tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-82098432024-03-14T00:11:31.664-07:00Hoof & PawUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger503125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-56745925052200893892020-08-24T09:58:00.009-07:002020-08-24T15:35:20.107-07:00How this middle-class millennial managed to buy a house<div class="separator" style="text-align: center;"><a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/50262588863/in/dateposted/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="House Circa 1910"><img alt="House Circa 1910" height="300" src="https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/50262588863_b43999c163_w.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script><p><br /></p><p>Most of my generation can't afford to buy a house. This is a fact and a meme, and some days I actually feel guilt for being an outlier. The least I can do is push back against the persistent, mostly older-generation-based idea that we're lazy and irresponsible or whatever.</p><p>Tl;dr: it was only possible because of a streak of good luck.</p><p>A large part of that luck was simply being on the older side of my cohort. I and my husband were born in 1984, so we managed to get ahead of a lot of the worst of the recession by a couple years, and then take advantage of low interest rates at just the right time.</p><p>But my luck goes much deeper than that. It's generationally built, and to have an understanding of how I came to own a house before I turned thirty, you have to go back at least a century.</p><p>I'm white, and my family has a history of being homeowners, both factors that statistically make my home ownership more likely. My working-class family immigrated here in the early 1900's, moved to the west coast (dad's side to the city, mom's side to the country) and immediately bought their own houses. They then, despite being working or middle class, had some extra wealth to help their children do things like also buy their own houses and go to college. </p><p>My parents were solidly middle class. They both worked full time to afford the small suburban house they purchased in the mid 70's, but even then, they needed some help from family members for the down payment. Which they got! Because we had a little bit of generational wealth to share around.</p><p>Having stable housing, plus raises they both got from their jobs--helped by the post-high school education their generational wealth helped them obtain-- plus finding a very affordable daycare provider --something that's rare and precious, and had retired when I was a teen, the first of many windows I slipped through before they closed-- meant they could afford to upgrade a few years later to a small rural property, which they live in to this day.</p><p>My husband's family was not quite as a privileged, but they are also white also had a history of generational property ownership.</p><p>Another big piece of luck was the unique college scholarship I received -- Being able to afford that rural property meant that I went to a specific small high school that paid many of its graduates a full-tuition scholarship to the local state university. It's worth noting that this small town had a very limited rental housing situation--meaning if someone had to move, they would likely have to move out of district--so that most of the kids who qualified for this scholarship came from home-owning families (it required a student to be in the district for, IIRC, 8 years at the time).</p><p>I once again came along at just the last possible second to really take advantage of it; After my year, the scholarship requirements became much more restrictive and limited. Had I been just a few years younger, I would not have qualified, and I'd probably still be in student debt to this day. </p><p>My extended family (using that generational wealth again) had been sending checks and bonds to us kids since we were small, so I had a small but significant savings account to dip into by the time I was eighteen, and my parents both had enough wealth to help with college expenses that weren't covered by the scholarship. Between that and my summer job, I graduated four-year university with that magical, nearly unattainable number of ZERO. Zero money in my bank account, but also zero debt. Nearly unheard of for my cohort.</p><p>Even my housing situation was lucky and set me up for success later: having stable housing my entire childhood meant I had grown up as part of a community -- I have friends and contacts all over the local area. I ended up becoming roommates with a couple of people I'd known since elementary school. Trusted and reliable roommates are worth their weight in gold, and what's more their family contacts let rent a house together for very cheap, which meant I could earn enough with my summer job to pay for rent the rest of the year, and therefore focus on study instead of working as well. Just a few years after we moved out, the landlord decided not to rent it anymore, and all over that university town, rents have skyrocketed in the last decade. </p><p>When people say that eviction is traumatic, this is part of what that means. Community members help each other in ways that are numerous, and difficult to quantify. Eviction and unstable housing destroys communities. </p><p>Anyway, back to me: I got a job with salary* and benefits right after graduation. Barely. I applied to about a dozen places, and it was the only one that called me for an interview. Most wanted the now-normal "experience in the field" or a master's or were seasonal-only and unstable. I almost passed by the booth at the job fair, assuming I wasn't qualified, but luckily, the woman who was working the booth that day was the extremely nice manager at the time. She actively encouraged me to apply. If she hadn't gone out of her way, I wouldn't have. Less than two years later, that organization changed its policies; no longer allowing not-yet-graduated to apply, and actively discouraging those with "only" a bachelors. I squeaked through yet another window that closed behind me.</p><p>Me having a salary with benefits meant that my boyfriend (and soon to be husband) could quit his dead-end job and start going to school full time, which meant after a while he could get a particular (paid!?) internship, which lead to a new job, a few years later that paid so well we moved across the state to take advantage of it.</p><p>With the help from his family for part of a down payment, and the fact that the rural area we moved to had some of the lowest land prices in the state, we bought our first house for $110k. A few years later, we would sell it for much more. Yet again, we made it just in time; We could not have afforded our house had we arrived a few years later.</p><p>But because we could, we could buy another house... barely. My husband's next job was in Portland, and housing prices were very high. It took nine months of searching to find one that fit our needs and was within a reasonable commute (two hours is reasonable, right?). And that only worked because we were able to tap into our family and friend network once again, me, my kid and dog living with my parents, while my husband lived with his friend in Portland during the week, rent -free Without that help, if we'd had to rent during that time, we would have burned through savings instead of being able to save for a down payment. We had a small child at the time, and I couldn't work because, again, affordable daycare is hard to find, and my wage wouldn't have been able to cover it or justify it. We'd be renting to this day.</p><p>The impact of childcare on society cannot be overstated. When we lived in a more rural part of the state, home ownership was more common for younger and blue collar people - part of this can be attributed to lower cost of land, but another thing I noticed is that people from there tend to stay there, near family, and therefore have free daycare. The boost this gives to people literally makes the difference between home ownership and renting. </p><p>But we finally found a house and bought it. The one we live in now. It's in a nice neighborhood with friendly neighbors, decent schools and walkable to some businesses. It's three bedroom, 1.5 bath, and has a backyard for my garden and the dog. It's not extravagant, and it's old and needs a lot of work, but we did it. We're livin' the American dream. Barely; Just one year after purchase, our house had increased in value so much we never could have afforded it had we tried to move later than we did. Yet another window closed behind us.