#i also have a carnivorous plant

[bibleofficial]

how many animals do you have?

like a lot ? 😭😭

- gloria, russian dwarf hanster

- the fish tank (5 gallon) 4 male guppies 6 pygmy corys

- jumping spider, cletus

- isopods, garden ants, 3 springtail cultures, & tigerworms

en route: american green tree frog, dwarf tarantula, dives, & rili shrimp (for 1.5gallon); live food: mealworms & fruit flies; considering doing again: sea monkeys

[botanyshitposts]

ok INCREDIBLY old content originally meant for this blog but in 2018 when i was just a wee lad with a little spinner propeller hat and big rainbow lollipop i went to a carnivorous plant convention in california and met a bunch of people who breed/collect/study these guys. one person was this collector who was slowly working on leaving the hobby or at least no longer growing plants, and he had a bunch of carnivorous plant related files he was charging like 50 cents for or something, and so i came into possession of these, which are examples of the kind of paperwork you have to have done to legally ship/trade endangered species of both plants and animals. functionally very boring paperwork, but something i found like, incredibly fascinating. i blacked out the personal id of the person and then immediately forgot to ever upload them, lmao.

these plants were bred and raised in a greenhouse and sold abroad, not taken from the wild, but because the species are endangered and often protected in their native countries (most of these are nepenthes, asian pitcher plants, a huge family spread throughout oceania and southeast asia), there's a lot more documentation that needs to be done regardless of their origin, both on the end of the seller and on the end of the buyer.

the rabbit hole on carnivorous plant trade is deep and kind of wild. there's plenty of common, non-threatened, greenhouse-grown pitcher plants on the market that people buy all the time, even non-collectors, but there's a whole debate to be had on if it's morally okay to be collecting the more endangered/rare of these plants in the first place. the big argument for breeding is that breeding them in captivity means there's more supply that's not poached from the wild, meaning poachers have less of an incentive to take the risk of taking adult plants from their habitats; from what i've heard, sometimes countries will issue permits for breeders to collect some wild seeds just to create a non-wild breeding pool to drive down the price. predictably, however, you also get people who are very much willing to pay a lot of money to get as rare of a plant as possible.

anyone familiar with the allure valuable plants have had over people throughout history can imagine the rest, but here's an article about a guy who started buying poached plants to enrich his private nepenthes collection, who then got busted by a fish and wildlife service agent embedded in his carvirorous plant circle. the plants this guy was buying were being sold to him without any CITES paperwork or declarations like the ones above; it was literally just a guy in indonesia taking rare plants from the woods around where he lived, selling them over facebook marketplace and ebay, and mailing them overseas as an undeclared 'gift' to get around customs. frighteningly small steps to take on all sides, to be honest.

(also, fun fact: another example of carnivorous plants that get poached are wild venus fly traps, which are only native to north and south carolina in the US. from what i understand it's a mix of people who genuinely did not know it's a native species and people who really are just going out into the woods and digging up plants to sell online. sometimes poaching is closer to home than you'd think!)

anyway. wild and interesting times in the land of plants recovered from a hard drive lmao

[prince-liest]

First ever budding flower on one of my carnivorous pings! This one is a Pinguicula gigantea “red flush” x cyclosecta cross. It's been growing nice and big ever since I got it, and as you can see with good lighting its leaves begin to turn a deep purple that matches its flower.

[zincbot]

i kind of love barry. autistic king

[thesnivy123]

Heya! So what headcanons do you have about Masked Kids in general? (Feel free to tell me absolutely everything about them lol)

Okayokayokay i cant get into all the finest details just bc idt i have the energy to write every detail out in one go, so feel free to ask about specific things if u want to know more. But basically: human-mimicking semi-brood-parasitic carnivorous pack-hunting goats. which. Is a lot. gonna break this down a little

start with the simplest one. Goats! They're goats- Or at least, they're goats in the way an aminoguana is a lizard and a mothi is a moth- They're sapient creatures descended from a lineage of goats that developed a specific genetic mutation universal to all monster species- It's tied to heightened intelligence, purple-hued blood that creates a thick gas when exposed to open air, and a heightened proficiency for magic. Humans are actually the only sophont in the setting to NOT have the "monster gene"- They evolved into sapience the long, complicated way.

