings are a little unevenly feathered on the trailing edge. His tail is fairly straight. It is a turkey vulture.
September 18, 2025 at 11:18 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Those apples that were in the wild, they are now preserved.
A number of jars filled with a chunky brown goo, labelled “Brutus’ Preserves: Feral Apple Chutney, September 2025”, with a black and white cat logo. Close up of a jar of a chunky brown goo, labelled “Brutus’ Preserves: Feral Apple Chutney, September 2025”, with an exceedingly handsome black and white cat logo.
September 15, 2025 at 9:29 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Share your favourite covers as a timeline cleanse
Cover art for “Organisation” by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark. Cover art by Peter Saville, photo by Richard Nutt, of the Red Cuillin on Skye. Cover is a bold black frame with white lettering, around a moody dark monochrome mountainous landscape, with glimpses of sun attempting to break through low cloud.
September 15, 2025 at 4:34 PM
morungos.bsky.social
Well, you link gender to white matter vs grey matter -- which is 100% the realm of biology. I accept that you were meaning to be trans-inclusive, but your point is ammunition for those who are not. It is a biological theory of social group difference, and those are dangerous.
Screen image from Sandra Bem's "The Lenses of Gender" chapter entitled "Biological essentialism" "The particular blend of antifeminist politics and biological theorizing that prevailed in the United States at the turn of the last century had begun to decline by 1920. Although many later scientists continued to find biological accounts of both sexual difference and sexual inequality more plausible than the evidence warranted, science was gradually becoming so much more grounded in well-controlled empirical research-and after the Nazi era, so much more aware of how a biological theory of group difference could be abused—that few of the truly major figures in biology were theorizing about any group difference, including the difference between women and men, between 1950 and 1970. That period of biological quiescence came to an abrupt end in the late 1960s, when the civil rights and women's liberation movements again threatened the established social order, much as the abolition and women's rights movements had done a century earlier. One of the first biological challenges to the civil rights movement came in 1960..."
August 29, 2025 at 7:11 PM
morungos.bsky.social
No. …. Just, no.
Two packs of “Barbie” bright pink Wagon Wheels on a store shelf.
August 27, 2025 at 2:28 PM
morungos.bsky.social
This is exactly what I remember seeing described elsewhere. I think the actual code book -- numbers to meaning -- has been lost (it probably changed a lot, anyway). But this is what we will have had here. parkscanadahistory.com/series/ha/64...
A mast with two cross pieces, each of which is marked with positions where balls can be attached. There are many combinations, allowing for a complex number to be transmitted by semaphore.
August 24, 2025 at 7:07 PM
morungos.bsky.social
I *think* the semaphore code used these masts with cross-pieces on, shown at the top of the Citadel. They're shown on a bank note from around 1810, so the time is right. But I do not know for sure. archives.novascotia.ca/halifax/arch...
An engraved print of Halifax Citadel seen from the harbour, with a tall ship close to the centre. Right at the top of the Citadel in the distance can be seen two tall masts with long cross-pieces on.
August 24, 2025 at 6:49 PM