Saturday 1 January 2011

Mary Poppins and her Robin................................

Mary Poppins and her little friend
American Robin (Turdus migratorious)
photo by Hilke Breder
 European Robin (Erithacus rubecula)
In 1965 when I was 9 years old my parents took me and my brother on holiday to Bournemouth in Dorset.
 One afternoon we went to the local cinema to see the latest blockbuster Mary Poppins.
I have two very vivid memories of that day.
We were always given an ice cream at our local cinema during the interval but on this day we had hot dogs as our treat....brilliant.
My other memory or really a question that has nagged away at me over the years was the size of Robin that appeared during "spoonful of sugar"....it looked more like a Blackbird they had painted red to me.
I have recently been introduced to images of the American Robin from fellow birders and bloggers in the USA and it dawned on me (after i had hit myself with a big stick) that they had used their little bird instead of ours for the bigger US audience.
Both birds are lovely and now at the age of 54 I have finally got rid of that nagging doubt.

6 comments:

Unknown said...

I haven't seen that photo of Mary Poppins in years.Boom & Gary.

grammie g said...

Hi Andrew..you are funny, like your humor...to tell you the truth I really think the Robin of the UK is adorable, and would be a much better fit in the movie!!

Arija said...

It certainly is the American robin who is about the same size as a European blackbird but whoever named it after a turd must have hated robins with a vengeance.

Don Wood said...

I had never noticed, next time I see the movie I will look out for it.

Veronica said...

Your photos are beautiful!!

theconstantwalker said...

Many thanks for all your comments.