Category Archives: Wildlife

PAD 1/14/2013 – Headlines

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“Head to your favorite online news source. Pick an article with a headline that grabs you. Now, write a short story based on the article. “

This article grabbed my attention and would not let it go. The story is about a dolphin that ended up in the Gowanus Canal in New York City. There really isn’t any story to write about this, nothing that will leave anyone feeling good about humanity. Look at what we have wrought. Wildlife wandered into a canal so awful, so toxic, so disgusting that it died of exposure to us. I would argue that the canal represents New York City quite well, anyone who has read my blog, especially my LiveJournal when I was there knows my opinion on New York City is poor at best. That the waters of the Gowanus Canal can kill just cinches it. Everyone thinks that New York City is the biggest and best city in the world, but I have never liked it. Too many people, too filthy, too disgusting, too dangerous. Some think that this tale of the Gowanus Canal is just one small little part and that the city has more to offer, that you can just whitewash over this awfulness by looking elsewhere – perhaps the arts maybe. The city is dangerous to more than just wildlife!

So what to write about New York City. The waters are toxic, the streets are lethal, and this is all before we add in all the sick twisted terrible humans which just add to this murk of awfulness. So, here’s a little story.

Years ago the people of upstate New York laughed amongst themselves that if everyone northwest of the Hudson River would just agree and all flush their toilets with uncanny synchrony that we could finally blow New York City into the Atlantic. After reading news story after news story about all the corruption, not just in the people, but deeply embedded in the very land itself it became clear that this upstaters fantasy really might need to come true. So everyone from Watertown to Syracuse and all the way over to Buffalo all agreed that they would pick the perfect day, a sunny day filled with hope and wonder and they would all march into their bathrooms and at the very stroke of midnight everyone in New York State would flush their toilets all at the same time and blow the cancer of New York City into the sea. Much like Atlantis, except riddled with toxins and horrors beyond understanding, the mad city of New York sank beneath the waves, never to be seen or heard from again.

If you love New York City, I invite you to saunter along barefoot all the way to Gowanus Canal and have yourself a bath. Good luck with that.

When mice are put into enclosures with limitless resources, their social behaviour degenerates dramatically. – Science – Aug 11, 2012 – Interesting Facts and Fun Facts – OMG Facts

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When mice are put into enclosures with limitless resources, their social behaviour degenerates dramatically. – Science – Aug 11, 2012 – Interesting Facts and Fun Facts – OMG Facts.

I love these studies! They prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that without space travel Humanity is pretty much doomed. I can’t help but think of Star Trek. In that fictional universe there is no want, no need, Earth is a literal paradise. I wonder what would happen to that Universe if you kept everything else the same but eliminated warp travel from the story.

You’d have Universe 25. It wouldn’t be pretty. HA HA HA.

So what is the most important thing in the Star Trek Universe? Warp Travel. Beyond everything else. LULZ.

Texas Cattle Die-Off Linked to Grass – USDA checking for mutations in grass that produced cyanide gas

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Texas Cattle Die-Off Linked to Grass – USDA checking for mutations in grass that produced cyanide gas.

So, GM-modified Bermuda grass eventually develops toxic properties? I can’t wait to see how the people who engineered this grass can spin this as a feature instead of a liability. I can’t help but notice the millions of years where cows ate grass without dying of cyanide gas exposure.

It’s almost as if GM modified grains are dangerous. Unthinkable! 🙂

The Passenger

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Amongst all the Christian saints that exist there really is only one that I really can identify with and believe in. That would be Saint Francis. I love the image of him in statuary, a monk in a garden with songbirds perched on his shoulders eating seeds out of his hands. There is something really quite gentle and special about someone of such faith being so kind as to attract and befriend animals. I’ve often said that how animals behave towards a person is one of the clearest indicators of what that person truly is. I think animals can sense the inherent goodness or lack thereof in human beings on some level that we are no longer a party to. If a dog avoids a person, perhaps there is a reason why, that sort of thing.

