#so basically absorbs nutrients

[featherlouise]

I doodled a non voided hollow and they look so fkin weird

[bobcat-pie]

GO WATCH THE OCTOPUS LADY ON YOUTUBE, SHES SO COOL AND I'M LEARNING SO MUCH

[tabbytums]

preds that can use magic. whooof.

teleporting prey into their stomach. there's no chance for the prey to struggle, to escape. they're immediately bathing in the pred's gastric juices.

or, alternatively, preds who like to play with their prey so they use magic/a spell to shrink down their prey. but after they've had their fun and swallowed them down, they reverse the magic/spell and their belly expands and bulges out with a full-sized person.

using magic to rapidly speed up digestion, turning the panicked prey into soup and nutrient mush in seconds.

and then, using magic to absorb the prey's soul/essence into their body after they've digested, basically turning them into sentient fat that can only jiggle and sway on their pred's soft belly

preds can also reform their prey, but sometimes, the prey reforms right back in the pred's stomach, back again for round two... or three... or four... or however many times the pred has reformed them in there. the prey doesn't really have a choice in the matter.

[mandowifey]

Ok but like the eggs--

I need to know if they grow!!!

Since there's so many are we under the assumption that reader will have hundreds of little babies? Maybe they fight in the womb (like some shark pups do)

I really hope reader has more than 1 baby since they're multiple little eggs and not just 1

OMG I'm so flattered you ask. I have a lot of headcannons and stuff for it, too! I will preface by saying this is OG headcannons and science, so I'm not abiding by any comics or real-life spider logic, haha.

Warning: sex talk/oviposition/pregnancy talk under the cut. My Miguel has eggs he dumps in you, be aware before clicking read more.

× ×

Okay, so, for Miguel, the eggs are stored in an additional pouch in his abdomen that connects via its own tube to his urethra. The eggs themselves are small, no bigger than a tapioca pearl, and cause no discomfort passing for him. That being said, he generates over one thousand in the span of 4 months. When that pouch gets overfull, it bloats and causes pain and discomfort for him.

When he passes them into reader, his precum/cum itself has a light numbing affect, which causes the cervix opening to relax. The eggs pour out right towards the end of his release, and they naturally gravitate into the cervix.

Once inside, they stick themselves around the womb in tiny clusters. Now comes the fertilization process, as they begin to draw nutrients from the cervical lining. Unfortunately, due to how many it is a battle of the best, and (good guess by the way!), they end up cannibalizing one another until only a few remain. The number of surviving eggs is dependent on the carrier's body health and the father's egg health.

So most likely, 500 eggs are released, 450 make it inside the womb, and they dwindle off one by one (or they fail to latch) and are dissolved by the mothers body. Most likely, due to the amount of space and nutrients needed, only 3 to 5 can survive and fit inside the womb.

After that process, they are generally the size of a golfball and will continue to grow. The casing of the egg breaks once the child is about three months (the babies absorb the egg casing!), and from there, they develop like normal human children.

That being said, the mother would most likely experience terrible side affects as the foreign DNA feeds on her body - the babies, before breaching their eggs, are basically extreme parasites - and it is difficult for mom to go through. But that'd be a whole other post for me to do haha.

Birthing is the same as a human, though with super babies, there will most likely be complications and dangers. Otherwise, yeah! That's how I think it goes. I also agree that the likelihood of having "just one" is small, and you'd definitely have a couple... which Miguel would love. He's always wanted a big family.

[filurig]

bcs there's another huldra/skogsrå type creature in swedish folklore which is basically just the same thang but. Water. i decided to make a species which resembles the huldra in pareidolia due to convergent evolution, but is a type of lichen instead!

read more for some extra info about the growth stages etc.

like mentioned on the page, the sjörå goes through 3 main stages. ill describe them here below:

incubation this stage lasts around 10 years, and the sjörå infects a host through either drinking water or through fish as a vector, as their spores can lay dormant in them for a few weeks. during this time, the lichen begins its infection by attaching itself to the internal organs and slowly using its specialized rhizines to intertwine with the tissue, absorbing nutrients to allow for further growth. the internal lichen structures are highly resilient however it is not impossible for the body to fight off the infection during its earliest stages. there are no major symptoms, other than light exhaustion, until the very end of this stage. during the end of the stage, when the lichen has managed to reach the nervous system, it will compel the host to find its way to the nearest body of water, and once it has done so it will expire there. the lichen then spends the next few days rapidly consuming what remains of the nervous system to replace it with its own analogous "organs" which have been slowly forming during the incubation, and the body will "reanimate".

roaming the "sjörå" stage. this is not actually when they first gain consciousness, but they first do so around the middle of the incubation stage, however this is when they are first "independent" from their host's. at the end of this stage, they are compelled to find a fitting tree near the body of water their territory encompasses, and they lie down near it. then, nearly all of the energy in their body is used to cause it to expel its lichens onto the tree, which attaches to it, covering the entire structure with itself. this destroys the remnants of the hosts body.

final this is the only stage in which the sjörå is infectious to humans and it will spread its spores into the waters below/by the tree with regular 10 year intervals. the lichen is still conscious during this stage, and is actually able to communicate telepathically with other creatures near its area of influence.

