its weird to think horses were ever ‘prey animals’ because what fucking predator looks at a 8 foot tall ENORMOUS beast with pitch black devils eyes, terrifying teeth and extremely powerful legs and think ‘yeah lets go attack that one’

well moose are still prey animals so

thats fucked up, a moose is like a horse with extra weapons

Would you rather they be predators

SHIT SHIT SHIT IM SO SORRY

It helps to have a furry coat on a snowy day.

🐯 🐯 🐯

good morning everyone have an absolutely furious mongoose

(Source)

this makes me so happy

Today I Learned:

That if a dog has pulmonary hypertension, it is usually prescribed Sildenafil… or in other words, VIAGRA. (Which in true form is a vasodilator that combats pulmonary hypertension quite well).

But my favorite part is that a small subset of dogs will have the side effect of… erect ears. 

I didn’t know cheetahs meow I’ve always thought they roar my whole life has been a lie

Ok but the other one is purring so hard

If I ever don’t reblog this assume I’m dead

reblogs for cheetah mews

I’d probably loose my arm, but if a cheetah meowed at me like that I’d attempt to pet it.

A reminder that it’s illegal in the USA to collect or sell the feathers of wild birds (and their eggs, bodies, and nests) even if you find them lying on the ground, unless you have a permit to do so. As in, actually illegal, not “outdated law everyone has forgotten about and is no longer enforced”. Eagle parts are extra illegal.

How about bones?? Not like bird specifically just animal bones in general. Also why is it illegal?? There so many birds ergo so many feathers no ones gonna miss em

The specifics depend on your state, the situation, and whether the species is a game animal, but usually, it’s illegal unless you are licensed (ex for educational purposes).

There really aren’t “so many birds”. The populations of many species are rapidly declining due to habitat loss and pollution. I’ve seen birds of prey autopsied and their insides are often coated in plastics. Pesticides and rodenticides wipe out truly horrifying numbers of larger birds - please only ever use mechanical traps for mice and rats, not poisons.

The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 was passed four years after the last passenger pigeon died. It discourages the personal and commercial collection of bird parts for very good reason.

Oh, Ship! Tag me in on this one, I’m ready!

So, the history of Wildlife law in the United States goes way back, actually, to the history of wildlife law in Great Britain.

See, in Ye Olden Days, the King was in charge of deciding who was and wasn’t legally allowed to hunt. This was a Big Deal, because many people needed to hunt to feed and clothe themselves and their families. If the King said “you can’t hunt anywhere near where you live because those are My Deer,” you were, well, fucked.

Eventually, this power of wildlife ownership was technically redelegated to parliment, but hunting often remained super inaccessible to anyone but the wealthy, privileged few.

So when people started coming here from there, it was a total free-for-all. You could hunt anywhere, anything! There were things to shoot in the US that had been extinct in the British aisles for centuries, even!

So not only were people hunting for food, clothing, to drive out unwanted animals (see: wolves), but also for the hell of it because they were allowed!

For a while though, hunting was still very much an “I need to eat” business. Can’t fault ‘em for eating, ya know?

But once Europeans became really established here, with cities and leisure time and fashion, things got way out of hand.

There were pretty much No laws dictating how many animals a person could take, or when and from where they could take them.

What’s more is, suddenly, it wasn’t just for food, it was for MASS PRODUCTION! You know what women REALLY wanted? Hats With Feathers. Lots Of Feathers.

People were already killing Many Birds, but not Enough. “We need to kill WAY MORE BIRDS and FASTER,” they said. So they made These Big Guns.

They were made for mounting on boats, and who gave a damn about ammo? ANYTHING that could presumably maim a duck was a go. They loaded them with pieces of tin, metal, shards of broken glass, ya know. The usual.

Then, at night, during Mating season, they’d go out onto the water, shine a light so that all the ducks raised their heads to investigate, fire the gun, and instantly decapitate hundreds of ducks a shot. It was wild.

So this was happening

And the REASON this was happening was there was a demand for these ducks, feathers, mainly. Meat second.

The demand is what’s imperative here. It didn’t matter if you had the means to kill 100 or 1000 birds in a night. If you shot ‘em, someone would pay for ‘em.

You can see where this started going wrong, however. Eventually, there were like, uh, no birds left to shoot.

So now everyone’s starting to say, “well, what the hell…it seems that shooting All Of The Birds At Once has somehow wiped them out. Maybe we should do something about this.”

NOW, that was NOT a popular move. People were really loving the whole “I can kill anything any time I want” thing going on. They argued that limiting their take would violate their rights and freedoms (never mind the hypocrisy of claiming any rights to the wildlife of this land that had been taken from the indigenous peoples they’d killed and driven out).