</p><p><br /></p><p>------------</p><p>*Funny story, just a couple months ago I was reminiscing with my husband about my first "grown up job", and how it had "paid so well", and I was like, "I don't remember exactly, what was my salary back then, like $50k? (a number that had been rattling around in my head because it's roughly the median income of the county I now live in)" He laughed, and was like, "um, it was barely $28k. It just felt like a lot because of how poor we were."</p><p><br /></p><p>------------</p><p>Some sources:</p><p><a href="https://www.epi.org/blog/the-great-recession-education-race-and-homeownership/" target="_blank">The Great Recession, education, race, and home ownership</a></p><p><a href="https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/essay/millennial-life-how-young-adulthood-today-compares-with-prior-generations/">Pew Research: How young adulthood today compares with prior generations</a></p><p><a href="https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/early-childhood/reports/2019/03/28/467488/child-care-crisis-keeping-women-workforce/" target="_blank">The Childcare Crisis</a></p><p><br /></p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-2096192064262303862020-06-28T12:31:00.000-07:002020-06-28T12:31:43.734-07:00Thoughts on "condo collies" and other "apartment-inappropriate" petsFor a couple of years, I had two border collies, one of which was bred to be a cow dog. My partner and I both worked full time jobs and usually weren't able to come home at lunch, and for a while we lived in a two bedroom, second story apartment. Sounds like the worst situation for border collies, right?<br />
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Here's all it took to keep my condo collies satisfied: twenty minutes of fetch in the yard/field in the morning before work. Filled kongs for while we were gone. They had run of the house and, after we moved, a doggy door to the fenced yard for the nine hours they were alone. More fetch or an off leash walk in the evening when we came home. A few minutes of trick-training for their dinner, then hanging out with the family as we went about our evening housework, dinner prep, and relaxing.<br />
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They both slept quietly in their crates next to the bed every night, and rarely made a peep until we got up the next morning. They didn't destroy anything, they didn't bark or develop obsessive habits. Every indication was that they were content and happy to be part of our lives.<br />
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When I got pregnant, the routine started slipping. For three months I was nauseous from noon until bedtime, and the only relief seemed to be to sit or lie down, so the evening walk was the first to go.<br />
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Soon, the only evening exercise they were getting was a few minutes of fetch in the yard. By the second trimester, I was more tired in the mornings and was sleeping through my alarm more often, so soon they weren't getting morning exercise every day either. I started getting lazy about filling their kongs every day. I started feeling exhausted in the evenings after work. All I wanted was to lay on the couch until bedtime.<br />
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By the middle of the second trimester, the poor dogs were rarely getting any exercise during the week at all, and only one good long off-leash walk on the weekends. It's no coincidence that they both started counter surfing during this period. Some dishes were broken. We learned to puppy-proof in the mornings, so it still wasn't a huge issue.<br />
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We made it through pregnancy and the newborn stage with both dogs still happy in their living situation. A couple years later, we thought that it still wasn't fair to the farm-bred one to be cooped up so much, so we re-homed her to a sheep farm. Ironically, she turned out to be bad at herding, as well, so she continues as a house pet to this day.<br />
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I'm not saying that a working-bred dog is for everyone. But so often we find ourselves judging pet owners for the type of animal they've chosen. I certainly have in the past, but, especially in the year 2020, we could all learn to let go of that knee-jerk reaction to assume the worst about strangers we know nothing about.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-83821319953939445932020-06-28T12:06:00.002-07:002020-06-28T12:06:43.670-07:00Thing's I've learned on the jobThings I've learned from working at a vet clinic and animal shelters:<br />
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-You can't fix everything all at once<br />
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-There is no such thing as a "perfect" pet home<br />
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-You never know the whole story<br />
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-A person's bank account is not an indicator of how good of a pet owner they will be<br />
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-There is no such thing as a completely healthy bulldog<br />
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-People will lie to you. (It doesn't automatically make them bad people)<br />
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-People will make mistakes. (It doesn't automatically mean they shouldn't own pets)<br />
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-People really can learn from their mistakes if given the opportunity<br />
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-Many more people than you would think are able to successfully keep multiple, large dogs without a fenced yard<br />
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-People get way more defensive about their dog having fleas than almost any other aliment<br />
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-DVM's can succumb to observational bias just like anyone<br />
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-Landlords will always complain about their tenants no matter what<br />
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-I really need to take a refresher course in conversational Spanish<br />
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-You may not understand why someone feels the need to spend a couple thousand bucks to import a rare breed of dog from Eastern Europe just because they read online that the breed would "make a good jogging partner", but it really doesn't matter what you think. Not everyone needs a lecture on their decisions<br />
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-"Pit bulls" really, truly, are a popular type of pet<br />
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-There is a definite correlation between a dog's status as "outdoor only" and how likely they are to be leash trained<br />
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-There are a lot more people than you'd guess that have "outdoor only" dogs that are loved and receive regular vet care<br />
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-People in the thick of animal rescue do not give enough credit to members of the community who help animals in small ways<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-15269717778883265802019-07-06T14:02:00.000-07:002019-07-06T14:02:43.215-07:00Domestication Stories: The Death and New Life of the GuardianThe bear came in the dead of night, when the fire was low and everyone was asleep except one watchman. Later, his father told him the bear had been very thin, and had come out of hibernation too early. Drawn to their temporary camp by the smell of the fresh horse meat hung in strips from the drying rack.<br />
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All the boy knew is that he woke to a frightening weight crashing down on him and a roar so loud and close it seemed to shake the whole earth. For three terrifying heartbeats, he couldn't move or breath, or see. Then, just as suddenly, the crushing weight lifted, and he jumped to his feet, throwing off the blanket fur and looking around wildly. He froze. The weight that had pinned him to the ground a moment ago was a bear, and now its huge, humped back was now less than two arm lengths away.<br />
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Time seemed to slow. He was vaguely aware of the others around him, rising from their blankets and groping for weapons, and of the odd, jerky motions of the bear as it bit and clawed at a spear that protruded from its shoulder. He took one step backward, then another, and that's when the bear paused and turned its eyes to him.<br />