[tobiasdrake]

Fun Fact: There is actually a reason for why Turles looks like Goku. And it's hysterical. I talk shit about Toei a lot but they understood the assignment on this one.

Lord Slug is my #1 Z film but Tree of Might is also conceptually a lot of fun. Even if they did call him "Turles" for some reason, rather than going with "Tullece" which everyone agrees does a better job of conveying the veggie pun.

This is the film's explanation for why Turles looks like an evil Goku. Low-class Saiyans like Goku and Turles all have a mass-produced factory-line uniformity to them. Vegeta is a $10,000 custom-made designer doll with carefully handwoven stitching, and Goku and Turles are $5 Barbies sitting on a shelf in Walmart.

I love this. I love that as a thematic piece of worldbuilding for Saiyans. Tragically, due to the movies being non-canon and having little involvement from Toriyama, this is not an official piece of Saiyan lore.

But I wish it was. Because I love that idea.

What the dub calls the Tree of Might is Shinseiju, made up of the components Shin (Godly) Sei (Sacred or Spiritual) Ju (Tree). It's a sacred bit of fauna meant only for consumption by gods. It's never explained how exactly Turles stole into heaven and made off with this; It's probably a reference to the Peaches of Immortality that Sun Wukong stole in Journey to the West.

(Funnily, to avoid mentioning Kami's divinity, the dub claims the fruit is meant for Shenron.)

This is some Galactus shit. The tree's fruit sustains gods by feeding on worlds. Once planted, the tree begins to cultivate its fruit by absorbing nutrients and water, as well as the genki of the living things on the planet.

You might recognize that word as a component of "Genki-Dama" or the Spirit Bomb. Genki is one of several components of ki. It's basically a person's physical wellness. There are other components like yuuki (bravery) or shouki (being in the right mind) that influence your ki as well.

This is how the film sets up Turles as Goku's evil counterpart. Goku is a heavenly martial artist, who has studied under gods and learned heavenly arts legitimately. Turles is a thief who somehow stole into the heavens and made off with Shinseiju.

The Genki-Dama is a mass of accumulated genki collected from all across the world, which Goku then uses to attack. Shinseiju does something similar, draining genki from across the planet to create a its special fruit.

Goku was born a low-class nobody but has improved himself through personal development physically, mentally, and spiritually. Turles, too, was born a low-class nobody, but he improves himself by looting the heavens and sacrificing worlds on the altar of himself.

Kaio warns Goku early on that the Earth is doomed. There is nothing he can do. Shinseiju cannot be destroyed. The coming apocalypse cannot be thwarted. All things will die and nothing can be done. The end is inevitable.

The rest of the film is an act of seemingly pointless defiance from Goku, who refuses to accept "Your world is doomed, it can't be stopped, there are no options, there is no hope," as an answer. The problem here isn't really Turles. He's the villain, but even if Goku could beat him, Shinseiju would still destroy the Earth.

The problem here is the invulnerable God Tree from a realm far beyond mortal life, that has laid down roots across the entire planet and shrugs off any and all forms of damage.

The movie pits Goku's heavenly arts against Turles's heavenly stolen loot. And Goku comes up short. Turles has Shinseiju's fruit.

And Goku has Kaio's signature art.

And when the two come to blows....

Fruit wins. In a straight arm-wrestling match, Turles's stolen goods have made him too strong for Goku's practiced arts and disciplined study. Even the Genki-Dama fails, because there's so little genki left for Goku to borrow from the Earth.

Get the hell out of here with this amateur hour horseshit. Kaio's greatest arts simply can't win against Turles and Shinseiju. In the battle of heavenly warriors, it genuinely seems as if Turles is superior.

But then Counter-Fighter Goku has an epiphany. The Earth is dying because Shinseiju is draining it of all of its genki, right? And the Genki-Dama works by drawing genki out of things, right? So. Like. Hear me out. What if I....

I genuinely love this moment. The movies have a serious problem with overuse of the Genki-Dama for conflict resolution, and I'll admit that. But. Like.

It's just like how Lord Slug's Solar Genki-Dama made use of a super-obscure piece of Dragon Ball lore for great thematic effect. Goku unmaking Shinseiju by letting the Genki-Dama's genki-accumulation effect drink the whole goddamn tree is a brilliantly clever application of a component of the technique we don't really think much about.

Goku can't draw genki from the Earth because Shinseiju took it all. So Goku uses the Genki-Dama to take it back.

Like. It's far from perfect. None of these movies really rise to the level of "good". But there's a lot of interesting or fun ideas that they have. And I think, in the broad strokes, the ideas put forth by Turles and Shinseiju, as well as Goku's conflict with them, are really interesting.

They needed a lot more polish to really tell a good and compelling story. But there's some diamonds to be found in this rough.