Masked Folk are unique among monsters, however, for their entire evolutionary history being inseparably intertwined with that of humans. See, the Masked Folk quickly established themselves as apex predators upon reaching sapience. Not many animals want to mess with humans, not many animals want to mess with large ungulates, and so, it stands to reason that VERY LITTLE would mess with large HUMANOID ungulates... That is, except for humans. Though they typically didn't compete for territory- humans preferring open fields, the Folk preferring dense forests- Masked Folk live off basically the exact diet humans do (plus a little extra meat, being obligate carnivores). They were in direct competition for resources. This led to conflict, which led to humanity now being one of the sole drivers of their evolution... Which, thanks to the wonders of the Monster Gene causing more mutations, happened to work faster than you'd expect.

In raids on Masked Folk villages, humans were far less likely to directly harm their young than the adults- Beyond the moral aspect of this, they shared a lot of traits with human children. And, over generations of conflict with humanity, these traits got amplified- When your one remaining predator is more willing to spare you when you look like their kids, you're gonna eventually start looking like their kids.

Eventually, we ended up with the Masked Kids we see today. Highly shortened muzzles, tiny horns, big eyes- all coming together to vaguely resemble a human child's face. This... Doesn't fool anyone on it's own, though, aside from looking cute.

That, of course, is where magic gets involved.

See, Masked Folk- as adults- have a natural knack for magic, compared to other monsters. This has nothing to do with it's usefulness to them in adulthood, and everything to do with its function in their youth. Young Masked Kids- from birth until around 16- ambiently radiate a powerful "illusionary" magic, making humans perceive them as being a human child.

"Illusionary" is in quotes, because it has no effect on their physical appearance. No, it's closer to a weak sort of mind control, if anything. The magic taps right into the facial recognition part of the brain, a few other places too, and just... Spins a few things around. Makes it so that, so long as you're within range of their aura, when you look at a Masked Kid, you consider them to be young of your own species. Even if you factually know they're not, you know how it works, it just... You can't really follow the train of thought that goes "that's something else". The thought might still be there, but it slips through your mind like butter, you can't hold on to the idea that this isn't A Child Of Your Species. "Your Species", because it isn't human specific- just... deeply ineffective on any other species. Really just counters humans. Either way, the masks they wear amplify this, giving the human mind a plausible excuse for why the features dont line up, and letting this mimicry go unquestioned.

This mental defense, combined with the odd growth rate of the masked folk, allows them to go relatively undetected in human civilization from any age up until their late teens. A masked kid will grow at around the same rate as a human infant until the age of ten- At which point, they very suddenly stop. They remain "ten years old" for years, not growing an inch- at most, gaining a little weight as their bodies stockpile energy, but even this is rarely noticeable, as this phase of growth is HIGHLY optimized to make as few stages as possible (there's actually a pocket of previously unused space within their chest cavity that fills up with a condensed fat deposit during these years- this goes away when their body structure changes in adulthood). Their mimckry aura works to ensure nobody questions this halt in growth, of course. Theyve got to remain cute and sympathetic for as long as possible.

Then, at around 16, they hit a growth spurt. A very, very big one. Within a couple years, they'll grow several feet in height, their torso and snout will elongate, and their tail thickens out as a counter-balance to their front-heavy posture- This is when the mimicry aura shuts down, because, as powerful as it is, there's only so much it can hide. That deep well of magic is now freed up for personal use, with some amount of knowledge on its use being instinctual, for at this age, they're bound to be shunned from human civilization.

That is, if they haven't left for the woods already. Though Masked Folk are just as sapient as humans, they've got some pretty strong instincts in their younger stages, to keep up the ruse- Don't stand out, avoid crowds, do what you're told, and, once the growth spurt hits, Leave. Even those who are still welcome in their home- more common than you'd think, for many reasons- often follow the call of the woods eventually. Those ones come back if they can't find other Masked Folk. They still go out, but still.

... All this, of course, is only relevant if they find themselves in a human settlement. Most Masked Folk never even see their mimicry come into play- If all goes well, they're raised peacefully by their parents and siblings in small communities in the woods- usually consisting of a few family groups and any stragglers from human civilization. See, they don't WANT to be brood parasites, it's not their plan A. No, that's all a last resort. A tactic to survive if the worst came to worst. Ideally, they raise their own kids safely within their own species- or, occasionally- a mixed-monster-species group.

The Hero Cycle and Stitched Castle have... complicated things, of course, in the regions surrounding the Chestnut Kingdom, but in other parts of the world, Masked Folk still live pretty traditionally. Often in better relations with humans, though- Agriculture makes the competition for resources a little less of an issue, and now, they've got a reputation far different than most monsters. Something a little surprising, actually. Something that's earned them a few different names, in different places.

