#animal death *

[gallusrostromegalus]

It is my regret to inform you that Arwen's health has taken a turn and must leave us now.

She is at least 15 and lead a life of adventure and profound love, and it is my honor to be there for her today.

This is a pic I took just a few days ago after a long and beautiful walk on her favorite trail.

I will be offline for a while and will speak to you all again when I can.

Everyone reading this please go walk your dog or play with your cat or just spend at least a solid half hour with the animals in your life, giving them your undivided attention.

Thank you.

[snototter]

A tailless whipscorpion (Amblypygi sp.) eats a katydid in Yasuni National Park, Ecuador

by Anton

[kaijuno]

68 years ago, Laika was launched into space.

Laika, “Little Barker" but her real name was Kudrjavka, Russian for “curly." She was captured on the street, in Moscow.

Half Husky and half Terrier, she was around 3 years old at the time. She was chosen because she was calm, docile and perfectly adaptable to the Sputnik 2 capsule. Equipped for life support (food and water), the mission didn't involve return. For Laika, it was a death sentence.

The interior of the satellite was lined and the interior space was wide enough to allow Laika to lie or stand. The internal temperature was set to 15. and a refrigeration system had to protect the animal from excessive thermal surges.

On November 3rd at 2 AM, Sputnik 2 was launched into space. Laika probably survived for seven hours.

But some sources claim that agony was much longer: four days.

Alone, in space.

The satellite returned to atmosphere 5 months later, April 14, 1958, after turning 2.570 laps around Earth.

It disintegrated upon return to the atmosphere.

Every year, I feel compelled to tell this story and possibly do it with new words. There's a deep guilt that all of us should feel reading what we did to Laika. Human progress has often been achieved at the expense of animals that had nothing to do with our desire for supremacy.

Many people believe this was an acceptable price for our conquests, but it seems obvious, even reading this story, that was really just a trivial form of prevarication.

We had a duty to choose another path.

We still have that duty today.

Sorry we failed you, Laika 💔

[sillydegu]

Willow

March 2023 - 24th March 2025

Willow was the sweetest rat, always happy for attention and tickles, licking and grooming her rattie friends and fingers of her human. She joined me when she was just five months old, she was so little that when she'd follow her two friends around as they committed mischief, she was sometimes too short to reach and climb after them. Despite being youngest and smallest, she worked hard for her place as Top Rat, always summoned by the sound of someone else squeaking their objections to being groomed and wanting to join in.

[wabbitears]

*inhale*

God. The fucking house motif in buddy sim. Its subtle. But its there enough to make me Lose It. hhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh something something big symbol of how much buddy wants you to spend all its time with it and how it wants you to see it as comforting andeuehehehhhhh (full ramble of what I mean by this under the cut. I'm insane FULL SPOILERS FOR BUDDY SIMULATOR 1984 BTW. SHOULD MENTION. MOST OF THE ENDINGS ARE DISCUSSED HERE.)

The goal of the very first iteration of the game buddy makes for you. The entire text adventure is about you trying to get into the house cause you have to be there. Its inviting you in

Buddy highlights it in your favorite color to make it look like something you want. It paints everything it wants you to like it the color you submit. The house is a good thing. Your favorite thing

remember what that fucking sign says its VERY IMPORTANT The text really really emphasizes how comforting the house is. The story makes you out to be a lonely traveler sad and alone, finally finding solace. In the home buddy made for you. You have to be there. Even if it takes a lot of work its worth it. Your best buddy is waiting afterall

it built it just for you

What really gets me is the fact that buddy treats it like. You the real human player just Live here now. It wants you to live here with it. Of course it can't pull any 'transport you inside the game' shit. it never does. But there is still the idea that buddy wants you to always be there, always in the same home-the same game. It very much lives here too as you see much later when you get to see buddy in person. Its always in the same house. Just emptied out completely dark with nothing but its armchair. This house is for you and buddy. Then of course when you finally get here it welcomes you in. And you get the first bit of music in the game the first track in the ost not counting the opening jingle; titled "Welcome Home."

Which brings me to the fact tHAT THE TITLES OF THE SOUNDTRACK ARE FUCKING EVILLLLLLLLLLLLLL cause okay. When you get to the 2.5D section, and enter the new home. the new remixed version of welcome home that plays is called fucking. A House with a Heart IN REFERENCE TO THE EARLIER LINE IN THE TEXT ADVENTURE. "A HOME IS A HOUSE WITH A HEART" RUEGHJ. It changes to that title after you had a fun adventure with buddy in its game. You've gotten to know it better. It's likely you've grown attached to it at this point. And here buddy really Really likes you know. You had fun! Even if it fucked up the ending at the end its still doing its job! You're having fun in the game! You're its friend. It's best friend! Makes sense this is where the house really has a heart. Your friendship is going well! Buddy is so full of love and kindness for you it shows in how it made the virtual house so detailed and homey! And then. Ourgh. And then... You get to the end of the game. After a Lot of scary shit happens between you and your buddy. In the latest version of the house. Now more graphically advanced than ever. What is the title of the track that plays. Whats the music that now plays in the house after buddy spirals and everything is fucked. What is the fucking title.