[pokemonshelterstories]

Have you ever taken care of a Parasect in your line of work? I'm intrigued on how that would work due to it mostly being the mushroom.

i have not! they're not native to paldea, and artazon's environment is not welcoming to keeping parasect- they need damp environments without too much direct sunlight. that being said, i've spoken with a few experts on fungus-based pokemon before, so i do know a little bit about them! parasect care is actually fairly well-known, since they're kept for their spores in some regions, and only parasect kept within the right parameters produce spores that are useful for making medicine.

keeping them is mostly a matter of providing the right enclosure for them. the bug itself needs very little care, and it mostly serves as a way for the mushroom to move around and absorb nutrients from its food source: live wood and decaying leaf litter. an enclosure for a parasect should focus on providing hides with varying levels of light and moisture, and enrichment is primarily foraging-based to encourage movement. the enclosure itself should be moderately damp, and parasect enjoy a regular misting. honestly, that's really all they need! the insect itself has little engagement with its environment outside of basic response to stimuli, and since it's being controlled by the mushroom, it doesn't have particularly demanding care needs.

keep in mind that you need to regularly harvest the spores a parasect releases, and you shouldn't enter its enclosure without a mask to prevent you from breathing in the spores. you can pick up a pretty horrible infection from breathing in the spores if you're not careful.

[bluegekk0]

finally finished the new ref sheet for hollow for the au :D

following the end of the infection, and once hornet brought them to dirtmouth, hollow finally found peace after all the suffering they had to endure. unfortunately, the damage caused by the infection led to the exposed parts of their body becoming quite unstable, as the void in those spots is unable to form back into the hard shell. that is why they now have to wear an eyepatch (first made from bandages, then from hornet’s old cloak, a much stronger material), that covers their now blind eye socket, as well as a set of bandages wrapped around their missing arm. they are considerably weaker now, even after recovering from the injuries, so they spend most of their time resting in the house, away from noise and bright lights. this is where the traits they got from their mother manifest themselves: since the white lady is a plant (or at least a plant-like creature), she’s not very active and tends to stay still for long periods of time. in that aspect, hollow is very similar, so they’re not the most interesting to watch

once pk moved to dirtmouth, he slowly began working on a new arm for hollow, a custom made shell for their void tendrils made from scrap collected in the junk pit. this new prosthesis allowed hollow to pursue a newly discovered hobby: plush sewing. seeing the plushies of the little knight made by bretta, they became interested in the process of making one. with the help of hornet, they learned the basics and used their newly acquired knowledge to sew plushies of all the dirtmouth residents, especially their father, who now keeps all the stuffed toys of varying quality made by hollow in the big pile of pillows and blankets in his room, one he uses to hide away when stressed

and yes, since they have no mouth, they eat by absorbing food into their body, which then instantly dissolves into soul giving them nutrients. quite a traumatizing sight, but i couldn’t pass on the opportunity to make them a tad bit monstrous. they are made of void after all, and void is unpredictable and scary. i also like to think that, similarly to ghost in the game, they can store items within their body. who needs pockets, right?

also: pk taught them how to write, to make the communication between easier. moreover, he encourages them to keep a diary with them wherever they go, so that they can write down their thoughts and feelings about the everything and become more independent as a result

[elizakai]

When it comes to the bad sanses, there’s so many things to be explored, but I want to point out something I never see addressed

SOULS.

⬇️ little soul analysis under the cut!!!⬇️

They all have COMPLETELY different SOULs;

Nightmare: Nightmare is a being that is a lot different from other monsters. He is basically a god, with a SOUL that holds great importance in relation to the multiverse they all live in, it’s an embodiment of negativity and corruption. Not to mention, Nightmare originally HAD no SOUL (same as Dream, as their entire body was magic, more so than normal, thus essentially being their SOUL) and this is a result of absorbing/ becoming the multiverse’s negativity.

Killer: Killer’s SOUL has been mutilated and twisted out of shape, it visibly and by nature is a “corrupted” SOUL. His very being was brutally and forcefully shifted, starting with his mind and ending with his very core, his SOUL. It being out in the open and, well, a literal target, makes me assume this is a weak point. I am under the assumption that SOULs are a very touchy topic for this man.

Cross: Cross had a SOUL that could be assumed normal, but he is also a creation of X!gaster. (I didn’t represent his actual SOUL oops) he has been shown to be out of the norm in terms of his existence/SOUL. To take it a step further, when he is fused with the soul of Chara,human and DETERMINATION, he only posses half of a monster SOUL. Either way his essence is very much different then that of “natural” monsters, I think it’s pretty self explanatory

Horror: this one can go two ways. A lot of horrortale fans interpret horrors eye, his source of magic, a representation of his SOUL. It makes a lot of sense within the comic and story. Thus we could obviously see that an eye and a SOUL are very different. However it could be argued that “source of magic” and “essence of being” aren’t the same. A lot of the fandom also interprets horrors SOUL separately, and a fair assumption is made that his SOUL is either shrunken or sickly in appearance in this case. This makes sense due to horrors lack of/small amount of magic, his body learning to regulate itself without proper nutrients to keep his magic going.

Dust: Dust has the most natural monster SOUL of the group. We can assume that monsters who have attained high LV, such as Dust, also have altered SOULs, especially when we consider how violence is out of a monsters default nature. That said, monsters are ABLE to gain LV, so it isn’t some anomaly. One could also consider Dust attaining “new traits” to affect his soul. What I mean is it can be interpreted that, Dust having lost JUSTICE and gained DETERMINATION, along with the usual PATIENCE (supposed to be cyan lol) , his soul would probably also reflect these changes. We can call into question how much DETERMINATION Dust actually possess? Is it dangerous? Again, it still doesn’t alter his actual MONSTER SOUL much

(I’d also like to point out, I think it’s cool that red (DT) and blue (patience) make purple (perseverance) which is the color of dust’s magic…I think it’s interesting 🤷🏽‍♀️)

They probably wouldn’t know what to make of the others SOULs, as they are all so drastically different. If something were to happen to one of them…would they even know what to do?

