#nature protection

[nalebifrie]

We got Ogier tree- singing!

(in a horrible Seanchan setting but I am going to ignore that!)

The Ogier are important to me.

(something about me and my username under the cut and something about the Ogier from TGH)

When I first discovered the WoT world through s1 I thought about what I would want to be if I were there and could choose.

And Ily explaining the Tuatha'an in S1 ep2 and e3 made me want to follow the way of the leaf!

"What greater revenge against violence than peace? What greater revenge against death than life? / You can cover the the light with the palm of a childs hand, but a leaf, even if you crush it, burry it, burn it, it becomes a part of the earth and the air" !

But then I listened to the audiobooks and in TGH they go to an Ogier stedding and the description of this place with its great trees and the peacefulness that can be feld and no one can access the One Power. And Loial looking for the Ogier groves in the city's and mourning the loss of many of them. But also them being able to make nature grow by singing!

That made me want to be an Ogier!

My love for nature is as big as the Ogiers love for nature.

Nature protection is my passion and I am in the process of making it my profession. And mourning the loss of species and ecosystems unfortunately is a part of my life and why I fight for it. I really wish I could make nature grow by singing!

(the only thing I hate about the Ogier is the arranged marriage thing 😒🤢, there is way to much heteronormative wedding talk and drama in these books, but that's a discussion for another time)

Now my username is a combination of words that describe who I am.

na for nature

le for lesbian

and the last two read as "be free" with an english pronunciation and they are my favorite group of animals and the first four letters of my name.

I hope to see more of the Ogier in the show in the future and maybe even a stedding although the beauty of that place is probably quite hard to bring to screen. But they introduced the Tuatha'an and their philosophy very convincing with just a few scenes and I that's what I hope for with the Ogier aswell. And if not I can listen to the TGH again.

[o-ctober21st]

via o-ctober21st

[townpostin]

Rising Sun English School Celebrates "Green Day" with Students and Parents

Green Day Celebration promotes the message of environmental and nature conservation, says Dinesh Kumar. Rising Sun English School, Cable Basti, hosted a "Green Day Celebration" in its auditorium to educate children about the importance of nature and environmental conservation. JAMSHEDPUR – Rising Sun English School, Cable Basti, organized a "Green Day Celebration" today to teach children about…

[meticulousmaker]

another random thing that stands out to me rewatching Steven Universe as an adult:

throughout the show there's this clear Vibe that Steven has inherited some big magical destiny, right? and it makes sense narratively: he's the son of Rose Quartz, leader of the rebellion, now being raised by her friends who were the last remaining survivors of an interstellar war. he's like a human child in most ways, except he has magical powers that start to become more obvious as he's getting older. no one like him has ever existed before. it's a big deal. raising him and figuring out how he's going to grow is its own unique challenge, because nobody knows what to expect. so of course there's this magical destiny vibe, given all that.

What's interesting to me, though, is that this magical destiny is in no way literally, physically present in the story, it's just something everyone kinda feels. Like, there's not some ancient prophecy about a half-gem, half-human savior. He's not the Chosen One in any literal sense, he just happens to give off Chosen One vibes. And I say that's interesting because it means that the fact he was kinda raised with this Chosen One vibe is completely a decision everyone around him made, for better or for worse. And the show is aware of this, because the weight of Rose's legacy and everyone's expectations of him is a constant theme, and as Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl all grow and develop, they also realize the downsides of them putting those expectations on a child. Like, Steven spends his whole childhood being told about how great Rose was, and how because he's inherited her gem he will probably inherit her powers - and that's not necessarily a bad thing. Imagine how awful things could have been if Steven had no exposure to the Gems and no knowledge of what they were or how they worked, and then his powers started coming in? It was hard enough even when he was surrounded by the most qualified Gem Experts on Earth. But being primed for all of this "you're going to have your mother's magical powers" stuff put a heavy weight on his shoulders, and then the fact that nobody else quite knew how his abilities worked meant he was constantly faced with the adults in his life looking to him with concern because they didn't know what was happening with him. That's gotta leave an impression on a kid - and, well, throughout the show and especially in SU Future we definitely see that it does.

I like the way the show handles the pressure that's put on him, and the fact that everyone is just... trying their best in a completely unprecedented situation. Nobody knows what to do or how to raise this kid, and that inevitably causes problems but everyone is trying. And Steven can feel that everyone is trying without knowing what to do and he just wants to help and not be a burden and none of his caretakers have said that he's a burden but he can feel everyone's confusion and concern and the expectations he's not living up to and he cares so much, about everyone, about everything. He's in an extremely unique position that grants him opportunities to help that nobody else has, and he feels like he's failing everyone if he can't fulfill that, and in the end it never should have been his job to fix things but somebody had to try. Somebody had to try, and he was one of the only people with the ability to stop the Diamonds, stop the war, stop the lies, stop his world and everyone on it from being destroyed... and he was just a kid.

