#plant thing

[ekat-fandom-blog]

I love Justice League Action. The very first episode has Plastic Man, Booster Gold, Plant Thing, Captain Marvel, overly British Constantine, and smug Batman.

I mean come on! Who wouldn't want to watch a series where Plastic Man dresses as Wonder Woman and then continues to wear her boots(which are high heels btw) because they're comfortable. She doesn't even blink that he's still wearing the entire outfit other than to question why he's wearing her boots!

It's great. 10/10. 100% recommend everyone watch this.

[asgardian--angels]

Planet's Fucked: What Can You Do To Help? (Long Post)

Since nobody is talking about the existential threat to the climate and the environment a second Trump term/Republican government control will cause, which to me supersedes literally every other issue, I wanted to just say my two cents, and some things you can do to help. I am a conservation biologist, whose field was hit substantially by the first Trump presidency. I study wild bees, birds, and plants.

In case anyone forgot what he did last time, he gagged scientists' ability to talk about climate change, he tried zeroing budgets for agencies like the NOAA, he attempted to gut protections in the Endangered Species Act (mainly by redefining 'take' in a way that would allow corporations to destroy habitat of imperiled species with no ramifications), he tried to do the same for the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (the law that offers official protection for native non-game birds), he sought to expand oil and coal extraction from federal protected lands, he shrunk the size of multiple national preserves, HE PULLED US OUT OF THE PARIS CLIMATE AGREEMENT, and more.

We are at a crucial tipping point in being able to slow the pace of climate change, where we decide what emissions scenario we will operate at, with existential consequences for both the environment and people. We are also in the middle of the Sixth Mass Extinction, with the rate of species extinctions far surpassing background rates due completely to human actions. What we do now will determine the fate of the environment for hundreds or thousands of years - from our ability to grow key food crops (goodbye corn belt! I hated you anyway but), to the pressure on coastal communities that will face the brunt of sea level rise and intensifying extreme weather events, to desertification, ocean acidification, wildfires, melting permafrost (yay, outbreaks of deadly frozen viruses!), and a breaking down of ecosystems and ecosystem services due to continued habitat loss and species declines, especially insect declines. The fact that the environment is clearly a low priority issue despite the very real existential threat to so many people, is beyond my ability to understand. I do partly blame the public education system for offering no mandatory environmental science curriculum or any at all in most places. What it means is that it will take the support of everyone who does care to make any amount of difference in this steeply uphill battle.

There are not enough environmental scientists to solve these issues, not if public support is not on our side and the majority of the general public is either uninformed or actively hostile towards climate science (or any conservation science).

So what can you, my fellow Americans, do to help mitigate and minimize the inevitable damage that lay ahead?

I'm not going to tell you to recycle more or take shorter showers. I'll be honest, that stuff is a drop in the bucket. What does matter on the individual level is restoring and protecting habitat, reducing threats to at-risk species, reducing pesticide use, improving agricultural practices, and pushing for policy changes. Restoring CONNECTIVITY to our landscape - corridors of contiguous habitat - will make all the difference for wildlife to be able to survive a changing climate and continued human population expansion.

**Caveat that I work in the northeast with pollinators and birds so I cannot provide specific organizations for some topics, including climate change focused NGOs. Scientists on tumblr who specialize in other fields, please add your own recommended resources. **

We need two things: FUNDING and MANPOWER.

You may surprised to find that an insane amount of conservation work is carried out by volunteers. We don't ever have the funds to pay most of the people who want to help. If you really really care, consider going into a conservation-related field as a career. It's rewarding, passionate work.

At the national level, please support:

The Nature Conservancy

Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation

Cornell Lab of Ornithology (including eBird)

National Audubon Society

Federal Duck Stamps (you don't need to be a hunter to buy one!)