(yeah I’m forcing my story ideas down your throats because headcanons)

All that to say, I’m interested to hear other people’s thoughts or headcanons on this, and I want to see more of this explored!!!

SHARE ANY THOUGHTS YOU HAVE ALRIGHT THAT’S ALL

[turtlesandfrogs]

One of the things I think about a lot is productivity comparisons between conventional and unconventional agriculture. Mostly because that's the first question you get asked when you talk about anything that's outside the norm*, but, on what metric are we measuring? Per acre? Per hour worked? Per cost of input? Are we measuring yields of product or dollars earned?

This question also, to me, rings of fear. Fear of food shortages, which are really a problem of greed & distribution, not the world's capacity to grow food. If we were really worried about calories though, I think we'd at least switch to pastured animals instead of sending so much corn and soy to livestock (for any non-farmers out there, you do not get nearly the calories out of a chicken or pig that you put in- you get much less**). Or we would put more effort into making cities great places to live so we stopped turning farmland into suburbia. Or we would be much more concerned with how to prevent erosion & loss of arable land. But we don't, and we're not.

I also think of the complexity of non- conventional farming, and how instead of it being a return to the past, it actually relies on new information and methods***.

Take the plot of land that I'm working to make into a market garden. It's soil is, from a farmer's perspective, crap. It's gravely, sandy, very little organic matter. If I were to farm it conventionally, I'd basically have till to open the soil and kill weeds, and then provide all of the plant nutrients through fertilizers, which would cause the plants to kick out their symbiotic fungi, leaving them vulnerable to pathogenic fungi, and more dependant on me for water. There would also be bare soil everywhere, increasing evaporation & providing plenty of opportunities for new weeds. My costs would be very high, paying for fertilizers, pesticides, & herbicides, and I would have to water, a lot. It probably wouldn't be at all economically feasible to grow food on this plot using conventional methods.

Now, I look at it and say, I'm going to do no-till. I look at the hard, weedy, depleted soil and there's no way a seed is going to be able to come up through that. But, I'm not just doing no-till, because I'm not looking at it from a conventional mindset and just trading out one practice. I'm doing basically everything different from above.

Instead of tilling, I'm laying down a thick layer of mulch, to shade out the weeds, increase soil organic matter (increasing the amount of water and nutrients the soil can absorb & good on to), and feed the soil ecosystem. By the time spring rolls around, the soil underneath will be much better, but I'll still add more compost in most cases.

Instead of fertilizers I've had to pay for, I'm using mulches that I got for free from my gardening work & composts made for free from restaurant kitchen wastes****. I'm going to use over crops, plants that fix nitrogen and also serve as perennial hosts to beneficial soil fungi, which will also form symbiosis with most of my crops, increasing their resistance to pathogenic fungi while also providing them with increased access to water and soil minerals.

Instead of bare soil, there will be mulches and cover crops every where. Instead of monocrops & pesticides, I'll be intercropping which will help by hosting beneficial native insects that will chow down on aphids and other crop pests.

From this framework, there's an upfront investment of effort and planning, but farming this land now seems feasible.

And the thing is, each of those choices is backed up by research. We know so much more now about soil and nutrient cycling and how it actually works than when conventional ag really got started. We know so much more, and so many practices are new, so growing non-conventionally isn't a step back into the past of how things were grown.

But at the same time, it's not exactly completely information either- other cultures have different ways of growing food crops, and if you broaden your concept of what cultivating plants looks like, there's examples everywhere. We're just studying it now and providing it scientifically.

*and I honestly think that it's a result of the extractive mindframe that comes from being the decendants of colonizers. Just look at the different perspectives between many western foragers ideas and Indigenous peoples' relationship with the land.

** chickens are one of the most efficient, with a feed conversion ratio of 1.6, which means for every 1.6 pounds of food you give them, you can expect the chicken to gain 1 pound (cows are over 4 pounds of feed to pound of live weight, and pigs are 3 to 4ish). That's the whole bird though, counting all the parts we don't eat- guts, feathers, bones, etc. Even so, a pound of chicken food has over 1300 calories, and is about 20% protein for starter/grower, where as a pound of chicken has about 500 calories and about 30% protein (for dark meat, you get fewer calories from white meat). I'm not saying everyone should give up meat, but I am saying that the amount of meat in mainstream diets has increased dramatically, much of it comes from cafos where animals are fed on grains & legumes, and if we're measuring productivity and yield per acre because we're worried about feeding the world, this is a huge factor. Look up how much of the corn & soy crop goes to actually directly feeding people.

*** from a western, colonizing prospective

**** is this a particular boon from my particular circumstances? Yes. But everyone has their own challenges and resources, there is no cookie-cutter solution to all agriculture, everywhere. You have to find the solutions that work for you.

[thebibliosphere]

I know you aren’t a doctor, but is there anything else that, to your knowledge, tends to get diagnosed by alt-doctors as CIRS?