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There was nothing between it and the boy. He heard his father shout something, but it was too late, the bear, full of hunger and frustration and pain, swung his body around and took a single step toward him, lowering its head. There was no time to run, or to grope for his spear. The bear would maul him to death in seconds, before his father or the other hunters would have time to attack.<br />
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But then, a dark furry shape hurtled out of the darkness and rammed into the bear. A wolf, from the Pack-that-Follows. It clung to the bear's neck ruff and shook and scrabbled and snarled. The bear roared again and swiped frantically at the wolf with both arms. Attention diverted, the boy wasted no time and threw himself backwards into the bushes, out of the way.<br />
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He looked up in time to see the bear throw the wolf to the ground, but it had given the hunters time to grab their weapons and now they closed in on the bear from all sides. The fight was over in moments, spears and finally a stone club finished off the bear. and it lay limp right next to the fire. There was a round of shaky, tired cheers and then several family members set to work immediately to skin and butcher the bear. It would be bad luck to try to sleep with it lying there in the middle of camp.<br />
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But the boy had eyes only for the still form of the wolf. He crawled over on hands and knees and touched the wolf with a shaking hand. It didn't respond, the muscles slack in that familiar way of of an animal newly-dead. He carefully turned the head toward the fire light, and it was as he feared: The wolf's face had a striking dark stripe from forehead to nose tip. His favorite wolf from the Pack-That-Follows, one of the handful who had a name.<br />
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Uncle came up and laid a comforting hand on his shoulder as he began to weep. He stroked the wolf's fur for the first, and last time. Even the friendliest wolves like this one, the ones who would venture close to the fire for dinner scraps, wouldn't allow a person to touch them. So incredibly soft and thick. For a moment, the boy wondered what it would be like to have a wolf sleep next to you at night. How safe and warm you would feel.<br />
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"Stripey was so brave," he said. "He saved my life."<br />
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"Yes," Uncle replied. "He was Her gift to us, we must be thankful for the time he was with us."<br />
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The boy looked over his shoulder at the activity around the bear's carcass, then into the brush where the rest of Stripey's pack would be. He couldn't see or hear them, but they were probably watching, as they always did.<br />
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"We should give the Pack some of the meat," he said. Uncle nodded.<br />
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"I'm sure your father will agree."<br />
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"What will we do with Stripey's body?" It seemed to wrong to butcher it, even for the luxurious fur. This was not just any wolf.<br />
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Uncle seemed to understand. He went around to the rest of the family and told them to leave Stripey where he lay. None argued. In the morning, he and the boy wrapped an old blanket hide around Stripey's body.<br />
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"Come," he said to the boy, and picked up the wolf and walked out into the brush.<br />
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They walked for some time, pausing now and then to collect branches. By the time they reached an appropriate place - a low spot between hills, where stones peeked out of the earth to show it was a favored place of the Stone Mother - he was carrying an armload of branches so large he could barely see over it.<br />
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Uncle chose a place with a natural depression in the earth, next to a large boulder, and placed Stripey's body into it. He took out his knife and gently removed Stripey's head and set it aside. The rest of the body he re-wrapped in the blanket and together they covered it in all the branches and twigs they'd collected.<br />
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"How will he hunt without his head?" The boy asked, his tears returning. Uncle put an arm around his shoulders.<br />
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"He has a different job now."<br />
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A week later, when the hunting party returned to the Winter Caves with their bounty of food to share, Uncle also helped the boy clean up Stripey's skull and choose a place for him near the doorway to his family's dwelling. The boy had never paid much attention to the Guardian bones that others had placed in different parts of the cave. They were just part of his landscape. Now he realized that each one was significant. He made sure to listen more carefully when stories were told, and to tell Stripey's as well, and he also made sure to bring extra scraps to the Pack-That-Follows. As long as he lived, he would make sure no one forgot the bravery of this Guardian.<br />
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Notes:<br />
<i>125,000 years ago, a family of Neanderthals in what is now called England placed wolf skulls at the entrances to their dwellings. It was around the same time that an important genetic divergence event took place among wolves in Eurasia, (according to mDNA, anyway) possibly showing the beginning of the separation between wolves and wolves who would later become dogs. We don't know much else about that period of time. We don't know Neanderthal's relationship with wolves, or their rituals or spirituality, but placing their skulls near doorways implies a spiritual connection. I think it's possible those skulls could have been from camp-following wolves. Wolves who are physically identical to, but were just a little different, from other wolves. Just a little more likely to hang out close to people, and for people to start to</i><i> recognize individuals and form favorites and attachments to them, even if these wolves weren't yet very "tame".</i>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-63897175401173180832019-02-07T14:01:00.000-08:002019-02-07T14:01:43.789-08:00My wine jug terrarium after 5 1/2 yearsOn September 24 2013, I tossed a pothos cutting and a chunk of lichen into a wine jug with some dirt:<br />
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February 7th, 2019:<br />
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It went through a rough period in 2014, when my toddler knocked it over and pushed a ball point pen in there (which remains to this day), but it persevered.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-55293232977668243412019-02-07T11:44:00.000-08:002019-02-07T11:44:33.909-08:00Old Homesteads in Western OregonI grew up hiking and hunting in private timberlands in and around the coast range of Western Oregon. I've lost track of the number of homestead sites I've run across in the middle of the woods, in unlikely places. My dad worked for timber companies, and would show me different sites. Often the only way to mark them is the ancient apple or pear trees who remain, clinging to life as the forest grows up around them and shades them out. Or sometimes, an oddly-placed clump of domestic iris or lily that has no business in a wild Pacific forest.<br />
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Most of these sites I'm talking about sprung up in the last wave of land-grabber/white homesteaders in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of them lasted, at most, a couple decades before the occupants realized how hard it was to grow crops on a PNW hillside with thin, clay soil best suited for sword fern and douglas fir. Most of them were abandoned and the land absorbed by large timber companies who let the trees regenerate and the buildings quietly rot away. Or, like in the case of my childhood house, the majority of the homestead land is absorbed, while the house, outbuildings and useless-for-logging-purposes flat ground near the creek was sold as a residence.<br />
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In some cases, families clung to homestead lands for as long as they could, slowly selling land to the timber companies when they needed money. As the original houses rotted, they built new houses closer to the public roads and highways, often delegating the original home sites as garbage dumps (because even to this day in rural communities, it's much cheaper than a long trip to the landfill). </div>