But responsible hunters knew that wildlife and hunting laws were imperative to the continued existence of wildlife.

This wasn’t a new concept, mind you. Responsible Wildlife laws are even in the damn Old Testament:

Makes sense, right? Eat the eggs but make sure the mother remains to lay more. 

And more than a century before, John Quincey Adams is quoted in reference to the issue:

ANYWAY. Point was, people were realizing that if things didn’t change fast, there’d be nothing left to hunt, to eat, or to use for Fancy Hats.

So we got the Lacey Act of 1900, the first federal wildlife law.

It limited market-hunting and commercial wildlife trafficking. People with Super Duck Guns were especially unhappy about this. However, if ducks understood federal laws, they would’ve been thrilled.

The problem was, there was still a HUGE demand for feathers, for meat, and absurdly, for specimen for people’s private collections. “I don’t CARE if that’s the last known living Auk. I want it.”

So they had it.

What we needed to do was to destroy the demand for bird products. And to destroy the demand, we had to stop products from being made. If no one is walking down the street wearing a Fancy Bird Hat, no one else is going to say “oh! I want one too,” and no one is going to pay a Fancy Hat Maker to pay a Big Duck Gun owner to shoot 1,000 birds.

So we got the Migratory Bird Treat of 1918, which made it almost totally across the board illegal to own Any bird parts (excluding legal game birds, but laws about when and how many you could hunt were forming to protect them).

 There is a misnomer that taking something off the legal market will increase demand because people love what they can’t have. That’s proven untrue in this case. Very few people are actually willing to break Actual Federal Law in order to own a hat they can’t wear in public. The issue was larger society and for the most part law-abiding citizens who wore this stuff while it was legal but moved on once it wasn’t.

The reason it still exists is to keep the demand for bird parts non-existent, and it’s WHY you can’t legally collect feathers even when they fall off a bird naturally.

Because hey, YOU may live in an area with a healthy golden eagle population. Or a Blue Jay population. Or Red headed woodpeckers. YOU find their feathers all the time! They just fall off, no harm done.

So you pick them up, make them into cool jewelry and art, and post them on your etsy and pinterest.

They’re super popular! People love them!

Now I want in on that business!

But there aren’t many golden eagles, blue jays, or woodpeckers around me, so I don’t find their feathers often. But you know what’s way easier than looking for one, fallen feather? Shooting a bird and getting a lot at once.

And thus an innocent market has once again created an unsustainable demand that will threaten bird populations.

And that’s why it’s just flat out against Federal US law to own, collect, or sell almost any wild bird parts!

And MAKE NO MISTAKE! This law is Very Enforced. Wildlife officers Do pay attention to people talking about collected bird parts, and they Will throw the book at you. The fines are wild. Don’t risk it.

THANKS FOR READING THIS LONG-ASS EXPLANATION!

This is a beautiful history of why wildlife protection laws matter. This is why I’m so stringent about people adhering to the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. 

what did these penguins do to the scientists to deserve this

researcher: okay so we’re calling these “african penguins” because it lives in africa

penguin: bites researcher

researcher: hey fucker guess what new idea

It’s actually because their vocalizations sound like donkey noises, but this alternate AU is also entirely reasonable.

Dog Thoughts (see 10 more)

I’ve talked about some of these separately but here’s one condensed illustrated post for some of my favorite ways real animals differ from their common animated/fictionalized versions. Cartoon versions aren’t necessarily “bad,” but it’s cool when you finally see one do the research, too.

EDIT/ EVEN I FORGOT THAT A SPERM WHALE’S MOUTH IS EVEN WEIRDER THAN I FIRST DREW Everybody does it!

When someone says these days sexism and misogyny don’t exist anymore show them this.

4 hours of lectures for the day makes for sleepy students

An Open Letter to All Puppies With Parvo Virus (That Were Unvaccinated)

Dear Adorable Fluffs,

I’m sorry.

I’m sorry that you don’t understand what is happening to you.

I’m sorry we have to poke and prod you every little bit so we can make sure you stay alive and get the treatment you need.

I’m sorry that your intestines is literally and continuously sloughing unto the puppy pad diapers that you are surrounded by.

I’m sorry I can’t explain to you why we have to draw blood so often or why you are hooked up to so many tubes and fluid lines.

I’m sorry that you feel so crummy that you won’t eat. Puppies should be able to love to eat.

I’m sorry that instead of a bright, hyper puppy you are reduced to being a miserable and dull corpse-like ball of diarrhea. 

I’m sorry that your entire body might begin to shut down and you might go into septic shock.

I’m sorry that even around the clock care might not be good enough.

I’m sorry that even the best medicine might not be good enough.

