Thursday - August 06, 2020

Just Buggin

I saw a couple of these around the patio yesterday and today. Don’t know if they got blown in by the big storm, knocked out of the trees by all the rain, or if their eggs were in that cheap mulch we laid down in June. Same mulch is now sprouting mushrooms too.

Anyway, the Brown Prionid is pretty much harmless to people. And quite common. They live in rotting wood.

But it is a heck of a big bug, as long and thick as your pinky finger. With big scaly twitchy bug legs, and it runs real fast. eeewwwrrrghh.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/06/2020 at 11:12 AM   
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   Friday - June 05, 2020

9 Lives, Feeding All The Woodland Critters

don’t touch this bird, you could get melanerpes

Crivens, red bellied woodpeckers eat cat food. Every critter in the forest eats cat food, especially catbirds, except maybe squirrels. I haven’t seen any snakes doing it. Yet.

Sniffles, our itty bitty indoor cat, will sit at the window for hours waiting for a chipmunk or mouse to come and have a taste. She ignores the deer, the trash pandas, and any of the creatures bigger than her “massive” 5 1/2lb self, but is hypnotized by the little twitchy animals that visit the feeding bowl. She doesn’t do anything, but she does get all bushy and buggy eyed when they come by. Moe, Moe-ette, and their broods of baby possums don’t get her worked up either. Too big, too slow.

I was in the kitchen making yet another cup of coffee when I saw a movement from the corner of my eye. Our outdoor kitteh Ginger has his dish just outside our kitchen slider. We usually feed him at first light, but sometimes he doesn’t eat it all. Sometimes he comes back later. Sometimes he doesn’t show up, especially if the weather isn’t nice. And it’s not that nice today, super humid and slightly warm, with periods of rain here and there. Typical NJ day actually. 

So there’s a bit of cat food left in his dish today. And hopping around and having a few pecks at it is a red bellied woodpecker. Life in the frickin’ jungle, get that protein in where you find it. After he ate what he wanted I put the dish in the fridge, because we’re not supposed to leave food out, and we’re under a Bear Alert. Some black bear has been sighted here several nights in a row, so everybody panic!! But how about that. Woodpeckers and cat food. Who knew? 

Posted by Drew458     on 06/05/2020 at 12:27 PM   
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   Wednesday - May 20, 2020

snagged another cute video

Got this one from the comments over at Stoaty’s, via Ace.

This is what a Scottish sports commentator does on his day off. He’s got several of these vids.

Posted by Drew458     on 05/20/2020 at 08:57 AM   
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   Monday - February 03, 2020

Chinese Herpes Monkeys In Florida

Oh great, another invasive introduced species of Asian disease carrier. Where else? You knew it had to be Florida.

There’s a new resident in the Julington Creek neighborhood Jacksonville. Also in St. Johns, St. Augustine, Palatka, Welaka and Elkton.

In all, a dozen confirmed sightings of a feral, invasive monkey species: the rhesus macaque.

Videos and photographs – grainy and shaky, shot by homeowners – track the trail of a species expansion that experts call concerning and possibly dangerous.

“The potential ramifications are really dire,” University of Florida wildlife ecologist Dr. Steve Johnson told First Coat News. “A big male like the one in that video in Jacksonville—that’s an extremely strong, potentially dangerous animal.”

First Coast News obtained two videos and several photographs taken of the monkeys. Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) officials call the reports credible, a likely expansion of the feral monkey population in Central Florida.

Rheseus macaques were first introduced to Silver Springs State Park in the late 1930s when a tour boat operator named Colonel Tooey released six of them on a manmade island as a tourist attraction. He released another six a decade later.

“Guess what?” laughs Johnson. “They can swim. They left the island.”

The monkeys have lived in the state park ever since – alternately mesmerizing and terrifying parkgoers. They’ve also ranged well beyond the park boundaries, with sightings far as Tampa and Apopka.

But this is the first time the monkeys have been reported on the First Coast.

Julington Creek resident Carrie Bennett is admittedly wary of the primates. “That is definitely a concern because I walk the dogs at like 5:30 in the morning and its pitch blackout,” she said. “If they bit me, if they came after and bit you, you don’t know what they have, what they’re carrying.”

In fact, the monkeys carry—and shed—the Herpes B virus, which can be fatal to humans. It’s what Johnson calls a “low risk, high consequence” possibility. The animals are also physically imposing with “strong arms, a very strong bite [and] large canine teeth.”

In the mid-1980s the population spiked to almost 400. Between 1984 and 2010, around 1,000 were trapped and killed in an attempt to control the population.