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So, if you're stomping around inside a tree farm and come across a spindly pear tree growing on a bench far from any road, or an old plow, or truck chassis, rusty artifacts like old water heaters or oil cans, someone once had a house there, and a few chickens, pigs, and maybe cows.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-17210359009804002042018-12-07T11:45:00.000-08:002018-12-07T11:45:07.873-08:00Domestication Stories #2: What it Means to be Alone<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Content warning: some violence and gore</span></div>
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Flatnose was going to die. He knew it would happen soon, and he knew he deserved it. He'd accidentally killed his own brother during a squabble. His own father had been the one to begin the banishing-chant, and he hadn't fought it, simply walked out of camp with the clothes he was wearing and a single spear in his hands.<br />
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That was over a season ago, and he wasn't quite ready to lay down and let the cold take him. But it might be out of his hands now that winter was fully upon the land. He'd never been great at plant identification, or at trap-making - those had been skills that other family members had excelled at so that he didn't need to. He hadn't eaten anything but bark and lichen for many days, and his last protein had been a handful of moth larvae barely worth the calories expended to dig them out of the rotting stump. This hunt might be his last chance.<br />
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So here he was: on his belly on the frozen ground, crawling toward a small group of deer bedded down in some shrubs. He'd been stalking them for hours, and was almost close enough to strike. It was a desperate way to hunt large animals. The best way was to steer a herd into a ravine or bog where they couldn't escape or fight well, but that method required familiar lands, and a family working together. Nearly impossible for a lone man.<br />
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Suddenly, he heard something approaching from the hill behind him and to the east, crashing through the brush, making no effort to be stealthy. Flatnose lifted his head and watched in silent despair as the deer sprang from their beds. A pack of wolves ran past him and charged after them. In the span of a few breaths both wolves and deer had run over the next hill and out of sight.<br />
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He lay for awhile, listening to the wind and fighting the urge to lay his head on the ground. Wolves were often messengers of the Stone Mother, She may have sent them to tell him it was time to stop hunting and give up. One could never fully know the minds of the Gods, though, and there was one, small hope: if the wolves made a kill, he might be able to scavenge from it.<br />
<br />
It took several tries to rise to his feet, he was that weak. He backtracked his own trail to where he'd stashed the small bundle of belongings he'd managed to make and collect since his banishment, and started to follow the wolves' tracks. It was easy tracking when the trail was this fresh: perfect little paw marks melted in the top layer of frost.<br />
<br />
Within a couple hours, he saw birds circling up ahead. The wolves must have made a kill. Would it do him any good, though? Alone, he didn't have a chance of scaring them off, but it was possible that once they'd filled their bellies they would leave - the pack had looked strong and healthy, they may not feel the need to guard the carcass. If he could beat the bears, lions, hyenas, eagles and birds to it, anyway. He crested a ridge and there, at the bottom of the slope, were the wolves. The pack had indeed managed to take down one of the deer, an adult, and were were eating voraciously, the way wolves do, as if it were their last meal. Flatnose's mouth watered at the sight of all that food, so close, and yet untouchable.<br />
<br />
He made a fire while he waited. The wolves didn't even seem to care, another jarring sign of his loneliness. A group of humans would have caused a pack of wolves to stop everything to watch them, or maybe even preemptively attack. A lone human held little threat. As long as he kept his distance, they ignored him.<br />
<br />
Flatnose huddled by the fire, and concentrated simply to stay awake. He was running out of time. The sun was sinking, and he wasn't sure he could survive another winter night without either calories, or proper shelter. The wolves had slowed down, the two larger ones had finished, and he had some hope he'd be able to try his hand at stealing some meat soon. Just as he thought this, he caught sight of movement out in the distance. A large, dark shadow, coming down from another hill. A lion.<br />
<br />
The wolves noticed at about the same time, and turned in unison, hackles and tails raised. Six wolves could take a single lion, but they might not want to risk defending food from such a dangerous foe when they had full bellies. If the lion took possession of the meat, Flatnose chances of getting any disappeared. A lean, lonely lion was much more likely than a fat and healthy wolf pack to guard the carcass or drag the entire remains to a lair and guard it until it was completely eaten.<br />
<br />
This, then, must be Her test. He had to do something before the wolves decided to leave. He took a deep breath and threw off his hood and gloves. He broke off the biggest branch of heather he could find, and lit it in the fire. And then, with his only spear in one hand, makeshift torch in the other, he ran down the hill.<br />
<br />
He kept wide and far away from the deer carcass, circling to get the lion between him and the pack. It would divide the lion's attention. Some of the wolves looked his way, but the lion was still their priority for the moment. They snarled and danced outside the range of its claws, making feint attacks as the lion was snarled back and swiped at them with deadly claws, slinking closer to the deer. Neither predator wanted to engage quite yet, and there was a temporary standoff. Now or never.<br />
<br />
Flatnose only had one spear. He had to aim for a spot that was impossible to miss, that wouldn't simply glance off bone. As he got close to the lion, it stopped and turned toward him, ears pinned and teeth bared. Before it could attack, he threw the torch in its face. It flinched and swatted at the fire. In the one heartbeat that the lion was distracted, Flatnose leapt forward and thrust his spear into the lion's belly. It screamed and spun around, yanking the spear from his hands as the cat swiped wildly at him. He fell backwards, rolling out of reach, but bruising his ribs and elbow in the process.<br />
<br />
It was a huge risk, spearing it in the gut. It could make it even stronger and angry, and now it might target him instead of the wolves. He scrambled to his feet as quickly as possible, backing away, but the lion wasn't coming after him yet; it was pawing and chewing at the spear stuck in its body, glancing back and forth between the wolves and Flatnose. In pain, surrounded by threats, it couldn't decide what to do. For a moment, Flatnose felt great sympathy for the lion. It was a gaunt young male, hungry and alone, just like Flatnose. It didn't realize that its life was already over, one way or another.<br />
<br />
Mercifully, it didn't need to die the agonizing, drawn-out death of a gut wound, for at that moment, the wolves decided to attack after all. Flatnose stumbled away from the furious swirl of animals as quickly as his weak limbs would carry him. Back to the relative safety of his fire. He was dizzy with exhaustion and relief: he'd attacked a lion, by himself, and survived mostly unhurt.<br />
<br />
He couldn't see the battle, obscured by brush and gathering darkness, but he could hear it just fine, and could tell it was not going well for the poor lion. Shortly, everything went quiet and the wolves came trotting back into view. Several were limping, but none seemed seriously hurt. He could swear they seemed smug. They settled in near the deer carcass, laying down to lick at wounds or curl up to sleep. They weren't leaving the area anytime soon. Flatnose wouldn't be eating any venison tonight, but he didn't need it now. He had roast lion in his future.<br />
<br />
