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rank-sentimentalist · 17 hours ago

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PARKOUR!

Edgar Vergara, of Jasper, captured this amazing trail-camera photo in Pickens County on Oct. 22, 2023 at 3 a.m. “I’ve never seen a deer photo like this before!” Edgar said.

#animals #Edgar Vegara #trail camera #deer #raccoons #trash pandas #trail photo #PARKOUR!#ghostowlattic

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lord-raccoon · 2 years ago

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i am something of a scientist

#raccoon #raccoons #cute #animal #animals #cute animal #cute animals #adorable #trash panda #trash pandas

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typhlonectes · 2 years ago

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#raccoon #trash pandas #animals #Wednesday #memes

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rebeccathenaturalist · 2 months ago

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Today I present to you not one but TWO examples of selfish people who keep treating wildlife like pets. The first shows the consequences of their actions; the second is a tragedy waiting to happen once that deer becomes aggressive and that poor kid ends up injured or worse, or the deer has to be euthanized.

The proliferation of "cute wildlife" pictures and videos showing people in very close contact with wildlife has led to the expectation on the part of many people that they, too, can get their Disney moment as a "wildlife whisperer". Unfortunately this leads to more people trying to force contact with wildlife on their own terms with no care for the impact on the animal or their own safety.

While habituated wild animals are generally more tolerant of human contact, they are absolutely NOT domesticated. Domestication is a long process that leads to significant physical and mental changes in a lineage of animals until they are a separate subspecies/species from their wild progenitors; a dog is not a wolf, a domesticated cat is not an African wildcat, a cow is not an aurochs, and so forth. A wild animal may be tamed to a certain extent, but it is still fundamentally wild and has wild instincts and behaviors.

They do not have a desire to be around humans bred into them the way domestic species do, and any habituation is at their own expense. Habituated animals often do not learn proper foraging or hunting skills, particularly if they were raised by habituated parents, they don't get to socialize with their own species and are less likely to successfully reproduce, which can affect the local population's gene pool, and they are more likely to be injured or killed when they come into conflict with humans due to their lack of fear of us.

The absolute selfishness that leads people to want to force wildlife to tolerate them for their own ego boost robs these animals of their autonomy and wild lives. And it is selfishness; we do this because WE want the animals to like us and entertain us, not because we care about their long-term well-being. Those who actually care about a wild animal's quality of life look at the negative impacts of feeding them improper food, habituating them to humans, and interrupting their life's progression in the name of our own agendas. This is why good, ethical wildlife rehabs are as hands-off with their patients as possible, so that they minimize the chances of habituation and maximize the animal's wild instincts and behaviors for a more successful return to the wild.

It's not enough to choose to not feed or pet wildlife; we also have to criticize "rehabs" and "zoos" that make their money on up-close-and-personal direct physical encounters with wild animals, rehabbers that take pictures and videos of them cuddling with animals in their care (or any other contact outside of immediate medical/feeding support), and influencers who get clicks, likes, and shares by getting footage of them too close to wildlife. We also need to call out those "Oh, how cute!" pictures, posts, and news articles showing how humans and wildlife can be "friends", and keep educating people on how habituation is dangerous both to the animals and humans alike.