We are so lightly here

5. A chicken wants bad things to happen.

came home drunk last night and got way too excited to see my cat

TINY WRLD (2020)

Ocean Sunfish or Common Mola (Mola mola), family Molidae, order Tetraodontiformes, found in temperate and tropical oceans around the world

photographs by Per-Ola Norman, Daniel Botelho, Amy Coghlan / Australian Museum

This is Gilbert. He’s been around a while. Attributes his long life to many, many years of always getting what he wants

Not to be a killjoy (though it is what I do best) but the unsafe and rough handling of a baby Pygmy hippo in a pretty substandard Thai zoo being meme-ed into something funny and cute really shows just how much groupthink plays into public perception of animal welfare.

Moo Deng shows avoidance, threat displays and stress around her keepers that are constantly man-handling her, blasting her with a hose and harassing her. The enclosure is mostly concrete, which is horrible for her soft feet. There looks to be some substrate but there doesn’t seem to be any areas for wallowing or deep water wading.

There’s also very easy access of this hippo to the public with no places to hide. I’d love if someone could shed more light on the enclosures but from what I’ve seen it’s not great.

Also the free contact and forcing into tubs that the keepers do is only going to create an avoidant and potentially aggressive and dangerous Pygmy hippo.

But the public happily overlook that because she’s cute. It’s a similar attitude with seals too.

Stop rewarding bad husbandry with clout. Baby animals deserve agency and respect and to grow up without getting harassed and feeling the need to defend themselves constantly.

Somewhat unrelated but that recent viral video of the pelican being manhandled in a shitty indoor facility is also driving me insane, but I guess it's funny because pelicans are evil or some shit.

This is the shittiest pelican enclosure I've ever seen, compare it to the second image at an actual zoo.

A few photos for context

Defensive behaviors!!!

Mouth open and trying to bite!!!

Thank you for adding these images! Gives me an excuse to go research hippo behaviour further for context:

Note that all of these mouth open behaviours are accompanied by either direct contact bite, avoidance related behaviour (turning body away, being chased, grabbed) and eyes are wide with the whites of her eyes visible.

Compared to examples of mouthing interaction with a baby common hippo like Fiona

Note the softer eyes, no wide bulging eyes or whites showing and no avoidance. Fiona was very young here and you’d expect to see “baby aggression” like frustration ect. But this looks more affiliative towards her keepers than aggressive.

Context helps a lot. In all the pictures of Moo Deng she’s being reached out to, touched or sprayed with a hose. That’s generally not the response you want to have to husbandry in a free contact setting.

And here in is Pygmy Hippo natural social behaviour with each other:

Soft eyes, mouths not completely open (which would be more of a threat display), affiliative interaction between a breeding pair.

Jaw sparring with a youngster in common hippos.

In this context, this is a free interaction with no force involved and is species specific between mum and calf.

I think it’s interesting to see the contrast between Moo Deng’s stress/threat behaviour compared to other common hippos and Pygmy hippo behaviour.

well? can you?

deeply obsessed with the salmon edit by _olive_ridley on TikTok

I'm baffled that some people seem to think this video/post is a joke & find it funny that someone ascribed emotions & music to the salmons' journey, as if that's new. Humans around the world have told stories about salmon since time immemorial. Salmon are sacred symbols of life, loss, and recovery. In many places, depletions tell stories of colonialism and genocide, and their recovery is a victory hard-won by Indigenous activism.

It's impossible to overstate the necessity Salmon have been to entire cultures for tens of thousands of years.

I get that the humor around this video may not be "that deep," but capitalism and colonialism divide us all from the sacredness and inherent value of all lives. Many of us have become completely disconnected from the cycles of life which support us every day and from the food that nourishes us. If a music edit about salmon moves you, hold onto that. Foster that! Salmon have always moved us. Listen to a story in Tlingit about the Salmon People:

Shanyaak’utlaax̱: Salmon Boy Told in Tlingit (with English Subtitles) - YouTube Find stories about Salmon in the Irish Folklore Collection:

Read about what Salmon are to Peoples of the North Pacific, from the Ainu people to the Ulchi people:

exactly

people at the grocery store sometimes do a visible double-take about how many vegetables I'm buying. they look at me probably thinking wow she's so healthy! it's ok that she's also buying donuts! she's earned them!

you fools. all the produce is for my pet pig. I'm eating donuts for dinner.

an older woman actually stopped me once and told me I must be a great cook because I was just throwing random vegetables in my cart based on price. she was like "gosh! I would need a recipe to know what to do with all of those!"

i do have a recipe. it's very simple:

ingredients: vegetable

step 1: throw it on the ground.

this is my son. btw.

Long-billed Curlew is one of the most common species at a site I've begun monitoring this summer, and also a sensitive wetland species of concern to the state.

Just doing a bit of sketching here to help me understand proportions because boy they're kinda goofy, that beak is so long! I wouldn't be surprised if I wind up doing a full illustration of this species at some point for work purposes so it's time to learn them.

Toad, Norman MacCaig

Published in The Poems of Norman MacCaig (Birlinn, 2011)

transcription:

Toad

why are seals so relatable

my father found these deer dead with their antlers tangled together in a field and i will literally never stop thinking about them

the wording on this Jack russell vid beamed a permanent mark onto my brain

@diesel-park

pelcan Mouth perfec t size for put baby in to n\ap! inside very Soft and Comfort baby sleep soundly put baby in Pelican Mouth. Put Baby In Pelican Mouth. no problems ever in peliccan mouth because good Shape and Support for baby neck weak of big baby head. Apelican Mouth yes a place for a baby put baby in pelican mouth can trust pelican for giveing good love to baby. friend pelican