The Forest Dwellers. The Fair Folk. The Other People. Changelings.

The Fae.

[uwu-scraptrappy]

Consider the Venus Flytrap and the Eye Vacuum. Both traps have to do with the eyes, but one must sacrifice the eye, while the other must save the eyes. Why are we not shipping the guys in the traps.

Consider this; Michael (Venus Flytrap) entrusting the janitor (Eye Vacuum) with the knife to cut out the key in his eye. As the janitor saws away at Michael's eyeball to get the key, Michael is flicking the dial to break the janitor's fingers, and through them begging the other not to die, to just hurt them because if they don't they both die, they survive. Can you imagine that. Come walk with me. I'll guide you.

[essektheylyss]

went mad with power at the local nursery (bought four ferns, a slightly monstrous spiderwort, and a PITCHER PLANT)

[food-lover9000]

19, 30, 39 for the handwriting ask game wahooo !!!

19) AAAAaaa so hard to choose fave songs…! but recently I’ve been listening to Bunny Girl a fair bit, started humming my clematis today so went to listen to that as well…Oh wait fave songs uhh RGU op is lovelyyy! also the song I want to be your lover appears in my mind a lot…wait also song I found on bilibili that does an ouchie to me is (mainly the first part) are you lost AAAAAA if I keep going I am going to fill 10 pages (of these short pages) but uhhhh a doll of lapis and erica’s sorrow and also karen’s cleanup are good! essentially there are too many nice silly songs and I am just really bad at making up my mind >:( (I think I will have links to the YT of these)

30) Thank youuu for sending in a silly ask >_O (It looks a lil goofy but its okay!) I think because of the pens I am using my handwriting looks slightly “nicer(?)” but oh well! I might have to add a transcript because my handwriting is still kinda messy :3 (aaa all my silly written faces are messed up in this page :c)

39) I have an egregious amount of stationary supplies and also really want to go back into sewing a bit! aaa or spending time making those silly friendship bracelets (would be silly to make some based on mutuals colors) Oh and also learning how to sew and embroider enough to make silly cotton dolls :ccc (so many things I wanna do yet so many horrors yet still)

[muttley-do-something]

oh shit wait can i get a rhino beetle pet would that be allowed

[post-punk-revival]

Next time someone uses the word "speciesist" to describe the consumption of animal matter or says you can't be an anarchist if you're not vegan because "humans > animals is a hierarchy" I'm going to look them in the eye and say "Why are animals higher in the hierarchy than plants? Why are you kingdomist?" And it's not going to be ironically at all.

[snekdood]

i both love and hate that i keep finding different moths in my house. why are they here? i dont want them to get caught on the sticky traps i put out for the flies. but also, very fun to see so many different varieties and knowing my garden probably plays a role somehow.

[thethingything]

shoutout to Feniseca tarquinius for being North America's only butterfly species with carnivorous caterpillars, which sometimes wear the corpses of their prey as camouflage.

the adults don't drink nectar, but do feed on honeydew and drink from mud, dung, and apparently carrion

[huginsmemory]

Recently started collecting carnivorous plants and we got some fruitflies and so I moved em all up into the kitchen. My new favourite activity is watching them catch the fruitflies, HIGHLY recommended. I get SUCH a kick out of it, go buy some sundews people.

[prince-liest]

Bought some live sphagnum moss from a guy's personal land on eBay to liven up THE BOG! I am really, really hoping that I can keep it alive through the coming high-90s temperatures in the full sun. To that end, I've got THE BOG fairly well flooded, which should hopefully go a long way towards the moss surviving.

Sphagnum moss actually is the natural companion of many of these carnivorous plants in the while! Technically this bog is full of it: peat moss is just decomposed sphagnum, and there's a layer of dead and dried long-fibered sphagnum on top of that before the final layer of live moss. I'm really doing my best to create a proper environment for them, and I also just think the stuff looks really nice. I can't wait for it to (hopefully) start growing in properly and look even nicer!

[thereareeyesinsidethetrees]

xylem is such a fun word but i don’t see it used very often and i feel bad for it, so it’s going in the name list

xylem and phloem are the parts of plants that…i forgot what they do. they’re in the inside of the stem or something i think. they help transport water and such? maybe?

y’know my biology teacher was great but i don’t remember basically anything of what i was taught about plants because i was so stressed trying to figure out how the fuck photosynthesis works

[fidgetspringer]

Been wanting to try propagating sundews for a while. Found this beautiful glass dome on sale today that i think will be really cool for it!