[singingrainbows]

https://www.gofundme.com/f/OVIWC-WATER-LAND-BACK

[petterbrorson]

Står stolt, akvarell, 26,5x36 cm Det här och mina två senaste inlägg är målningar av skogar som är anmälda för slutavverkning. Delar av dem är enligt Skogsstyrelsen skog med höga naturvärden och nyckelbiotop. Det finns fynd av rödlistade och fridlysta arter i de här skogarna. Nu riskerar de, precis som 80% av alla skogar som huggs ner i Sverige, att bli pappersmassa eller andra kortlivade produkter som bränns upp inom två år.

...

Standing tall, watercolour, 26,5x36 cm This and my two latest posts are paintings of forests that are notified for logging. Parts of them are defined as having high natural values and being a key biotope by the Swedish Forest Agency. There are findings of several redlisted and protected species in these forests. Now, like 80% of the forests that are cut down in Sweden, they risk being turned into paper pulp or some other short lived product that will be burned withing two years.

[foreverbaby25]

[hypewinter]

Firefighting hadn't been the first job on Danny's list but it was surprisingly well suited for him. Toxic smoke and blazing fires were nothing to a guy who didn't need to breathe and could phase through anything after all. Plus it gave him a way to feel useful without catching the attention of the big bat himself. At least.... it was supposed to. But Danny supposes that ship has sailed considering Batman is standing in front of him at this very moment.

[stars-obsession-pit]

Following an accident, Danny wakes up in Gotham City in a DC universe. Lacking any forms of ID or possessions beyond the clothes on his back, he’s forced to commit some crimes to survive. Minor crimes, but still.

And then he gets caught.

During the court proceedings, they come to the mistaken conclusion that he’s a Meta suffering from some psychiatric issues such as Cotard’s Syndrome (a real rare condition where a person holds the delusional belief that they’re dead/don’t exist/etc).

Thus, between his “need for mental treatment” and the concerns about housing someone with his unique physical traits, he is sentenced to spend time in Arkham Asylum. He’s under pretty low security aside from the anti-Meta stuff and has more freedoms than some other inmates, but it’s still not a great experience. Even at the best of times, Arkham is hardly a nice place.

Some of his fellow residents are decently chill all things considered, but lots very much aren’t.

[lavotha]

“Sketches from life” by Toby Wright exhibition at Accademia in September

[demaparbat-hp]

Golden Boy (and Silver Girl) for the Kintsugi AU.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

i vote that next year instead of reading Dracula we do a Jeeves & Wooster Book Club. those two never got the rabid tumblr shipping fandom they deserved (disqualified for the sheer technicality of being published a century too soon). we must correct this injustice

[loumandforyou]

Armand + why would you say that if you have only met this man once

[blessedscavengers]

transsexuality is as old as time

made in 2023

[wachinyeya]

‘Ferrari in a junkyard’: Mules sold at auction are rare, endangered horses

https://washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2024/08/09/przewalskis-horses-rescued-dna-shrek-fiona/

Hannah Huckabay regularly combs livestock auctions online for horses she can rehabilitate and train at her Colorado ranch. But when she saw a video in February of a mule for sale in Kansas, she could hardly believe what she was seeing.

The stocky animal’s short black mane shot straight up like a mohawk, and its white belly stood out against its tan coat. As it nervously paced in its corral, Huckabay said it bore a striking resemblance to Przewalski’s horse, a critically endangered species she’d learned about while studying equine science.

“I was like, ‘There is no way. That is not a mule,’” Huckabay recalled thinking. “That’s a purebred Przewalski.”

Such a find would be incredibly rare. Once extinct in the wild, around 2,500 Przewalski’s horses remained worldwide as of 2022. They’re native to Mongolia and in June, seven were reintroduced to nearby Kazakhstan as part of an effort to return them to their natural habitats. They are the only truly wild horse remaining (mustangs are feral horses).

But scientists say Huckabay’s hunch appears to be correct. Hair samples from the animal Huckabay purchased - along with a second horse recently surrendered at a Utah sanctuary - were sent to Texas A&M University’s animal genetics lab. Both appear to be Przewalski’s horses, said Rytis Juras, the genetics lab’s director who tested both samples.

The hair test looks for genetic markers associated with different horse breeds to determine an animal’s likely ancestry. Unequivocally confirming that the horses are purebred Przewalski’s and not hybrids would require advanced blood tests that are expensive and would mean sedating the equines.