In the 1970s, a laboratory animal supply company introduced rhesus macaques to the Florida Keys, but they were removed between 1990 and 2000 after they ruined red mangroves, causing a loss of vegetation and eroded the shoreline.

Now, the animals, which can live for over three decades in the wild in groups of between 10 to 80 monkeys, have been spotted in the Julington Creek, St. Johns, St. Augustine, Palatka, Welaka and Elkton areas of northeast Florida, according to First Coast News.

Dr. Steve Johnson, an expert in primates at the University of Florida, told First Coast News, “The potential ramifications are really dire.”

I’d say, hunt them to extinction. At around 15-17lb full grown, they’re the perfect size game for a .22LR. Since they probably travel in packs, you’ll want a repeater with a large magazine and several buddies hunting with you.

OTOH, they could try trapping them and using them as python bait.

Posted by Drew458     on 02/03/2020 at 03:13 PM   
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   Tuesday - January 28, 2020

Nobody noticed the smell?

30 years of turtle poop in the house and nobody noticed the smell. Nor did anybody clean the place up at all in all that time? Seriously???

I Guess I’m Not Such A Bad Housekeeper After All

A family in Realengo, Brazil, found their long lost pet tortoise after they decided to finally clean out the house. Back in 1982, the Almeida Family was saddened to learn that their red-footed tortoise, Manuela, had gone missing.

Their house was being renovated at the time, so the family assumed that the tortoise had slipped out through a door left open by the construction crew—disappearing into the forest near their home.

But they couldn’t have been more wrong. The true fate of their lost pet remained a mystery for the next 30 years, until the father passed away and the Almeida children returned to help clean out his cluttered storage room.

It turns out, the father was somewhat of a hoarder, so the room was jam-packed with things.

While cleaning out the house, a neighbor asked son Leandro if he was intending to get rid of the tortoise, too.

“I put the trash bag on the floor and the neighbor just warned me ‘are you going to throw the turtle away too?’ At that moment, I went white and didn’t believe it,” Leandro told Globo TV.

That’s when the Almeidas learned that Manuela had managed to survive for three decades on her own.

The family suspects she survived on termites which, thanks to all that unwanted furniture, were likely in abundance.

Aye Yai Yaaiii, we found Mr. Turtle!! He was in the living room this whole time, since we were little kids!!!

Are termites juicy? Don’t turtles need a drink of water now and again?

PS - Think this one through a bit. Since the turtle was there the whole time, the implication is that as soon as the renovation was complete the house was hoardered up with junk immediately. Otherwise, wouldn’t the turtle be noticed in the nice new rooms?

Posted by Drew458     on 01/28/2020 at 08:20 AM   
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   Thursday - January 23, 2020

Doing The Dad Job

Coyote Attacks Child: Hero Dad Strangles Coyote

Ok, this first part needs a bit of work with the grammar, but ...

A man choked a coyote to death Monday in New Hampshire after the animal attacked his child, bit a woman walking her dog and charged a vehicle, authorities said.

The state Fish and Game Department was testing the animal’s body for rabies, according to police in Kensington, about 25 miles east of Manchester.

Pretty sure Dad didn’t choke the ‘yote then bite a woman and then charge a vehicle. Whatever.

The series of attacks began after a witness reported seeing a coyote attack a car just before 9 a.m. Monday in the nearby town of Hampton Falls.

“The car was trying to get the coyote to move out of the road, and the coyote started attacking the car,” Kensington Police Chief Scott Cain told NBC Boston.

At 9 a.m., Kensington police got another call about the coyote. This time, the animal was said to have opened a woman’s sliding glass door and gotten inside her enclosed porch. There, it lunged at her and her dogs.

...

Two hours later, authorities in Exeter, another nearby town, got a call that the coyote had charged a family walking on a trail.

“The coyote attacked a young child, and the child’s dad went into protection mode and suffocated the coyote until it succumbed,” police said.

“protection mode”?? Horry clap, how low writing has become. How about “the father risked his own life to stop the attack, fighting the probably rabid vicious animal with his bare hands and choking it until it was dead”?

Dad here is a hero. That’s his job.

Posted by Drew458     on 01/23/2020 at 11:04 AM   
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   Saturday - August 20, 2016

under the knife

That does it. The cat is going to get fixed. I can not take it any more.

Dizzy the cat, the mostly blind one, is in heat. Again. Every 4 god damn weeks, I swear. And she’s a very talkative cat to begin with. Which means now I’ve got Opera Cat, doing her full-throated arias all over the house. All day, all night. For days.

Would. You. Please. Shut. The. Flying. Fuck. Up!!!

It doesn’t matter how much she gets petted, or rubbed, or brushed, or played with, or snuggled, or fed. Or anything. A minute later and she’s at it again. 3 in the morning and she jumps up on the bed and starts howling.