So this is probably going to piss some people off, but I genuinely believe that CIRS (which as I've talked about before as being... questionable as a diagnosis) is more likely to be a mast cell disorder.

The science and reasoning around CIRS and the obsession with "toxins" and mold is just too vague, and I say that as someone who was at one point diagnosed as CIRS and went through the whole process only to be met with HEAVY resistance from my alt doctors when I wanted to know WHY something was "toxic" and why I wasn't improving despite doing what they recommended.

They couldn't explain it. Thing Just Bad. And if I wasn't improving, it was my fault for not removing enough "toxins" from my environment.

Well, turns out some of those things weren't universally "toxic," I just have an immune disorder (MCAS) that makes them toxic to me, where my body thinks harmless things are a threat-- including my own hormonal cycle!

There was mold killing me, though, that was indeed making my mast cells unstable and sending me into anaphylaxis on a regular basis and causing all kinds of neurological problems. Mast cell stabilizers and removing the mold from my home did more good for me than any of the CIRS treatments.

(Important note: not everyone with MCAS experiences anaphylaxis as a symptom, and it is not a requisite of diagnosis.)

MCAS is not the only form of mast cell dysfunction either. There's also mastocytosis and Hereditary Alpha tryptasemia. You can read more about them at The Mast Cell Disease Society. (There are also different types of MCAS for anyone interested.)

Other things I've seen alt-doctors misdiagnose as CIRS over the years include:

Dysautonimia (high rates of comorbidity with MCAS)

Fibromyalgia (some recent research suggests that mast cells play a role in the onset of fibromyalgia)

ME/CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome)

ADHD

Autism

Celiac Disease

Multiple Chemical Sensitivity Disorder (which I also think is mast cell related, tbh.)

Pernicious Anemia (the other thing that was killing, because my untreated MCAS was stopping me from absorbing nutrients from my food)

Chronic migraines.

SIBO (which can lead to secondary MCAS)

Various different mood disorders

Interstitial Cystitis (also a common symptom of various mast cell disorders)

And I'm sure a couple more I'm just forgetting right now.

Basically, there are a lot of things CIRS could actually turn out to be. But my money is on some form of mast cell fuckery.

[dvrcos]

Ive been bothering everyone I possibly can by dropping asks abt Aaron in their inbox soo it's ur turn now

Any Aaron hcs? Your opinion on skater boy Aaron?

And because I love Kevin too, any Kevin hcs? I feel like people tend to forget that Kevin likes photography too canonically besides exy and history

OMG I JUST SAW THIS THANK YOU FOR ASKING HEHEHEHE

Skater boy Aaron is real and true and canon (to me at least)

He is the poster boy for the early 2000s skater aesthetic

Part of the reason he continues skating in college is because he enjoys the heart attack it gives Kevin

Kevin doesn’t want him getting hurt and jeopardizing the team and his wellbeing

So Aaron makes sure he finds time to skate everyday

Aaron is a lover of pop culture and is just a fucking nerd dude

He loves Lord of the Rings and read Harry Potter as it came out (and also very actively hates JKR in the modern day)

Aaron Minyard is a chronic migraine girly

He’s a med student and athlete who gets very little sleep so his head constantly hurts

And yaknow what he’s a little bitch about it too

He is constantly complaining to Katelyn and using it as an excuse to be an asshole

(I love him so dearly)

I also think he is constantly cold and has terrible blood circulation

His hands and feet are always freezing

Years of drug use and constantly needing to take Advil for his headaches has just shot his cardiovascular system

So he’s constantly cold and doesn’t run a lot because his stamina is shit

He has a raging addiction to caffeine and his vice is RedBulls

His sleep schedule is absolutely wrecked from both Exy and school so he’s rarely ever without a RedBull in hand

I don’t think he cares a lot about his diet but he does try to keep it pretty nutrient packed bc he knows the benefits of it

But he also has a sweet tooth (not as strong as Andrew’s but still strong) and he favors baked goods like cake and banana bread and pastries

His vision is bad and it just keeps getting worse over the years but he doesn’t wear his glasses often

He usually resorts to contacts but has to switch to his glasses late at night or when his head is hurting extra bad

OKAY KEVIN FUCKING DAY

He loves tea

Like has an extensive tea collection and will spend the money to buy teas from around the world

He also has a mug collection (the Foxes start gifting him mugs every holiday when they find out about it)

His favorite mugs are his vintage Trojans mug, a “history is not boring” mug the Foxes gave him when he graduated, and a Hogwarts mug Aaron gave him

(they read the series together :P)

Kevin’s favorite areas of history to study are Ancient Rome and the history of Ireland

He’s fascinated by the Roman Empire and studying Ireland makes him feel more connected to his mother

I think he continues school on the side and eventually gets a doctorate degree and teaches a bit after he retires from Exy

He always tries to sign with teams in or near the cities the other OG Foxes are in because he doesn’t really know how to function without the familiarity of his people

Kevin works a lot on undoing his Raven dietary habits and since he’s surrounded by people who can’t cook he grows a love for frozen food as well as caffeine

I think he takes a few art classes and really enjoys it even though he doesn’t think he’s that great at it

He’s actually not bad at all and makes a lot of really cool pieces

Kevin exclusively wears 5 inch inseam shorts

Anything longer is blasphemous

He has basically zero sense of style and just kind of mimics what the others are wearing

