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We have had the opposite with a couple of crows ! For years , a pair of crows have come for food scraps in our back garden .

Not everybody's cup of tea but these two are extremely timid . We assume that it's the male that is slightly braver and comes to get the food when we are out the way . The female hangs around at the back of the lawn and occasionally the male will regurgitate food and go and feed her .

The pair of them have a lot of grey feathers but up until this week the female had been missing for weeks . We assumed she had either died or was sitting on eggs as the lone male looked a bit lost but was eating for England !

This week though the female has re-appeared with no chicks evident .

Maybe she had been on her hols ?

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have to say first of all that these are the words of someone else not me. . if it was me i'd have been sure to go off on tangents at least twice haha I will tell you a tale that is true and will once

First shouted at Wellington by a Notts lad at Waterloo when he saw a cannonball heading straight for the Iron Dukes head.

I was watching a couple of wood pigeons mating on our fence last night and I envied them till I fell off the damn fence myself!

  • 1 year later...

have to say first of all that these are the words of someone else not me. . if it was me i'd have been sure to go off on tangents at least twice haha

I will tell you a tale that is true and will once more bring to mind one of Nottingham's forgotten characters. The man in question was the late and sorely missed Albert Gristle.

Albert was a dweller in Narrow marsh during the 1890s when the reputation of "the Marsh" was at its worst.

Albert was a man who once seen was not easily forgotten. He had a wooden leg, black and burnished by the elements, since Albert never slept anywhere but beneath God's good sky.

He had a black and bushy beard and on his shoulder he had a stuffed parrot. This parrot had been his companion when Albert sailed on the seven seas, although Albert could only remember five of them, except when he was drunk. The parrot was long dead but Albert had formed such an attachment to it he had had it stuffed and kept it close by him at all times.

His leg had been lost, so he said, in an encounter with a shark off the Goodwin sands. Sharks are not normally seen off the Goodwin sands but this shark was a rare Halibut shark, the most deadly and rarely seen of all that dreadful class of fish.

Because Albert was unfit for work in the nearby mills he had become the knocker-upper for those who rose each day before dawn to start their 20 hour shift at the mills in the Lace Market.

Every morning he would sway and curse his way along the narrow alleys that made up the Marsh waving his knocker-upper's pole aloft like some wooden badge of office.

His gait was awkward and slow and his aim with the pole was even worse because of his unsteady state. Often he would take several attempts at each window before he could strike it and call out the customary "Are ya up me lad".

His walk was so slow that before long those he had woken would gather behind him in a sullen crowd and watch his antics, well there was no telly in those days.

Often as he tired he would take so many swings at each window that the occupant of the house above would already be awake, roused by the laughter of the crowd who stood around the lurching, cursing figure of Albert.

If this happened Albert's pole would strike the head of the unfortunate occupant as they looked out of the window to see what all the noise was about. In this event the crowd would call out to prevent such a calamitous collision "DUCK".

On these occasions Albert's cry would be rendered as "Are ya up me... DUCK" and raucous laughter would accompany Albert's journey to the next house.

It became quite the joke in all the mills and pubs in the marsh to call out to anyone passing "Are ya up me DUCK" since this would invariably bring the recipient of this cry to tears of laughter.

And so it remains today, just try it yourself. Walk around any city in any country in the world and call out to passing strangers "Ay-up midduck".

Most will stare at you as if you are mad but anyone from Nottingham's fair city will instantly smile and laugh and return that greeting.

It's in our blood dear people of Nottingham so shout it loud and remember the dear departed Albert Gristle who is still putting a smile on all our faces.

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On 03/02/2013 at 8:16 AM, mick2me said:

Thanks Ducks :)

Anyone from inner Nottingham would say "Taa ducks" or "Taa me ducks".

Personally my flesh crawls at people saying taa and I always say thank you but I was from Kimbo not inner city whereas my first husband was born and raised in Strelley with his parents having to be re-educated to say thank you when my son (their Grandson) was born asvi certainly didn't want him saying "Taa". It just reminds me of the exinlaws eww

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Rarely if ever used 'Duck' as a kid in Bestwood.  'Youth' was far more common, and a good freind of mine still in Nottm. often calls me 'Chap'.

 

'There's a Chap', was the common warning if we were where we shouldn't be and someone, maybe a watchman, was approaching.