He made a new pair of torches and took them back down the hill, once again keeping well clear of the wolves and their food. They watched him, but none made a move toward him. Whether it was their exhaustion, full bellies, or that they still didn't see him as a threat, or maybe even that they saw him as an ally who helped them with a common enemy, or simply the grace of the Stone Mother, tonight they would tolerate him. Now that they weren't competition for a meal, he actually hoped they would stay for awhil<span style="background-color: white;">e. After being alone so many months, it was comforting, having other creatures nearby that were neither food nor enemy.</span><br />
<br />
The lion's body was resting just a few lengths from the deer, in a small hollow. Flatnose used the torch to make two new, bigger fires, one on each side of the lion. It might be enough to keep away other scavengers that came in the night. It was all he had the energy for, but he was optimistic. For the first time in awhile, he had some plans to make for the future: Tonight, he would eat until his belly was swollen and painful. Then he would sleep. Then he would get up and eat some more. He would keep the fires going; he would build a shelter; he would find some water to drink; he should try to tan the lion skin, it would be a welcome addition to his pathetic bedroll of stitched-together small animal hides, or maybe he would try to make a water-tight cooking bag so he could make stew, which was a less-wasteful way to cook than roasting. His only spear was shattered, and he was banished from all the sacred yew groves, but perhaps the Stone Mother would see fit to show him the way to a different grove of trees so he could make more. She seemed to think he should live for tonight, maybe he would live through the winter after all.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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~~*~~</div>
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<br />
Notes:<br />
While I was in the middle of writing this story, an extremely pertinent interview was published in Psychology Today: '<a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/animal-emotions/201811/dumping-the-dog-domestication-dump-theory-once-and-all?fbclid=IwAR3GjW-sTKbqP75R9exI_t7FWQVbHBub4LrLtUjQvCiSClJtYFSpDLZmvTY" target="_blank">Dumping the Dog Domestication Dump Theory Once and for All</a>' I highly recommend reading it.<br />
<br />
'<i>What it means to be alone</i>' takes place 150,000 years ago. Not much has changed since the time of <a href="https://hoof-and-paw.blogspot.com/2018/10/domestication-stories-talking-to-animals.html" target="_blank">SmallWatcher</a>. Although the climate has fluctuated in that time, both people and wolves have adapted with no apparent changes to their habits or tool-uses. Flatnose's people, Neanderthals, still dominate the hunting grounds of Eurasia, living in traveling family groups and sharing the landscape with wolves and other predators. The creature we know today as the dog is still 100,000 years away from being fully created, but humans and wolves still have frequent interactions that are leading up to that final domestication.<br />
<br />
Humans and wolves share what Christoph Jung in the above interview describes as, "astonishing similarities in their social behavior, their psychology and social communication." Both are also excellent hunters. Part of being a successful hunter, especially a human with a big brain, is to put yourself inside the mind of other animals, so you can predict their moves and habits. From there, it's a short step for a social creature to sympathize and feel close kinship to other animals, especially predators that are so like himself, even when those predators are often competition for the same food.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-31506076554053028052018-11-13T15:14:00.000-08:002018-11-13T15:14:22.341-08:00Stop Being Terrible at Werewolves: A Friendly Guide for Fantasy Writers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-A8SQ1vpygHA/W-s8hzsFcuI/AAAAAAAAzac/l5Ybth0HFKoXM7lElVXWkT1gO2zIPu1zQCLcBGAs/s1600/WereWolf_Graphic_Final.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="618" data-original-width="771" height="256" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-A8SQ1vpygHA/W-s8hzsFcuI/AAAAAAAAzac/l5Ybth0HFKoXM7lElVXWkT1gO2zIPu1zQCLcBGAs/s320/WereWolf_Graphic_Final.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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The modern concept of werewolves originated some time after we stopped being hunter-gatherers - who weren't afraid<sup>[1]</sup> of wolves, and in fact made friends of them and turned them into dogs - and sometime before the Renaissance. Wolves were the last widespread, man-eating large predator in Eurasia. They could leap out of the dark woods to attack livestock and eat children and <a href="https://retrieverman.net/2010/09/25/the-wolf-of-ansbach/" target="_blank">unarmed peasants</a>. The perfect animal to hang our collective monster fears on.<br />
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This wolf, the "werewolf-wolf", is not based on real <i>Canis lupus</i>; it's simply a stand-in for all things savage and animalistic. Fantasy need not be "realistic", but a problem arises when writers create a werewolf that isn't a generic savage beast, but a detailed, fleshed-out species with its own society based on the way wolves actually operate in the wild. And it's almost always done poorly. I don't care if your lycanthropy is based on magic, Magik, viruses, or aliens; <b>If you want to base your fantasy creature on real-world animals, you need to base it on real, up-to-date science about those animals.</b><br />
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I recently had to quit an urban fantasy series<sup>[2]</sup> I liked because I just couldn't stand the werewolves any longer. The rest of the world-building was great, but bad science will get to me every time. Here's an excerpt from the first chapter of the first book in the series:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i><br />"'...eat, then come back out when you're ready.' ... He heard the command and stiffened, raising his eyes to meet mine. ... I knew better than to give orders to a werewolf - it's that whole dominance reflex thing. Werewolf instincts are inconvenient - that's why they don't tend to live long. Those same instincts are the reason their wild brothers lost to civilization, while the coyotes were thrivin<span style="background-color: white;">g<sup>[3]</sup>, </span>even in urban areas."</i></blockquote>
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Keep in mind, the werewolf character in that excerpt is young, injured, and came to this person for help. And yet even in such a state he still "instinctively" hates receiving even the mildest form of an "order", to the point that the person trying to help worries that he'll attack her because of the way she phrased a single sentence.<br />
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This lays the ground work for werewolf social interaction for the rest of the multi-book<span style="background-color: white;">, best-selling </span>series. Werewolves are obsessed with hierarchy and dominance. To the point of stupidity - they often get distracted in the middle of things they're doing, including fighting an enemy, to turn on each other and fight their own comrades and family. All of them (except for some very rare individuals) are constantly, every moment, every single interaction, battling to become the "Alpha" and control the rest of the group.<br />
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I read a fair amount of contemporary urban fantasy, and this is a very typical example of how werewolves are portrayed. And it stems from an outdated and over-rated idea of wolf psychology, which can be summed up in one word:<br />
<h3>
The "Alpha"</h3>
Please, for the love of doG, <i>stop</i> with the "alpha wolf", "pack leader", "dominance is everything" crap. That's not how real wolves (or dogs, for that matter) work. We (western science anyway) used to think that's how canines worked. But we've learned a lot in the <span style="background-color: white;">last 40 years. In fact, one of the originators of the term "alpha wolf", who is still a wildlife researcher, has since <a href="http://davemech.org/wolf-news-and-information/" target="_blank">strongly rejected it</a>, going so far as to beg publishers to stop reprinting his older work.</span><br />
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I get why fantasy authors continue to use this outdated theory of dominance as a framework for werewolf world-building. It's simple, most laypeople are familiar with the concept, and it's satisfying to the <a href="http://news.janegoodall.org/2018/07/10/top-bottom-chimpanzee-social-hierarchy-amazing/" target="_blank">chimpanzee inside </a>our brains. But it's boring, it's unscientific, and it's a sign of lazy researching.<br />