So, the saints are supposed to inspire the faithful to follow in their footsteps. I may not be a Christian, but I can appreciate the faith without getting hoovered into all it’s dogmatic thinking. Specifically speaking, this morning after I drove to work and parked my car in the parking lot in front of my building I looked at my rear-view mirror on the drivers side and noticed that I had a very tiny, very dangerous passenger who followed me to work, riding on my car. It was the business end of a yellowjacket. Apparently sometime during the night he struggled up to my side mirror and was trying to climb behind the mirror to get away from the chill in the air this morning as we had a light frost. I sat there for a minute or two and looked and he was not moving. So after I turned the car off I opened the door gently and closed it and blew a little stream of warm air at him to see if I could rouse him. He was alive. Very sluggish, but alive. He continued his trek to climb behind the mirror assembly and once he was there and safe I sat there talking to him. “I spared your life, so, when we meet again you won’t chase me and sting me, okay?” and I’d like to think that we’ve got a deal. Obviously bugs don’t speak english and you can’t make a deal like that with them, but a part of me did think that if there was some regard from nature that perhaps one good act, not stuffing a credit card into the slot to crush the bug but instead allowing him to seek refuge in my side mirror assembly might just be enough to earn me a “Get out of a yellowjacket sting” card from mother nature itself.

It’s a deal that I’ve made with all the creatures that surround me. If you are outside I will not kill you, but if you enter my home and you are either hazardous or frightful then your life is forfeit. This is specifically for the spiders that invade every spring and hide in the drains of the sink in my basement. They aren’t really hazardous to me, but to Scott they are little crawling chunks of pure nightmare and so, they die. The only thing I offer is that death is swift and complete, that there is a minimum of suffering. It may not be exactly Franciscan but it certainly beats dealing with a frightened partner gripping his chest trying to catch his breath.

I can only hope that the daily temperature rises enough, and the sun comes out. Once the sun hits the side of my car and that housing to the side mirror assembly, it should warm up in there quite quickly, as my car is a dark blue color and is apt to absorb heat than reflect it away. Perhaps when I get back out after quitting time I’ll check to see if my little yellowjacket friend got warm enough to fly away or if I have a lethal little buddy for the summer. I know that one yellowjacket is not lethal, in and of himself, but I have never been stung by any stinging insect so I always reserve a little latitude for them as I do not know for certain how my body will react to the toxins in their stings. It could just be an irritation or it could be anaphylactic shock. It’s really a toss of the dice and if you can avoid pissing off a stinging insect it’s in your best interest. Every time I see one I develop an intense case of the willies. I think it’s an instinctual response to avoiding the risk of a sting. Nothing makes me more keen to flee than the willies.

Winter Visitors

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Since we’ve refilled the bird feeders and filled the sideboards with suet cakes we’ve noticed a huge population of resident birds. I got it in my head to try to identify what we’ve spotted at our feeders. This really won’t be useful to anyone but us, unless one of you readers is interested in bird populations or diversity.

  1. Blue Jay – A male, big bright blue and very aggressive.
  2. Northern Cardinal – A breeding pair, a male and female and they feed together usually. Very skitterish. They do not like the squirrels.
  3. White-Breasted Nuthatch – Not very frequent at the feeder. Will visit the front feeder way more often than the back feeder. Tends to get spooked by picture window and sometimes attacks the reflection in the window. So far no dead nuthatches from window-strikes.
  4. Downy Woodpecker – We have spotted 1 male and 3 females. Originally the male had a seriously hard time keeping on the feeder, he would have to perch and then hold his body under the feeder and crane his neck around to get some seeds. This would throw a lot of seed on the ground. Since we installed the suet cake he monopolizes that instead. The females will only visit the suet cake now as well. That’s apparently their preferred food.
  5. Mourning Doves – We have at least a breeding pair. They never visit the feeder, they prefer to hang out on the ground and wait for the finches and chickadees to toss seed down from the feeder onto the ground. When the downy woodpeckers are after the seed, the mourning doves are “casing the joint”. They’ll follow much later and much prefer the rear feeder to the front one.