Month: October 2025

Avatar Guide to the Genus Melocaeruledus: The Honey Fladger

Welcome back to Melocaeruledus corner. This week we take a deep dive into the scarier parts of the Fladger family tree with the Honey Fladger…

Honey Fladger

Scientific Name: Melocaeruledus melliferus (melliferus = “honey-bearing”, fitting its honey badger heritage and predatory, aggressive nature.)
Common Names: The Honey Badger,

Habitat: Savannah, scrublands, arid grasslands.

Description: The Honey Fladger combines the white-headed bastardry of the honey badger (Mellivora capensis) with the shiney blue abdomen of a bluebottle fly. Compound eyes lend it a fearsome viso/volto.

Behaviour: Both feared and admired by locals, Its powerful build makes it a fearless hive-raider. Shrugging off bee stings, it consumes the honey, wax, and larvae with equal relish. Whilst it will generally eat anything that annoys it, it has a fondness for snakes, biting them behind the head and dropping them from a great hight onto other unsuspecting Honey Fladgers.

Notes: Its buzzing flight has been likened to the growl of a wolverine caught in a trap.

Avatar Tired (again)

As we can all tell from my last post, even without the statement at the end, I was, and still am, very tired. What started as a brief joke message to my brother turned into a rambling post on here about all sorts. This was not what I had intended to do. I was going to set some time aside for another Chris open source DNA newsboost post only suddenly it was 11pm before the end of the month and I had to scrabble around for something quicker and easier instead.

Everyone knows that looking after babies is exhausting. That still doesn’t prepare you for how exhausting it actually is. It’s a new level of exhaustion not felt in a very long time; to think I used to get a bit rowdy if I lost as little as half an hour’s sleep on a weekday. Oh, what a fool I was.

The good news is that despite some major changes to preparing baby formula bottles and some minor stuff, a lot of it remains the same and muscle memory is keeping me afloat. I am a happy state of tired, one that means I struggle to remember which way to clean the cheese grater so that I don’t shred the sponge but one that knows it is all worth it because of who it’s all for.

Perhaps with all this weariness we’ll return to 2007 Ian, writing nonsense poems about shoes made of bonfires and random articles about haunted sesame seeds. That all remains to be seen and I apologise in advance if it does happen.

Avatar Newsboost – Burnham’s Laburnums

Burnham Calls for Change in Laburnum Society

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham has turned his attention from politics to petals, declaring that his laburnums outshine those grown in London, and that he should take the helm of the Laburnum Society.

Speaking at a small community garden event this week, Burnham praised his golden-flowering trees, saying, “I honestly believe the laburnums I grow here are stronger, brighter, and more accessible than anything they’ve got down south. The Laburnum Society is not currently serious about serving the people. I’ve even had Laburnum Society Committee members asking me to stand for the leadership now”

Burnham went on to argue that laburnums should not remain the preserve of the wealthy or well-connected. “These flowers should be available to everyone, regardless of cost,” he said. “We need to make them a part of everyday life, not just something admired in gated gardens or exclusive shows.”

While his comments have raised eyebrows among traditionalists in the horticultural world, local gardeners in Manchester have welcomed Burnham’s push for a more open and inclusive approach to laburnum growing.

The Laburnum Society has yet to respond to his remarks.