I’m sorry that even if you walk out of here alive and possibly eventually happy, you had to endure even a single second of this awful, cruel, debilitating disease.

I’m sorry that your owner didn’t believe in vaccines or that “we just want to give them for money.” (Hint: iF we ACTUALLY were in this career for the money, then why in the absolute world would we give a $20 vaccine when we could refuse to vaccinate and make $1,000-$7,000 ++ on each critical parvo patient that walked in the door?)

I’m sorry that you could have been playing with your siblings and being snuggled as a puppy should but instead I’m trying not to sob I might have to put your tiny, emaciated body into a body bag.

I’m so sorry. You deserve so much better than this.

reblog this w cool facts abt dogs

Newfoundlands have water resistant fur and webbed feet

Dachshunds were originally bred for fighting badgers

More than 5,000,000 puppies are born in the U.S. every year

i’m glad i made this post

Skilled sheep dogs can separate a sheep from the heard by just looking at it, not even moving.

Three dogs survived the sinking of the Titanic, two Pomeranians and one Pekingese

Poodles are not French by origin. They’re German dogs, but French nobility quickly became fascinated by these pooches

i’m so glad i made this post

Greyhounds are the only breed mentioned by name in the Bible.

When you pet a dog, both you and the dog experience a release of oxytocin. Petting dogs objectively makes you both happier

Dog’s nose prints are just as unique as human finger prints !

Corgis were bred for herding cows.

Dogs’ eyes contain a special membrane, called the tapetum lucidum, which allows them to see in the dark.

Kangal dogs guard flocks (other dogs do the actual herding) and don’t have to be trained because they pass the knowledge down through generations. They will take up advantageous lookout positions, rotate watches, patrol the perimeter, and use a special bark to summon the other dogs and form a wall to drive off an encroaching bear.

Huskies, especially Siberians, will travel in a circle around humans, dogs and other animals to protect them from predators. The radius is usually large enough that they can find threats and chase them off before they even return to your line of sight. They will also chase bears and aren’t always smart enough to stop chasing them.

Labradors are bred to have a soft bite so they can capture a hunter’s kills without damaging them.

IM SO GLAD YOU MADE THIS POST

Poodles were bred as water retrievers, and the poofy haircuts they’re sometimes given were originally designed for practical purposes. They’re shaved so the wet hair wouldn’t weigh them down, except in areas that need the insulation if they’re swimming in cold water: poofs around the joints to prevent them from stiffening up, hair around the chest to keep the vital organs warm (and sometimes also a small saddle of hair over the kidneys, too), hair around the head because the head is where most animals lose a lot of their body heat. I’ve read the the pom on their tails was to make them easier to spot if they dived, but I’m not certain if that’s true.

Pitbulls were originally nanny dogs, and were left alone with children because they would demolish anyone that tried to hurt their precious squishy human friends.

Also spiked collars were originally designed to hurt wolves that attacked sheepdogs.

The Miniature Pinscher is actually an older breed than the Doberman Pinscher, contrary to popular belief. A tax collector (I believe) by the name of Doberman wanted a dog that resembled the little rat-catchers’ small but intimidating look to scare away potential robbers who might target him knowing he was often carrying large sums of money. However, he also wanted a dog that could live quietly and happily with his wife and children, so while they were meant to look fierce, his Dobermans were actually bred to have a very loyal and friendly, but still protective nature.

bull terriers with piebald coats are more likely to be born with partial or complete hearing loss. They are also the only breed of dog with the distinctive triangular eye shape. Despite their muscular appearance they are very playful and great with kids. Most well known for the Spuds MacKenzie bud light dog and the Target dog (both of which have the piebald coat)

It used to be a status symbol among French Nobility to carry around a Bichon Frise in a basket around their neck.

fact: all doggos are perfect and great

#i’ve reblogged this like twice#and i think some people are reblogging this as a joke#but bless this man and what he stands for

how is this funny to anyone.

Those people obviously don’t realize the extremely high kill rate for cats at shelters, not to mention that people literally dump indoor cats outside when they don’t want them anymore, and indoor cats often die due to starvation/predators (duh they have no survival skills).  

Also - I might also be crying.

Jackson Galaxy is awesome. His story is is that he used to be a drug addict, and that while he was in the beginning of his recovery he saved a stray cat and nursed it back to life, and in return the cat essentially did the same for him, and ever since then, he’s taught himself everything there is to know about cats and their behavior. Cats saved his life, so he’s saving cats lives. He’s awesome.

All of the above. How often do you see people freak out over a lost dog, or a strange dog in their yard and desperately try to find their owner? You see a cat wondering around your yard, or hiding somewhere on your property and ‘it’s just a dirty stray’. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, Cats are seen as ‘disposable’ pets. It’s disgusting.