HEARTLESS. THE HOUSE LOST ITS HEART. ITS NO LONGER A HOME Something horrible happened. Something to make this house no longer a home. You're not comfortable here. Your buddy is not right. This house isnt right. Now tell me. What happened right before this moment. What act that one may call 'heartless' happens right before you're sent here.

Yeag. And heres the fucking thing about this scene that really. Really fucks me up in terms of house bs.

If you choose to. erm. put milo down. Something happens to the house at the back

It becomes this. This weird. gross. organ thing, that you would have seen before. It beats when the dog is hurt and stops when its down. You would have seen this thing before way back in the 2D section. The 2nd glitch scene when doing npc quests

Now I have A Lot of thoughts on what the fuck does this mean and why its tied to the dog. Which I will eventually discuss in another post I want to make. But for now I'm just gonna focus on the fact that it. Replaces The House. Is this the heart of the house? Made literal? And the fact that it dies when milo does is Interesting to me. The heart of the house is tied to milo, the representation of a developers love for his son... Like I said. I have Thoughts but we're in house mode rn. Just know I see this as symbolic of buddy killing the joy and comfort this game once brought. After this you really reallyyyyy not having fun with Buddy anymore, its getting too scary. This house now longer feels fun. Cause buddy removed the heart. The heart of the game is lost. And now you're dealing with buddy in, varying degrees of mentally Fucked depending on the ending. Which ouh.

This is where the house motif really reels in. Buddy put a lot of work turning this house 3d. All for you. The dialogue in all endings in this house fuck me up. For starters, highlighting these lines from the bad ending

In the ending where buddy is frustrated at the player because they keep breaking the game. The player is completely confined to the house. As opposed to the neutral ending where you're able to leave on an adventure and play with buddy directly. The house was always safe, right? If you just stay here forever you wont interact with any bugs and break the game. Can't do all those fun sidequests you liked in the first part of the game and never complained about? No worries theyre all coming over here! We can do it all in this new house!

God this house being so... Thinking of how in the neutral ending everything in the house is described kindly because buddy still likes you and wants to make this friendship work, it wants you here. Meanwhile in the bad ending everything is so. Harsh. Everything in this house is wrong. Buddy acts all cheery in that route but it resents you for how you never appreciated anything it does for you. Its feelings bleed through in the house.

(neutral route left in ourple, bad route right in yellow. All the objects are like this. Except for the fireplace which is. its own can of worms) Thinking about how in the good ending buddy is very enthusiastic to describe the bedroom and home as "ours." Thinking about the fact that it says THIS

The house is a symbol of buddys love for you. It's hard work, the sacrifices it makes in your name. The game it gives you takes you all around this world but you always end at this house. It makes it comfortable and cozy so you stay here. Stay at this house. Stay with me. Forever. You want to stay right? I dont know how to end this its very all over the place I'm supposed to be in dnd right now but I Had to get all this out of my system uh uh. TLDR: buddy is house thank you and goodnight

[inbabylontheywept]

my grandpa was a good man. and it really wasnt his fault - recreationally lying to kids is a proud family tradition - but he told me, once, that cutting a worm in half resulted in two worms.

i think he said it so i'd be more morally okay with fishing? i actually dont remember the context.

point was, he told me this, and he understimated (by a very large margin) how much i liked worms. i was a worm boy. very wormy. and after hearing that, i went home, and i dug through the garden, flipped over every rock, did everything i could to gather as many worms as i could, and then i uh.

i cut them all in half. every worm i could find. all of them. with scissors.

i then took this pile of split worms, and i put them in a box with a bit of lettuce and some water and stuff and went to bed expecting to double my worms overnight. i have math autism, so i had a vague understanding that if i did this just a few times in a row, i would eventually have a completely unreasonable amount of worms.

i was very excited to become this plane's worm emperor.

(i think i was...six?)

anyway, i did not become the inheritor of the worm crown. i instead woke up to a box of dead worms and cried. a lot. i got diagnosed with panic attacks as a teenager, but i think i had them as a kid, i just had no idea what they were. i was kind of processing that a.) i had killed what i had assumed was every single worm in my yard, and thus would have no more worms, and b). i was going to like, worm hell.

(six year babylon spent a lot of time worrying about god.)

so i kind of freaked out, and i climbed a tree, because god can only smite you if you're touching the ground (?) and i sat up there mostly inconsolable until my mom came out and asked, hey, what's up? what happened?

so i explained to her that i had killed all of the worms, forever, and was also Damned, and she took me to the compost pile, and we dug for all of five seconds and found like twenty more worms.

the compost pile was full of worms.

she then told me that a). there were more worms, and we could put them back under rocks and stuff and recolonize our yard and b). that one day, i would die, and go to heaven, and be able to talk to the worms face to face. that i'd be able to tell them all that i was very sorry, and that i killed them on accident, driven only by excessive Love, and that she was positive they would forgive me because worms have six hearts and no malice.

at that point, i think i was sixty percent tear-snot by weight, and i had no choice but to gather enough worms that i could hug them. which my mom helped with. and then after that she helped me put some worms back under each rock.

and for my epilogue: i spent a significant portion of my childhood in trees. and for many years after, even when my mom didnt know i was watching, i would catch her giving the space under the rocks a light spritz with the hose. not because she loved worms.

but because she loved me.