<h3 style="text-align: center;">
How To Be Better at Writing Canine-Based Fantasy Creatures </h3>
Wolf packs are families. There is a father and a mother, who mate for life, and their children. There may also be aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins in the same pack. There is no all-powerful king. The mom and dad may not even have many leadership roles. They often do, simply because they're also the oldest and most experienced in the family, but it's by no means a given. It may be other family members who decide when and where to hunt, or where to get water, or when and where to explore/check territorial marks, how harshly to discipline trespassers, etc.<br />
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The main thing the "alphas" are concerned with is that they are the only ones allowed to have babies (this isn't a strict rule either! More on that in a moment). This is for good, evolutionary reason: puppies survive better if the whole pack focuses on sustaining just one litter at a time, sharing the duties of babysitting, providing food, and teaching. Too many puppies at once, and all the puppies starve or die from accidents because there weren't enough adult eyes watching.<br />
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This "law" of no babies is loosely enforced by the mom and dad by discouraging the rest of the family from mating. The type of discouragement, and how rigidly it is enforced, will vary a lot from pack to pack and depend on how plentiful resources are. There's no need to "fight" their parents for leadership - if a son or daughter wants to have babies, they just leave and start their own pack. Even if one of them did feel the need to fight their parent, what would be their prize? Wolves mate for life, and they choose each other. If a son kills his father, there is no crown or queen to inherit, he's just as likely to be driven off by the rest of the family as he is to "win" a kingdom.<br />
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If a daughter does get pregnant while still living with her natal pack, it is usually by a rogue male (scientifically known as a "Casanova male", which is fantastic) who's been creepin' around the edges of the family's territory. Under normal circumstances, these puppies would be ignored by the rest of the pack, and die of neglect. It's possible they may be outright murdered by their own grandparents and/or the daughter may be shunned or kicked out of the pack. When resources are plentiful, however, sometimes the parents allow their daughters to have puppies, too, and the whole pack raises all of them at once.<br />
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Another "law" that is often bent and broken: territory. Wolves are often very territorial, and spend a good amount of time patrolling and marking the family's property line. Trespassing wolves may be killed on sight, but not always. Sometimes, new wolves are welcomed into the pack. Sometimes, they're allowed to visit and even mate with some of the females, but aren't really welcome to hang out very long. Sometimes, families join together into "super packs" for awhile, then go their separate ways after awhile. Some children are kicked out of the pack when they're mature; some choose to leave on their own; some choose to stay with their parents for many years; some may leave for awhile and then come back.<br />
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Like human families, each pack is different. Some will be more egalitarian, while others will indeed have authoritarian parents that are every bit the stereotypical "alpha". But they are also dynamic. If a father or mother is too much of an a-hole, members may simply leave, which would be detrimental to the "alphas" because then they have less help raising their puppies, deincentivizing extremely aggressive kin behavior. If a younger member of a family fights or kills their parent (which does happen sometimes), it's a lot less less about "fighting to be dominant" and a lot more, "jeeze, dad was such an abusive dick, it's so much better since he moved out".<br />
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Wolves can indeed be brutal, but it's not a given. Wolves are flexible, adaptable, social, and intelligent. It makes no sense for werewolves to be mindless, rigidly adhering to hierarchy, and wasting energy fighting each other. The real lives of werewolves could be just as complex, dynamic, rich, brutal, bloody, as real wolves. Let's not limit ourselves.<br />
<h3>
Some examples of good werewolf world-building</h3>
Shout out to <span style="background-color: white;"><a href="http://hemlockgrove.wikia.com/wiki/Werewolf" target="_blank">Hemlock Grove</a></span> for creative and well thought-out werewolves that have an animalistic nature and all that fun duality symbolism without the weird baggage of dominance theory.<br />
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Shout out to <a href="https://discworld.fandom.com/wiki/Undead#Werewolves" target="_blank">DiscWorld</a> for a well-formed and complex werewolf society that does not involve any "alpha dog" nonsense (that I've seen; I haven't read all the DiscWorld books). Although werewolves are quite harshly hierarchical, in typical Pratchett fashion, it's allegory about human monarchy/authoritarianism rather than anything to do with real wolf "pack dynamics". Bonus love to Pratchett for pointing out many times that wolves and dogs are not very different at all.<br />
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Shout out to <a href="http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Werewolf" target="_blank">Harry Potter</a>, in which lycanthropy is treated mostly as a disfiguring disease. There isn't so much a society of werewolves, as there is a loose association of people who come together because they're infected by the same disease, and therefore face the same discrimination from the rest of the world. Werewolves who are bad, violent, or authoritarian, would be so whether or not they were infected with lycanthropy, not because of anything to do with wolf psychology. J.K. Rowling goes out of the way to point out in the text that werewolves don't act much at all like real wolves.<br />
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~~~*~~~</div>
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<b>Footnotes</b><br />
[1] The old paradigm of early dog domestication (where cave men hated wolves and wolves were scared of cave men) is falling out of favor. The newer theory, is that wolves and early humans were hunting partners to one extent or another as far back as the Neanderthals or earlier. For more info, read the wonderful book <u><i>How the Dog Became the Dog</i></u>, by Mark Derr (or google his <a href="https://thebark.com/content/wolf-who-stayed" target="_blank">essays</a>), and the many essays on the subject <span style="background-color: white;">by <a href="https://retrieverman.net/category/dog-domestication/" target="_blank">Scottie Westfall</a>. This is also something I explore in my "<a href="https://hoof-and-paw.blogspot.com/2018/10/domestication-stories-talking-to-animals.html" target="_blank">Domestication Stories</a>" series of short stories.</span><br />
[2] Which I won't name. You can probably figure it out<br />
[3] A side note of irritation for this quote specifically: new research suggests coyotes are much closer genetically to wolves than originally thought, and may actually be a subspecies of wolf, or that wolves and coyotes make up a species complex. This makes sense, because they are identical in almost every way to wolves. The only reason they're currently thriving, and wolves aren't, is that they are smaller. They can live off smaller prey and lower quality foods like fruit and garbage that simply won't sustain the mass of a wolf, a diet that means they slip under the radar easier than an animal that requires large prey. It means that a century ago, when the government was giving out bounties on a whole list of "unwanted" animals, coyotes weren't as heavily persecuted as wolves were. Coyotes only managed to expand their range after humans systematically killed off most of the wolves in North America. Not because they're smarter or have somehow less "volatile instincts" than wolves.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-9381800625072061512018-10-30T15:23:00.001-07:002018-11-06T16:58:33.136-08:00Domestication Stories: Talking to Animals<div style="text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9s-Nx0Eq8cA/W-IRMClKzlI/AAAAAAAAzMA/w3RWbcLahTAHfd7qLmGaP5RDbLzY7svQgCLcBGAs/s1600/Zelda_Run_Forest_Graphic_Final.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="637" data-original-width="948" height="215" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-9s-Nx0Eq8cA/W-IRMClKzlI/AAAAAAAAzMA/w3RWbcLahTAHfd7qLmGaP5RDbLzY7svQgCLcBGAs/s320/Zelda_Run_Forest_Graphic_Final.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small; text-align: center;">(Content Warning: graphic description of hunting and butchering)</span><br />