Until Allison forces him to go to the mall with her and they spend hours building him a real wardrobe that is him

Most of his closest still consists of PSU and USC merch though

And truly would this even be me if I didn’t put kevaaron headcanons? No

Kevin is basically a human radiator, especially after practice

And that is a blessing directly from God in Aaron’s eyes

Kevin comes back from night practice and Aaron just clings to him, absorbing all of his heat as they fall asleep

Aaron is a chronic clothes stealer like he just has sticky fingers when it comes to Kevin’s wardrobe

They spend a lot of time together in the library

They’re both in quite intensive and workload heavy majors so they study together a lot

It happened more as an accident tbh like Aaron was heading to the library to study for a midterm

And basically all of PSU’s student body had the same idea so there was no open tables

But low and behold there was Kevin, alone at a table tucked in the back corner, typing away at his laptop

Aaron joins him without asking and it kinda just becomes their thing

Kevin joins Aaron at the library between regular and night practices

They spend most of their weekends there and bring each other caffeinated drinks and snacks

Eventually they’re not even studying half the time, they’re just talking and spending time with each other outside of Exy and the other Foxes curious glances and prying comments

Aaron takes a history class with Kevin but Kevin refuses to take any science class outside of his required credits

He’s not a science person so Aaron doesn’t take it personally

Kevin can never properly wrap his head around how strong Aaron actually is

It just doesn’t compute for him, like how can so much strength be packed into such a small body

But he is most definitely not complaining, especially not when that strength is so clearly but on display or used against him

Kevin is practically drooling anytime he watches Aaron body check a striker twice his size and send them sprawling onto the floor

They become each others partners/marks during practices and it is simultaneously the best and worst thing to ever happen

They’re just excessively flirting while tripping each other and fighting with their racquets

The other Foxes comment on their “weird and disturbing foreplay” every chance they get

[flock-talk]

Transparency With Parrot Food Manufacturers

There's been a significant rise in the expectation of transparency between pet food manufacturers and the general public. Dog food manufacturers, for example; have AAFCO, feeding trials, and an array of nutrient digestibility charts, base nutrient expectations, and sanitary guidelines to follow which a lot of brands then openly share with the public. These standards help pet parents make more active choices in what they feed their pets, tailor their pets diet to meet their individual needs, trust that their food meets a base line of nutrition, and that the food was produced in a sanitary manner. The dog food industry is far from perfect and even these regulations have their flaws and the tests aren't without fault but it is a good base for us to compare to when we're trying to sort out what we want from other pet food manufacturers. In this case I'm focusing on parrot pellet manufacturers.

I had a few different goals heading in to this.

I wanted to see how transparent pellet manufacturers would be with sharing information that is common to ask dog food manufacturers (information is not confidential, revealing formulas, secrets, etc.)

The availability of nutrient analysis charts (breakdowns of how much of each nutrient is in their pellets)

What standards parrot food manufacturers held themselves to

If any feeding trials were performed on their pellets

And to preface this with my own bias, I am pro-pellet, I currently feed pellets.

Before we get too deep in to this let's break things down a bit.

As it stands there really aren't any regulating bodies above parrot food manufacturers as far as I could find. There doesn't seem to be much of any standards when it comes to their sanitization or product quality, the best you get is the FDA/ CFIA which basically just make sure a food isn't outright toxic. As it stands there haven't been enough studies done on parrot nutrition for there to be a governing body stating what the minimum nutrient requirements are for parrot food, we simply do not actually know what those requirements are yet so there cannot be a set standard for it. This unfortunately leaves us open to a lot of problems, if there's no nutritional requirements and no standardized testing then we're really just putting a lot of trust in to a company that wants to turn a profit. We're hoping that the food that says it's nutritionally complete is what it says with no evidence to show for it, and no science to confirm it.

So with that said no parrot food can actually claim to be "100% nutritionally complete", we do not know what nutritionally complete looks like for parrots, there is no science to back up those claims.

So I set out and emailed every parrot pellet manufacturer I could think of and asked them the some questions.

"Does your company do feeding trials? If so, is that data available to the public anywhere?"

"Do you have a nutrient profile available?"

Feeding trials are very simply a test where you feed a set of animals exclusively one diet and then monitor them to see if the food is capable of providing the base essential nutrients needed to live. Usually they do blood work, urine and fecal alongside regular physical exams to monitor things like nutritional deficiency, ailments, and nutrient digestibility. This helps show that a food is capable of providing what the target animal needs to survive without causing health problems and provides vital information on what amount of vitamins/ minerals in the produced food are actually being digested and absorbed. These tests are common among well-known dog food companies and most are more than willing to share that data to give their consumers peace of mind with easy transparency.

And let me tell you I am beyond disappointed at what happened when I asked parrot food manufacturers the exact same thing.

TOPs: No nutrient profile listed on the website, does have a detailed breakdown of why every single ingredient was added though. Happily discloses that parrot nutritional science doesn't have all the data to claim any food as 100% nutritionally complete and advises for the feeding of fresh foods in addition to their food, didn't specify exactly how much of each to maintain optimal nutrition.

I emailed them three times and never got a response back from any of them.