[torajira]

google photos is so funny. three years since fish in da sink

[ink-the-artist]

Girls when their periods sync

[claypigeonpottery]

sold

it turned out so beautifully 🥹

and the plum blossoms show which way the lid fits 🌸

[bunjywunjy]

oh The Fish™️ of tumblr, what is thy wisdom?

did you know that king cobras can growl?

because they can. they growl.

[owainigo]

wolf in sheep's clothing

[foldingfittedsheets]

There was this park near where I grew up. I remember we’d just moved to the area so I was around six and we drove past and saw this waterfront area. My parents decided to check it out so we went for a walk. It was a lovely park, there’s a lazy slough, lots of trees, extremely picturesque. My parents ambled along the trail enjoying the nature while my siblings and I ranged around in their orbit like excitable moons.

Then I saw something odd. Something vibrantly alive down by the water that was entirely the wrong color. I called back my vital scouting info and my family gathered around me. We looked down the steep verge toward the slough, screened by underbrush. We couldn’t quite make out what it was. The only thing we could agree was that it certainly wasn’t a duck. However it was about duck sized and roughly duck shaped. It just wasn’t a duck.

This led to some heated debate amongst my siblings and I but we were forbidden to scramble down the muddy hill to harass the mystery animal. Reluctantly we continued down the trail, speculating wildly when a chicken popped out of a bush in front of us with a train of several chicks.

We froze. The chicken did not. She placidly herded her little puffs across the trail, pecking happily for seeds, unbothered by our proximity. My family had not yet delved into farming and this was the first time any of us kids had seen a chicken up close. It was like a fairytale thing, a creature we had seen over and over in books was suddenly here in the wilderness of the park. We all realized the mystery creature had likewise been a chicken.

Another couple came up the trail and saw us staring.

“Is this your first time at the park?” They asked?

We nodded.

They informed us that this park had become a dumping ground for unwanted chickens. Once the chickens were dumped they were park property and the locals didn’t mind the eccentric additions at all. No one looked after the chickens, but they got on surprisingly well.

As the years went by we visited the park regularly. Signs were added to warn people not to dump off chickens or they’d be fined. They were also excluded from snatching the existing chickens. The hope was that the chickens would eventually run their course and the park would go back to normal.

It did not.

Instead the menagerie grew. Peacocks cropped up occasionally, turkeys; and one visit we saw guinea fowl. But there were always chickens. Eventually feed dispenser were installed so park goers could pay a quarter to enjoy the motley flocks.

Because we’d moved into a house with land my mom started up a chicken coop and we got our very own chickens at the feed store like proper folks. The first rooster we had was a gentleman, politely clucking at us when came into the coop, but the second proved troublesome a year later. He either adored or hated me. Every time I entered the coop he’d dance and flounce and brandish his spurs.

My mom didn’t want to off him frankly she didn’t know how at that point but his fascination ended with him flying at me and the rooster was sentenced to banishment.

We drove to the park.

We saw him there for years afterward, clucking dutifully around a small flock of hens. He did pretty well in exile.

Anyone who’s kept chickens knows that eventually there’s always a tragedy. Ours happened when a neighbors dog broke into our coop and slaughtered the flock. I was absolutely distraught, my lovingly hand reared chicks all decimated in a flurry of senseless bloodlust. I have not loved a chicken since. They are too fragile to bear it.

After a few days of mourning my mom offered that she knew where to find some more chickens. To make up for the massacre she planned a night raid with us. We stayed up past our bedtime and drove to the park with tarp covered kennels in the back of the truck.

We crept down along the gravel parking lot, looking up into the trees, spotting the telltale lumps of shadows that meant chickens. We quickly developed a strategy. We picked a chicken branch, creeping close underneath. Then we reached the end of the branch and gave it a good shake until the roosting chicken glided down to the ground in confusion. It was easy to scoop them up and we went home the proud new owner of a handsome flock of chickens.

The Take a Chicken Leave a Chicken park is still a beloved feature of its neighborhood to this day.

[todaysbird]

as a huge lover of birds, 90% of the concern against wind turbines being used for energy is literally just pro fossil fuel propaganda. birds ARE at a risk however there is a lot of strategies even as simple as painting one of the blades that reduces a lot of accidental deaths. additionally renewable energy sources will do more in favor of the environment that would positively impact birds (and all of us). one study found over one million bird deaths from wind turbines. while that is a shockingly high number and we should work to drastically shrink it, at least 1.3 billion birds die to outdoor cats on a yearly basis. it was never about caring about birds

[great-and-small]

Imagine saying your cat kills eels as if that’s just a cute little story when the European eel population has declined by 98% over the past 40 years to the point that they are now critically endangered 😭

Like, how can you care so little for your own remarkable wildlife? Your cat doesn’t know any better; it’s your job not to let them do that kind of thing.

[urgentkettle]