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When the faint howl rose from over the ridge, SmallWatcher and the rest of the nearby Family leapt to their feet. They'd been wandering together along the bottom of a ravine not far from the den, alternating between lounging and halfheartedly digging for mice. The last big kill had been days ago, and they hadn't scented any Prey of decent size since then. They were all starting to get hungry, and the the howls were a very welcome sound. It was GreenPaw's voice. He'd found Prey.<br />
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SmallWatcher whined in delight and danced around Aunt, begging her to start the run. The oldest in the Family, and the best hunter, everyone watched to see what she would do, even Father. Aunt lifted her nose to the wind. There was no fresh scent there yet, but she must have decided to trust GreenPaw, for she started off at a trot toward the sound of his voice. SmallWatcher stayed right on Aunt's heels, just far enough back to avoid annoying her. The rest of the Family spread out on either side (except for those who remained with Mother back at the den).<br />
<br />
As they crested the ridge, Aunt suddenly let out an excited <i>wuff</i> and broke into a gallop, turning downhill. A moment later, SmallWatcher caught the scent as well: an<span style="background-color: white;"> aurochs, </span>not far away, running alone, its sweat and fear a delicious beacon billowing up from the<span style="background-color: white;"> forest </span>below. The chase commenced. Every muscle stretched and trembling, the scent of prey hot in her nostrils, breath burning in her throat, the feeling her Family around her, joined in the same joyous motion, hunger pangs forgotten.<br />
<br />
Soon, she could hear it - like an entire herd of deer crashing through the brush. Finally, she caught a glimpse of the prey with her eyes. A flash of black through branches. Her stride faltered for a step. This was no calf or cow, but a full grown male, with two enormous horns. Just like the on<span style="background-color: white;">e that had killed an older Sibling this past winter. SmallWatcher and her litter siblings had been younger then, they mostly observed during that hunt. Aunt had cleverly chased the bull into a swamp, but e</span>ven exhausted and mired down, it had still managed to hook its horns through VoleChaser's body. The Family stilled mourned him.<br />
<br />
SmallWatcher's heart clenched, fear replacing excitement. It wasn't winter any longer, they weren't that desperate, were they? Surely there were easier prey to hunt today. But Aunt did not slow. She was running along side the prey, trying to pass it, get in front. SmallWatcher's heart gave another surge of fear, but she quickened her pace to catch up.<br />
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They broke out of the forest into the wide river valley filled with grass and low shrubs. Here it easier to see and smell, but also easier for the prey to outrun them. But the prey didn't run faster. In fact, it was slowing down. It dawned on SmallWatcher that it was far more exhausted than it should have been. It must have been running for far, far longer than the Family had been chasing him. Sweat had dried in salty streaks along its flanks, and blood dribbled from its nose and from a mysterious wound on its hind leg.<br />
<br />
The whole family was running parallel to the prey now, keeping pace with ease. Aunt began to slow and veer toward it, staying just outside the range of the terrible weapons on its head. Greenpaw and Father were on the other side, mirroring Aunt's action, staying alongside without attacking. It swung its massive head back and forth, unsure if it should attack any of them. As it slowed further, Aunt took the opportunity to cross in front of it. It made a perfunctory swipe at her with the horns, but she was well out of range. The motion tired it even more (as Aunt knew it would) and it slowed to a limping walk.<br />
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The rest of the family followed Aunt's lead and started to circle the prey, taking turns to make feinting attacks. The prey snorted and swung his horns again and again, but the action did nothing but tire it more. Aunt and Father still weren't attacking yet, even though they had the prey trapped. SmallWatcher tucked up her tail with anxiety. Eventually, if they wanted to eat, they would have to attack for real, and someone would probably get hurt.<br />
<br />
But before she could worry further, she suddenly caught another scent on the air. She froze in her tracks and jerked her head up. Father noticed, scented the air, and then trotted over to her. He rubbed against her shoulder reassuringly. <i>Wait, watch</i>. He trotted back to continue to circle the prey.<br />
<br />
Smallwatcher walked away from the Family to stand on a rock. She had the best view when the Travelers arrived. They trotted out of the forest, from the same direction the chase had come from, slow but confident. It was her first time live-scenting a Traveler. Last <span style="background-color: white;">autumn,</span> when she was just old enough to start roaming the Family's territory, Aunt had showed her their empty camps near the river. Their live-scent was just as smokey as their cold camps, as if they carried fire with them under their skin, although they didn't look very imposing. They were tall and gangling, not much bigger than a Family member. They had no horns or antlers or sharp hooves or large teeth, but they approached the prey without fear or hesitation.<br />
<br />
The circle of the Family became a half circle, as they made way for the Travelers. Aunt, Father, and GreenPaw were wary, but not afraid or surprised by their arrival. Only SmallWatcher's litter siblings, who'd only been hunting for two seasons, were uncertain.<br />
<br />
The prey lifted its head and swung around, eyes rolling,. This is what the it had been running from. It was more scared of them than it was of the Family. The Travelers stopped outside the range of his horns, and started a slow dance, shifting their weight from foot to foot, long sticks raised in their front hands. One of them began to sidle around to one side. The bull tensed, eyeing both of them, as if to choose which one to charge. Just then, Aunt raced forward and attacked the prey's flanks, tearing at them. I tensed. Was it time? Would the rest of the Family rush in? But no other family member joined her.<br />
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The prey bellowed and swung back around, kicking out, but she'd already let go and retreated. It was not a real attack, but a distraction. The two Travelers immediately took the opening as if they'd been waiting for it, leaping forward to stab their sharp sticks into the Prey's ribs and soft belly. They stuck there, deeply entrenched in flesh as the Travelers jumped back. The prey screamed and kicked, now at its most dangerous and unpredictable. Pain would bring renewed strength and bravery; It could attack any of them, now.<br />
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Each of the Travelers pulled another spear from their behind their backs, and the dance repeated itself, with one of them trying to hold its attention while the other circled around. Once again, the bull started to charge, and once again, Aunt bravely rushed into to attack its rear. This time, one spear went into the ribs behind the elbow, the other into the neck. The prey went down on its side, kicking and thrashing, its horns digging a deep furrow into the moss and dirt.<br />
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SmallWatcher twitched and whined in excitement. The prey was down! Now was the time the Family should rush in. But Aunt and Father had retreated again, and went back to just watching. The Travelers waited, too. They backed away and squatted on their heels, patient and unhurried.<br />
<br />
Finally, after what felt like days, the prey lay completely still. One of the Travelers rose to his feet and circled around behind its head to pull out the spear from the neck. The food did not react, nor did it move when he gave one last thrust to the spine to make sure it was dispatched.<br />