Lucky for her she really isn’t trying to get out of the house. Because I might just be too tempted to let her. But more kittens is the last thing we need around here.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/20/2016 at 06:09 AM   
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   Wednesday - August 10, 2016

earzz!!

Squeeee!!!

It’s a bobby bagle! I mean, a babby bugle! I mean, a beggy babble! I mean, a baby beagle!

Posted by Drew458     on 08/10/2016 at 05:42 AM   
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   Tuesday - August 09, 2016

hat day

Rhinoplasty? It almost looks like she’s wearing a tiny little nose ring in the corner of each nostril.

Sorry, not paying too much attention. Dizzy the cat had a big seizure today, her first one in 4 months. Entirely our fault, because we ( I ) have been a bit lax on her meds, “weaning” her down from a solid 2 pills per day to 1 1/2 to 1, and lately it’s only been 1/2. I have to get it back up to 1 1/2, and it has to be regimented, not random. So she pitched a fit behind the couch, shit in the corner, but only scratched me a little when I caught her and held her close until the episode passed. Then I made sure to get 2 halves of pill down her.  Ok, from now on: 9am, 5pm, 10pm, 1/2 a pill each time.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/09/2016 at 11:06 AM   
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   Monday - August 08, 2016

alternate name

We have the most adorable little cat. She’s the one with the permanent upper respiratory condition, always snuffing her nose and making glack noises in her throat, so we call her Sniffles. Not the cutest name, but an accurate one. I wanted to call her Amanda, a name I always thought was pretty. Or at least one I secretly associate with the little girl at the far end of the street I grew up on, who grew up to be strikingly curvy and good looking.

But I’ve come to realize that Amanda wouldn’t be right either. Ammonia would be better. OMG. OMFG. Time to change the litterbox.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/08/2016 at 02:33 PM   
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   Wednesday - August 03, 2016

bears repeating

A bear attacked and injured a Pohatcong Township man before running off into the woods Wednesday morning on the man’s property off Route 627, the township’s mayor said.

The black bear, estimated to be between 450 to 500 pounds, ran over to the 57-year-old man about 9:30 a.m. and began swatting at the man, Mayor James Kern III said. The man was outside trying to feed his animals in the 300 block of Route 627, Kern said.

The mayor said he didn’t know what kind of animals the man owned, but indicated they were his pets, not farm animals. Pohatcong Township police said the man was feeding a cat.

“The victim said the bear was startled and reacted by swiping his paw at the victim,” police posted on the department’s Facebook page.

The man suffered cuts in the attack to his arms and hands and was taken to St. Luke’s Hospital in Phillipsburg, but injuries did not appear to be life threatening, Kern said.

Pohatcong Township is only a few miles away, just the other side of Jugtown Mountain.

Pohatcong Township on Wednesday afternoon posted an update on its Facebook page indicating the reported attack is yet to be confirmed. The update, which went live shortly after 2 p.m., came about four hours after the department and township mayor initially warned residents about the reported attack.

Guess they have their doubts. That’s understandable; my bet is that if a 500lb bear takes a swipe at you, you lose an arm or a leg, not get minor scratches.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/03/2016 at 04:40 PM   
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   Sunday - July 24, 2016

bad kitteh

We’re following UK policy of not showing the faces or giving the names of the alleged perpetrators.

This was a brand new roll of paper towels. And then someone decided that it needed killing. Severe killing, extra dead.

Posted by Drew458     on 07/24/2016 at 12:29 PM   
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   Friday - June 17, 2016

ginger overload

I had 6 gingers outside this morning making a ruckus. 6! And grumpy old Momcat, aka Scowler. Click any 4 big.

  

Posted by Drew458     on 06/17/2016 at 09:52 AM   
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   Friday - June 10, 2016

Dying To Be A Ginger Is For The Birds

A seagull turned bright orange after he plunged into a vat of chicken tikka masala.

The bird fell in to a container of the food while trying to scavenge a piece of meat from a food factory bin on Monday.

He was rescued by workers at the site, in Wales, and picked up by a volunteer for Vale Wildlife Hospital near Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire.

Staff at the centre used washing up liquid on the seagull to remove the bright orange from his feathers.

They managed to return him back to his original white colour but have not been able to wash away the smell of curry.

Lucy Kells, veterinary nurse at the hospital, said: “He really surprised everyone here - we had never seen anything like it before.

“He had fallen into a waste vat of curry that was outside, it was chicken tikka masala.

”The thing that shocked us the most was the smell. He smelled amazing, he really smelled good.”

h/t to my brudda

Posted by Drew458     on 06/10/2016 at 11:00 AM   
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