These first four work to acquire and restore critical habitat, change environmental policy, and educate the public. There is almost certainly a Nature Conservancy-owned property within driving distance of you. Xerces plays a very large role in pollinator conservation, including sustainable agriculture, native bee monitoring programs, and the Bee City/Bee Campus USA programs. The Lab of O is one of the world's leaders in bird research and conservation. Audubon focuses on bird conservation. You can get annual memberships to these organizations and receive cool swag and/or a subscription to their publications which are well worth it. You can also volunteer your time; we need thousands of volunteers to do everything from conducting wildlife surveys, invasive species removal, providing outreach programming, managing habitat/clearing trails, planting trees, you name it. Federal Duck Stamps are the major revenue for wetland conservation; hunters need to buy them to hunt waterfowl but anyone can get them to collect!

THERE ARE DEFINITELY MORE, but these are a start.

Additionally, any federal or local organizations that seek to provide support and relief to those affected by hurricanes, sea level rise, any form of coastal climate change...

At the regional level:

These are a list of topics that affect major regions of the United States. Since I do not work in most of these areas I don't feel confident recommending specific organizations, but please seek resources relating to these as they are likely major conservation issues near you.

PRAIRIE CONSERVATION & PRAIRIE POTHOLE WETLANDS

DRYING OF THE COLORADO RIVER (good overview video linked)

PROTECTION OF ESTUARIES AND SALTMARSH, ESPECIALLY IN THE DELAWARE BAY AND LONG ISLAND (and mangroves further south, everglades etc; this includes restoring LIVING SHORELINES instead of concrete storm walls; also check out the likely-soon extinction of saltmarsh sparrows)

UNDAMMING MAJOR RIVERS (not just the Colorado; restoring salmon runs, restoring historic floodplains)

NATIVE POLLINATOR DECLINES (NOT honeybees. for fuck's sake. honeybees are non-native domesticated animals. don't you DARE get honeybee hives to 'save the bees')

WILDLIFE ALONG THE SOUTHERN BORDER (support the Mission Butterfly Center!)

INVASIVE PLANT AND ANIMAL SPECIES (this is everywhere but the specifics will differ regionally, dear lord please help Hawaii)

LOSS OF WETLANDS NATIONWIDE (some states have lost over 90% of their wetlands, I'm looking at you California, Ohio, Illinois)

INDUSTRIAL AGRICULTURE, esp in the CORN BELT and CALIFORNIA - this is an issue much bigger than each of us, but we can work incrementally to promote sustainable practices and create habitat in farmland-dominated areas. Support small, local farms, especially those that use soil regenerative practices, no-till agriculture, no pesticides/Integrated Pest Management/no neonicotinoids/at least non-persistent pesticides. We need more farmers enrolling in NRCS programs to put farmland in temporary or permanent wetland easements, or to rent the land for a 30-year solar farm cycle. We've lost over 99% of our prairies to corn and soybeans. Let's not make it 100%.

INDIGENOUS LAND-BACK EFFORTS/INDIGENOUS LAND MANAGEMENT/TEK (adding this because there have been increasing efforts not just for reparations but to also allow indigenous communities to steward and manage lands either fully independently or alongside western science, and it would have great benefits for both people and the land; I know others on here could speak much more on this. Please platform indigenous voices)

HARMFUL ALGAL BLOOMS (get your neighbors to stop dumping fertilizers on their lawn next to lakes, reduce agricultural runoff)

OCEAN PLASTIC (it's not straws, it's mostly commercial fishing line/trawling equipment and microplastics)

A lot of these are interconnected. And of course not a complete list.

At the state and local level:

You probably have the most power to make change at the local level!

Support or volunteer at your local nature centers, local/state land conservancy non-profits (find out who owns&manages the preserves you like to hike at!), state fish & game dept/non-game program, local Audubon chapters (they do a LOT). Participate in a Christmas Bird Count!

Join local garden clubs, which install and maintain town plantings - encourage them to use NATIVE plants. Join a community garden!

