They make an appearance on the older buildings, indicating that they have been Alsace's special bird for a long time!
They dominate the souvenir boutiques.
They appear on socks & slippers...
...and backpacks...
...and babies 'hoodies'.
They are embroidered onto a wide variety of table & kitchen linen.
For those who want to make their own, there are printed patterns for embroidery.
They even appear on comic book covers!
Today I found a chocolatier who has created a stork to indulge in.
Across from the Cathedral, a mother stork is teaching her chick how to fly, by jumping out the window!
All of these are mere representations of the real bird, and don't show one of the stork's most endearing attributes, their nesting habits.
As with the storks that migrate between northern Spain & Morocco, these storks have large flat nests which they build on high & rather odd (&inconvenient to humans) locations...like chimneys!
The Strasbourg Botanic gardens are home to a number of storks.
Aside from chimneys , they locate themselves on rooftops & wooden frames in the zoo.
Being birds of flight, they also like trees, especially the very top of knobbly trees.
They have formed a small neighbourhood on the top of this arcade of trees.
They are so happy here, in the Botanic Gardens, that they can no longer be bothered to migrate each year, & the Garden staff have to ensure there is enough potential food for them.
They are sometimes gangly & sometimes graceful. They have the weirdest bird sound...more like an animal than a bird & they clack their beaks rapidly to communicate.
They are QUIRKY, and it's this quirkiness that I love about them....however, I would not like to have one choose my chimney to nest on...even if it is supposed to bring good luck!!
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