Harrisons: Does say you can feed 20% vegetables by weight while the pellet should be 75%, has an easily available nutrient analysis on their website.

also emailed three times with no response back.

Caitec: no nutritional analysis listed on their main website, website did not state how they want their product to be fed, product packaging states that veggies should be a treat/ addition and lists the pellet as a "complete diet".

emailed three times with no response back.

Lafeber: Primarily promotes mixed seed and pellet formulas, doesn't state any risks of parrot's selective consumption (study on that problem), does promote the feeding of fresh produce in conjunction with their formulas at 20% of the diet, no nutrient analysis on their website.

emailed three times with no response back.

Zupreem (Compana Pet Brands): did respond back but they phrased their response in a way to dance around the subject, after some pushing they confirmed they do not do feeding trials. Encourages use of fresh foods with their formula, at least 60% pelleted diet recommended. Had an extremely small nutrient profile that just skipped over the important nutrient requirements like the Ca:Ph. I asked for a nutrient profile which they did not want to provide but were able to tell me that the naturals pellets have 0.59% calcium

Roudybush: Says fresh foods can be fed but "as a minor part of the diet", does say that science doesn't have enough information to make a product tailored to each species of bird, did make changes to their formula recently to remove menadione in favour of alfalfa due to it's potential toxicity. does seem to be evolving as science progresses. Ingredients list wasn't listed on the website, nor was a nutrient profile.

did not reply to any emails.

Tropican (HARI): I was hopeful for this one by the way their website boasts about their feeding trials and research. So so hopeful.

Talks about doing feeding trials openly on their website, recommends 70% pellet to 30% fresh foods (by caloric content not weight) but mentioned that their birds eat 100% pellets. Easily accessible albeit basic nutrient profile but it covers the main things.

After my email Mr. Hagen actually ended up calling me and what I was hoping would be a motivating call ended up being very hostile. Whenever I asked questions about data or results of a feeding trial I was immediately shut down, the topic was changed, I was interrupted mid-sentence over and over again. I was able to get small tidbits of info that were as vague as "we've fed multiple generations of birds on this food" and "we do annual weigh-ins". He would casually mention data from a study he had done but then dart away if I asked for the name of the study so I could read it later. It was an extremely off-putting phone call. Completely unwilling to say how many birds were in a trial, how many years the trial went on for, if there was bloodwork or nutrient digestibility charts, nothing at all. He also casually mentioned that once the birds are old enough they get sold to stores which was very unnerving to me.

So I guess they maybe do legitimate feeding trials but they will under no circumstances offer that data to the public? I don't know. They wouldn’t provide any published articles or data to actually prove that the trials exist and I will definitely not be contacting them again to find out. They suggested I was trying to steal their formula and lying about my identity. I'm not going to try to get a simple answer out of them again.

Mazuri: recommends 20% fresh foods 75% pellets, nutrient profile available on the website.

did not reply to any emails.

Pretty Bird: Does not do feeding trials, prompt to reply, at least knew what a feeding trial was. Couldn't find feeding recommendations on the website, no nutrient profile aside from the generic guaranteed analysis having a few add-ons but still skipping on the important nutrients you'd want to know about.

Kaytee: Did not know what a Feeding Trial was. Thought I wanted samples and offered me a coupon. I had to explain to this animal food manufacturer what a feeding trial was. Unsurprisingly they do not do feeding trials. Website had no listing of a nutrient analysis. Recommended 70-90% pellets to some fresh foods. In their own published article they went over how damaging seed diets are for parrots but then they also sell seed-only diets with the ingredients they were specifically bashing in their own article. When I asked for a nutrient profile this is what I was given:

"Nutrient levels are calculated based on ingredient data, feed compendium tables and direct diet analysis. Actual levels may vary slightly due to ingredient and analytical variation."

Kaytee exact naturals cockatiel pellet:

"0.4% Calcium 0.2% Available Phosphorus (non-phytate P) 0.1% Magnesium 120 ppm Zinc 140 ppm Iron 700 IU/kg Vitamin D3"

and that's just extremely limited information. I'm glad they were willing to provide something but in comparison to some of the others it's just not a lot of data.

Psittacus: advises for the use of grit in parrots, recommends 100% pellets but says you can feed a minimum of 70% to make room for fresh foods. Their response to feeding trails was really vague: "our products have been evaluated and tested in our centre as well as collaborating centres. This information is for internal use and it is not published anywhere". Wouldn't say what tests were done or elaborate further than that in any way. I then inquired for a detailed nutrient analysis chart saying that Mia's calcium has been a bit of a struggle (since it has been), curious if their brand may have more calcium than the ones Im using now to help her out to which they replied with "our food contains the calcium levels appropriate for him/her". (you literally cannot say that, you haven't run tests on my bird, you haven't worked with my vet regarding my bird, you cannot guarantee a blanket statement like that.). They did offer me a link to this catalogue which has more detailed info on their pellets production and a more thorough nutrient analysis chart.

I am shocked by the responses I received. I am disappointed in parrot food manufacturers. I am frustrated with parrot food regulations.

I knew I wouldn't get much out of these emails since the standards for parrot food are so low but the amount of companies that just pretended not to get my emails or didn't even know what a feeding trial was is ridiculous. The amount of companies that were making claims that science can't back up, or making claims that science actually disagrees with is astounding.