Get your college campus or city/town certified in the Bee Campus USA/Bee City USA programs from the Xerces Society

Check out your state's official plant nursery, forest society, natural heritage program, anything that you could become a member of, get plants from, or volunteer at.

Volunteer to be part of your town's conservation commission, which makes decisions about land management and funding

Attend classes or volunteer with your land grant university's cooperative extension (including master gardener programs)

Literally any volunteer effort aimed at improving the local environment, whether that's picking up litter, pulling invasive plants, installing a local garden, planting trees in a city park, ANYTHING. make a positive change in your own sphere. learn the local issues affecting your nearby ecosystems. I guarantee some lake or river nearby is polluted

MAKE HABITAT IN YOUR COMMUNITY. Biggest thing you can do. Use plants native to your area in your yard or garden. Ditch your lawn. Don't use pesticides (including mosquito spraying, tick spraying, Roundup, etc). Don't use fertilizers that will run off into drinking water. Leave the leaves in your yard. Get your school/college to plant native gardens. Plant native trees (most trees planted in yards are not native). Remove invasive plants in your yard.

On this last point, HERE ARE EASY ONLINE RESOURCES TO FIND NATIVE PLANTS and LEARN ABOUT NATIVE GARDENING:

Xerces Society Pollinator Conservation Resource Center

Pollinator Pathway

Audubon Native Plant Finder

Homegrown National Park (and Doug Tallamy's other books)

National Wildlife Federation Native Plant Finder (clunky but somewhat helpful)

Heather Holm (for prairie/midwest/northeast)

MonarchGard w/ Benjamin Vogt (for prairie/midwest)

Native Plant Trust (northeast & mid-atlantic)

Grow Native Massachusetts (northeast)

Habitat Gardening in Central New York (northeast)

There are many more - I'm not familiar with resources for western states. Print books are your biggest friend. Happy to provide a list of those.

Lastly, you can help scientists monitor species using citizen science. Contribute to iNaturalist, eBird, Bumblebee Watch, or any number of more geographically or taxonomically targeted programs (for instance, our state has a butterfly census carried out by citizen volunteers).

In short? Get curious, get educated, get involved. Notice your local nature, find out how it's threatened, and find out who's working to protect it that you can help with. The health of the planet, including our resilience to climate change, is determined by small local efforts to maintain and restore habitat. That is how we survive this. When government funding won't come, when we're beat back at every turn trying to get policy changed, it comes down to each individual person creating a safe refuge for nature.

Thanks for reading this far. Please feel free to add your own credible resources and organizations.

[litaesthete]

hearts in trees ♡

[jagalart]

Yarrow and Feverfew

Art trade with the incredible @liscepu, I'm so grateful for the chance! Thank you for fueling my love for the game again <3

[turndecassette2]

[raphaerolo]

ok but what if- what if they kissed in front of a pretty darn detailed mural, like have we thought it through thoroughly enough?? cuz like... what if there were tigers.

this comes from mine and @anaclastic-azurite 's surfer/bananawan codywan au which you can read here

mural without the giant obstruction below the cut

(With and without wall texture:)

[glossc1]

OSIRIS-ANTINOUS. antinous enters the nile human, and leaves a statue 🪷

[headspace-hotel]

I saw this book entitled "Plants Have So Much to Give Us, All We Have to Do is Ask" by Mary Siisip Genuisz and i thought oh I HAVE to read that. The author is Anishinaabe and the book is all about Anishinaabe teachings of the ways of the plants.

Going from the idiotic, Eurocentric, doomerist colonialism apologia of that "Cambridge companion to the anthropocene" book, to the clarity and reasonableness of THIS book, is giving me whiplash just about.

I read like 130 pages without even realizing, I couldn't stop! What a treasure trove of knowledge of the ways of the plants!

Most of them are not my plants, since it is a different ecosystem entirely (which gives me a really strikingly lonely feeling? I didn't know I had developed such a kinship with my plants!) but the knowledge of symbiosis as permeating all things including humans—similar to what Weeds, Guardians of the Soil called "Nature's Togetherness Law"—is exactly what we need more of, exactly what we need to teach and promote to others, exactly what we need to heal our planet.