The blood tests look at the number of chromosomes in a horse’s cells - 66 in a purebred Przewalski, versus 64 in a common horse or 62 in a donkey. An even more advanced version could sequence the horse’s entire genome.

But Juras and two other scientists who reviewed the findings said the hair-test results are reliable.

“If I would have gotten it from a zoo … that would be one thing,” Juras said of receiving the samples. But two random tests with Przewalski’s results were “surprising and a little bit disturbing,” he said. “This is weird.”

How the horse Huckabay found - and the second in Utah - ended up in livestock auctions is a mystery, said Christopher Faulk, a professor of animal science at the University of Minnesota who has studied Przewalski’s horse genetics and also reviewed the DNA results.

“Someone had to have known what they were, they don’t just appear out of anywhere,” Faulk told The Post. “Especially to have been disposed of in that way is even weirder,” he said, since livestock that aren’t purchased at auction can end up in slaughterhouses.

“That’s like finding a Ferrari in a junkyard,” he added.

Huckabay bought the animal for $1,375 in February and, after three weeks in quarantine, the ragged and underweight animal sold as a mule arrived at her ranch outside Denver.

Seeing its features in-person left her even more convinced it was a Przewalski’s horse, she said. With a large clunky head and stiff black mane, her daughter said the horse was so ugly, he was cute, Huckabay recalled. They named him Shrek, after DreamWorks’s beloved ogre.

After almost two months of helping Shrek acclimate, Huckabay’s daughter stumbled upon a video posted on June 9 from a sanctuary in Utah.

“Did we just have a Przewalski mare surrendered?!” the caption read.

Kelsey and Gunnar Bjorklund - who own the Lazy B Equine Rescue and Sanctuary in Utah - suspected their mare was also a Przewalski. But they had no idea there was a second possible Przewalski, saved from another auction.

The Bjorklunds’ horse was brought to their facility after being purchased for $35 in January at an auction in Utah, where she was advertised as a mule.

“It takes more money to get your nails done,” Kelsey said, adding that her previous owner decided to surrender the mare after she flunked out of a professional training program.

When the horse arrived and was unloaded from the trailer, “we were just in shock,” Gunnar said. It was clear the animal wasn’t a mule or a mustang, he said.

“Anyone getting possible Przewalski vibes!?” the Bjorklunds posted. “A true wild, endangered species of equine‼️ How cool would that be!”

In response to seeing the Bjorklunds’ viral video, Huckabay’s daughter posted her own videos of Shrek two days later. One got over 11 million views.

After coming across Shrek’s video, it was easy for the Bjorklunds to settle on a name for their mystery horse - Fiona, the princess-heroine from the Shrek movies.

The rescuers were stunned that two possible Przewalski’s horses could have surfaced almost simultaneously. The Endangered Species Act allows private ownership of endangered animals, but only with a permit, and under strict stipulations. The law prohibits the possession of illegally obtained endangered animals or their transport across state lines without permits.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declined to comment on whether officials are investigating the horses’ chain of custody.

Some livestock auctions have occasionally served as hubs for illicit trade in exotic animal species.

Because most Przewalski’s horses descend from only about a dozen surviving individuals, scientists closely manage breeding genetics for diversity. Compared to the feral mustang, Przewalski’s are more resilient, said Dolores Reed, a biologist who helps oversee a small herd of the endangered horses at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute. Przewalski’s horses are built for the Mongolian steppe’s harsh climate, she said, adding, “they’re very tough,” and can be unpredictable.

There are about 100 Przewalski’s horses in U.S. zoos, Reed said.

Shrek and Fiona are adjusting to their new environments, their owners said. After keeping his distance from people and trotting in circles in his pen while stressed, Shrek has relaxed and moved to a larger field. He has bonded with two gentle mares and while he won’t accept treats from people’s hands, he loves when apples and carrots are left in his feed bucket, Huckabay said.

“He’s very piggy,” she said.

In Utah, Fiona has put on weight and made friends with a miniature mule and a quarter horse filly at the Bjorklunds’ sanctuary.

The rescuers wonder what would’ve happened if Shrek and Fiona hadn’t been saved. The endangered animals might’ve been sent to slaughter “and nobody would have known about it,” Gunnar said.

Huckabay and the Bjorklunds plan to care for the horses as long as needed, but said they’d prefer to see their rescued Przewalski’s move to a professional conservation program.

Shrek is happy on the ranch, but Huckabay said she’d rather see him with “a herd of his own.”

“That would be the best-case scenario,” she said.

[singingrainbows]

"But 28 million acres are now in danger of being mined, drilled and developed."

"Healthy wildlife, clean air and water, and climate solutions must come before industrial development."