The complete lack of transparency is terrifying.

[agentc0rn]

my sort-of AU idea proposal is that the ultimate weapon draws its power from Arbordrasil indirectly; it was partially made from the root materials (its own plus other roots that grow separately from it) teemed with regenerative and draining power. Its roots themselves are capable of physical regrowth. It also can stretch its branches/vines outwards!

While lying dormant within a gorge of sorts, Arbordrasil's roots eventually rose to surface in a labyrinth-like spiral, which AZ came to randomly discover some day prior to the creation of the machine. He then extracted the materials and used them to create the pre ultimate weapon machine to bring Floette back. In the process, it required input which basically meant the drainage of other lives was required (think of it like roots draining nutrients from the soil to supply and sustain its growth).

Then the conversion to the ultimate weapon came to be, which swelled with overflowing power (the root material absorbed so much from the lives of pokemon that there was still enough energy residue that would then serve the recipe for disaster.)

[marigoldwitch]

Marigold’s Witchcraft | Tip of the Day

If you plan on sprinkling any mixtures (like blended herbs, dried flowers, dried fruits etc.) into or onto soil (for a spell or ritual) or you plan to dispose of your spells outside, and the spell requires salt, replace the salt with crushed egg shells. Doing this ensures you don’t damage the soil because salt will basically poison the dirt so that plant life will not be able to grow.

Salts in the soil can absorb water. This results in less water being available for uptake by the plants, increasing water stress and root dehydration. This is referred to as physiological drought, which, if not corrected, can lead to reduced plant growth. XX

However, [chicken] egg shells are comprised of about 96% calcium carbonate (CaCO3). Calcium is an essential plant nutrient and moderates soil acidity.

Egg shells, good 👍🏻

Salt, bad 👎🏻

Magically speaking, egg shells and salt share very similar properties. So substituting one for the other shouldn’t be an issue. Unless however, you plan to ingest your mixture or blend. This substitution is really only necessary if you plan to bury your mixture or you plan to dispose of it in soil or outside.

[cosmica-galaxy]

Silly question - feel free to ignore if it's not your jam. I know not everyone finds this stuff as funny as I do!

Can mimics fart?

I remember you posted some anatomy diagrams that showed that their digestive systems are cul-de-sacs because they absorb everything... so presumably they have no bumholes! Could they form transient bumholes if they wanted to fart for the hell of it?

(I was going to ask the mimics division blog but I figure your characters are too polite to answer such a question, so I thought I'd ask you the creator!)

Not really. You see, in order to produce flatulence, a creature would have to have intestines to do such an activity. That's because the bacteria in your gut is the primary reason for gas to be produced, especially in the lower digestive tract, which mimics lack.

Here's a refresher on the mimic digestive system from Mimic Biology 101! Mimics don't have any lower organs that humans have. Like kidneys, neither intestines, bladders, or rectums.

The stomach, liver, guts, and upper tracts are located in the top part of the torso in mimics, with the median line being at around the bellybutton or slightly below it.

That's when the digestive part of the mimic stops completely and everything that the mimic consumes is absorbed into the flesh of their body directly via "nutrient roots" seen in the diagram, this is also how large mimics seem to digest themselves during death spirals, leaving no waste behind. If something is indigestible, like a chunk of porcelain from Skibidi prey, they will simply spit it back up like a watermelon seed--meaning that there is only one entrance and one exit, the mouth. Their main way of absorbing food is also slightly different. Human stomachs use gastric acid to breakdown food and gut bacteria is what processes the food. Mimics are similar, but a little different.

All mimics have three organs that help in digestion.

The entry gut pretty much sorts out parts of the prey and covers the prey in a slimy mucus that allows for transportation throughout the guts easier and coats the prey parts in a "softening film" that makes breakdown easier.

The breakdown gut is basically the mimic organ version of a "checkpoint". It burns away all the impurities that would cause gut-based trauma or buildup, such as metal parts, wires, porcelain, ect. This is where most "remains" are spit back out from the mimic's mouth and the rest is coated by bile from the liver.

Finally, the prey is sent to the main stomach which works it over, furthers absorption, and the thick fleshy walls eventually wrap around the prey and liquefies it, feeding it directly into the nutrient roots for the body to use for energy, which finishes their digestion process! So...what fills the space in the hips and such if they have no lower guts? The answer: their reproductive parts!

Mimics have both male and female internalized sexual organs for reproductive purposes. If one is currently dominant, the other will be inactive.

For example, if a mimic is currently fulfilling a feminine role, their ovaries, canal, and womb will be active. If a mimic is fulfilling a masculine role, the internal testes, sheath, and tendril will be active. Both of these systems take up the space that is left from having no intestines nor connective exits. This is also how most mimics are able to have multiple young, such as Camera Mimics. Would they make a rectum to fart for "fun"? I would also say no. It would be far too much of a hassle for a mimic to work around their insides, create a fleshy tube through their body, and connect it to their back end just to push air out of it. Though, they do have the ability to burp!

The ruder mimics tend to do that a lot and pretty loudly, much to the chagrin of other mimics. If a young mimic does that, they tend to get bapped by their parents in scolding.

They still have manners, you know! XD