She has a lot of really interesting information on how knowledge is created and passed down in cultures that use oral tradition. The stories and teachings she includes are a mix of those directly passed down by her teacher through a very old heritage of knowledge holders, stories with a newer origin, and a couple that have an unknown origin and (I think?) may not even be "authentically" Native American at all, but that she found to be truthful or useful in some way. She likes many "introduced" plants and is fascinated by their stories and how they came here. (She even says that Kudzu would not be invasive if we understood its virtues and used it the way the Chinese always have, which is exactly what I've been saying!!!)

She seems a bit on the chaotic end of the spectrum in regards to tradition, even though she takes tradition very seriously—she says the way the knowledge of medicinal and otherwise useful plants has been built, is that a medicine person's responsibility is not simply to pass along teachings, but to test and elaborate upon the existing ones. It is a lot similar to the scientific method, I would call it a scientific method. Her way of seeing it really made me understand the aliveness of tradition and how there is opportunity, even necessity, for new traditions based upon new ecological relationships and new cultural connections to the land.

I was gut punched on page 15 when she says that we have to be careful to take care of the Earth and all its creatures, because if human civilization destroys the biosphere the rocks and winds will be left all alone to grieve for us.

What a striking contrast to the sad, cruel ideas in the Cambridge companion of the Anthropocene, where humans are some kind of disease upon the Earth that oppresses and "colonizes" everything else...!...The Earth would GRIEVE for us!

We are not separate from every other thing. We have to learn this. If I can pass along these ideas to y'all through my silly little posts, I will have lived well.

[hollycircling]

α.♊︎

[caemidraws]

Out of the blue

[colebirb]

This is what I did

[grassyeggroll]

Another one of my AUs that I haven’t worked on in months 🌲💫

[jayrockin]

The avian homeplanet's plants, and worms pretending to be plants.

Plantworms tend to out-compete the true plants in wet climates with nutrient poor soil or unstable substrate (such as wetlands and rainforests) because of their opportunistic carnivory and mobility. The true plants out-compete them in arid climates (such as tundra and deserts) because they have more robust water gathering and anti-freezing mechanisms. While both can form mycorrhizal associations to aid in water and nutrient deliver through the soil, true plants have extensive root systems and are not completely reliant on rainwater and condensation in the absence of mycorrhizal partners.

Both plantworms and true plants have clades that partner with pollinator animals to reproduce, but some plantworm "flowers" are honey traps. They use their colorful genitals as a lure to snare and eat potential pollinators, and reproduce "the old fashioned way," as in, reaching over to their same species neighbors to exchange gametes.

I've posted a little about avian flora before, though this is more up-to-date.

PATREON | Runaway to the Stars

[dietmimo]

Plant boi be planting. 🌱

[botanyshitposts]

hey can any snake special interest havers on this website tell me why all snakes dont have venom? is there some sort of hidden evolutionary cost to producing a magic liquid that does the work of killing stuff for you? because much like carnivorous plants that sounds pretty awesome and suspiciously devoid of possible drawbacks for the creature on paper.

this question comes courtesy of my emt textbook saying that all (wild) venomous snakes in the US will produce a bite that looks like two pinpricks, as opposed to nonvenomous snakes that will produce a horseshoe shaped bite. it says you can tell by looking at the bite if it might be dangerous or not using this distinction. is this true? and if so, are more teeth part of the price you pay for magic liquid that kills stuff for you?

[uncanny-tranny]

Please intentionally attempt to see the magic in everything. Everything is magic, even if you understand the "boring" reasons why things happen. Look at the magic in growing plants, the magic of your muscles flexing and retracting, the magic of your eyes and skull, the magic of a cat's purr.

It's all magic. Understanding the "why" is just understanding what makes things magical, it doesn't change that it's all significant and magic.