 

That said. 'Eyup Miduck' wasn't uncommon in my youth.

 

Sometime n the late 80s I went from Merseyside to Wirksworth in Derbys in my role as a part time youth worker.  In Wirksworth, it was just plain 'Duck'.  Every other word...

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Some of the old time Londoners say 'Duckie'...only recently heard it from a London Lady.........as in     'just going to sqeeze me, Lemon Duckie'.................don't know what she meant.............lol.

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Welcome to Nottstalgia DCorah and Danum. It's always nice to see new members joining. We look forward to sharing memories with you.

Danum, I see you use the term 'Flower' with each other in Doncaster, that is interesting as I now live in West Mids and people use that term here. It is a favourite of my husbands who is Black Country born and bred.:)

 

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I remember that comedian using the word 'flower' - in my mind, I can hear him saying it now!

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Charlie Williams did indeed use that term. Charlie was born in Royston near Barnsley and became one of the first black professional footballers when he signed for Doncaster Rovers.

 

After football he became one of the first well known black stand up comics.

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Saw Charlie play for Doncaster...........a good centre half......seemed a nice bloke too,wife sat with him on a train journey and she said what a nice bloke....and he called her 'Flower'..........

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Charlie Williams was also on The Golden Shot. He was very popular and it was such a shame

that he died after suffering from Parkinson's disease and dementia.                              

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I recently taught lots of Arab schoolkids the use of Ey-up Duck,,tara mi duck and a few other local phrases,,they were attending the place i worked to learn English..........their Libyan teacher picked up on it and asked me about such terms, i,offered to take a class every week for a fee, lol, he declined but thanked me for teaching them a bit of Notts speak,,

                           In the end i gave him one of my books called ''Ey-up Duck''.....was really funny when he and his pupils greeted me with Ey-up duck'' and Tara Duck on leaving,, i call that proper integration ,,

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I met a chap in Nottingham who had come to see the site: he'd travelled from Blackpool where he'd seen the lights

He said I've seen Nottingham Castle though it looked more like a hall, I've even seen the statue of brave young Albert Ball.

I went to the park in Wollaton were the Reindeer run free

I took a trip to Sherwood Forest and saw the old oak tree

Then I wonder round the Council House sat in slab square, loved the flowers up the poles and all the pigeons there

Saw the Galleries of Justice, and Tales of Robin Hood, went around the sandstone caves folks told me I should.

Visited the Oldest Inn partaken in it's beer cruised along the river Trent it was really pleasant there. BUT!! there's one thing that I missed, could you tell me where to look? I hear it mentioned every where!

"WHERE CAN I FIND THE DUCK"

I look at him in puzzlement and said "What ever do you mean" I'm a stranger here myself and this duck I've never seen.

We joined forces and wonderd  off to seek, around the streets of Nottingham for this creature with a beak.

We hunted High we hunted Low  yet!!!! every place we've been, we heard the locals speak to this creature with a beak' but never once have seen.

"Ay up mi duck"      "Ta rah mi duck"   even    "See you mi duck"

Yet never once have we observed this most elusive bird.

The time has come to leave your city it really is a pity, that the one thing we did not see was the.

LEGEND OF YOUR CITY

 I can not take credit for this work as a friend of mine wrote it.

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On ‎2‎/‎9‎/‎2013 at 5:31 PM, Scriv said:

I asked me Dad about this years ago. His explanation was that it is a corruption of "My Duke".

Suspect Trevor S might be closer though.

Research shows that the term is a slovenly way of saying My Duke dating back to the time that Notts was dominated by a number of Dukes. As the years have passed it has been more widely used till now it is simply a means of address , mainly between friends or at least people who know each other. Some people take exception as its too familiar for them to stomach. There were many more Dukes in Nottinghamshire than most other counties due to Sherwood Forest being broken up into the Dukeries. Most of these Dukes made their money from Coalfields and the opening of pits and pit villages where it became common to address the Owner (The Duke) as Midduk ie My Duke. The term was prevalent in "pit villages" where The Duke, who owned the colliery also owned he houses that miners lived in. You will therefore find that the term midukk was used throughout the South Notts coalfields. Hence its common usage from Nottingham City to Worksop in particular. The Labour Government nationalised all the coalfields and the dukes and their land became a thing of the past. More evidence of this can be found by researching the history of the Duke of Newcastle.

 

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