<br />
SmallWatcher marveled that the hunt was already over. The entire hunt had taken less than half a day. Some hunts of large animals took the Family days to complete. No one injured. And before them lay enough food to feed the family for two weeks. But would they get to eat any of it?<br />
<br />
Saliva dripped from SmallWater's mouth. The scent of sweet blood and dark, rich offal filled the air. but still, none of the family came forward to eat. Aunt and the rest of the family still paced in a rough half-circle, but slow now, at a further distance, eyeing the Travelers, and the Travelers eyed them back. But unlike if the situation had involved a lion or hyena, or a rival Family, Aunt and Father did not make any aggressive moves to claim the kill for their own. Everyone remained calm and watchful.<br />
<br />
While the one kept watch, the other Traveler pulled a small stone from the animal skin around its middle and used it to cut into the skin on the auroch's hind leg. Two mighty blows from another, larger rock, and the lower leg was severed below the hock. He repeated the action for the other hind leg, and paused in his work long enough to suck some marrow from the end of the crushed leg bone. He tossed the second leg to his companion, who did the same. When he was finished, the dropped the leg to the ground. That's when Father made his move.<br />
<br />
He rushed in and snatched up the leg. Both Travelers yelled, and the guard swung with his spear, but Father was already out of range. He took his prize deep in the grass to gnaw on, and in the moment of distraction Father, Aunt snatched up the other discarded leg and ran in the opposite direction. I listened with mouth-watering envy as she settled in the bushes to chew on it. My litter Sibling, FastPaws, whined and started to dart forward as well, but Aunt left her treasure long enough to block him, growling and snapping at him. <i>Not yet. They are dangerous. Wait.</i><br />
<br />
The Travelers ignored the Family as long as they stayed back, and continued to cut into the kill, slicing away at skin and tendon and muscle, until the entire hind quarter was separated from the rest of the body. The Traveler dragged the quarter off to the side by the flap of extra skin. By the time the sun began to set, the other hind quarter joined the first, and then a shoulder quarter, then more Travelers arrived.<br />
<br />
These ones carried more things. More sticks of all sizes; more animal skins wrapped around objects; more rock tools; more exotic scents. They dropped their things and milled around the food for awhile, chattering and waving their front limbs. Then they all sorted themselves and got to work. Some stood guard as others helped butcher, and others fiddled with their belongs, arranging sticks and animal hides in some pattern that SmallWatcher couldn't understand. SmallWatcher stared in wonder as one of them knelt and produced fire from the ground. This caused some excitement from her siblings, but when Aunt and Father continued to stay calm, they soon settled down.<br />
<br />
None of them ate, until at one point, one of them emerged from the bloody center of the food with the liver. SmallWatcher's favorite, though she rarely got a taste since Aunt, Mother, Father or older siblings usually got to it first. Everyone stopped work and passed chunks of liver around, each cutting off pieces small enough to put into their tiny mouths.<br />
<br />
SmallWatcher couldn't stand it any longer. The scent of warm liver and blood were so close, even the alarming smell and crackle of the fire couldn't keep her away. She slunk down off the rock and inched toward the food. One of the Travelers shouted and pointed at her, and a couple guards came toward her, sticks raised. They were so close to her, they could have stabbed her with their spears with one lunge. They smelled exotic, dangerous; they carried on their bodies the relics of so many successful hunts - skins and tendons and bones and teeth and claws from all different animals, even teeth from a lion. She heard Father's distant growl and whine, but he wasn't coming close. SmallWatcher shivered with nerves, but didn't retreat. They hadn't attacked yet. And if there was even a chance...<br />
<br />
Without thinking, she lay down on her belly, flattened her ears, and licked her lips beseechingly, chin almost touching the ground. She'd never seen anyone try to talk to other animals before. It felt odd, like play-bowing to a rock. But, SmallWatcher was the smallest in the Family, not counting the new pups; the last-born of a large litter, last to the teat as a pup, and last to the kill now that she was old enough to hunt. Begging was second nature to her.<br />
<br />
It worked. They lowered their spears and looked at each other and chattered with their strange voices. And then, one of them flicked a small piece of liver at her feet. She gulped it down at once, possibly the best thing she'd ever eaten. Her actions elicited more chatter from them, and then another Traveler tossed a pair of vertebrate at her, still stuck together and covered in scraps of meat. She snatched it and ran back to her rock to chew on it. Her instincts told her to run much further away, but she sensed that her siblings wouldn't dare come and try to steal it if she stayed closer to the Travelers and their fire.<br />
<br />
She was right: her Siblings never tried to steal her bones. She ate at her leisure, nibbling every last scrap of meat, and watched the Travelers work. When they finished their work, and had a mound of their butchered meat covered in a hide tarp, they - all except a guard - lay down near the fire to sleep.<br />
<br />
Only then did Aunt and Father allow the rest of the Family to approach the food. Aunt's demeanor said, <i>it's ok to eat now, as long as you stay away from them. </i>And she seemed to be right - the guard watched them, but made no moves against them as they dragged away portions of food. Father, the strongest, grabbed the head. The Travelers had cut off the horns and scooped out the brain, but left all the face meat for the Family. There was also offal, all four lower legs, the pelvis and tail, big pieces of neck, some skin, many bones still coated in meat. There was plenty for everyone.<br />
<br />
The Family stayed near the carcass most of the night, taking turns to drag bits away into the grass, gulping down the soft bits as fast as possible and gnawing on the bones. Aunt and Father were the first to leave, after they'd filled their bellies. They would go back and share the feast with Mother at the den.<br />
<br />
The Siblings stayed until almost dawn, squabbling over bones and nibbling every scrap of meat they could, some of them carrying bones with them as they left. SmallWatcher was the last to leave. She nibbled on a rib and watched as the Travelers got up with the sun, buried their fire, and each took up a load of the meat to carry. They walked away, toward the river, probably to the camp that SmallWatcher had seen last year.<br />
<br />
SmalWatcher stayed near the auroch's scattered bones until the last Traveler disappeared from view. They were returning to their den, just as SmallWatcher's Family returned to theirs. But they'd meet again, soon, out on the hunting fields.<br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
~~~*~~~</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<i>SmallWatcher's story is set in Europe 200,000 years ago and the people she encounters are Neanderthals. Her clan wouldn't m</i><i>eet Homo sapiens, the humans who would eventually mold them into the dog we know today, for at least another 100,000 years, but it's very likely Neanderthals and other archaic humans started wolves on the path to domestication, simply by virtue of having the same habitat, prey sources, and sharing the wolfish traits of being opportunistic, adaptable, and curious.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>Imagine how many of these encounters like what I write here must have happened over the millennia, and you can see how ancient humans could have n</i><i>aturally shaped wolf populations to be some degree of people-friendly, long before their "true" domestication by H. sapiens 35,000 years ago.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>My series of 'domestication stories' are speculative, but are based on the most recent data we have on early people and wolves</i><i>. </i><i>Science used to believe that to domesticate the dog there had to be intent. It's hard to imagine selective breeding without an end goal in mind, but the more we learn, the more we understand that that's exactly how the dog (probably) came about. As canine historian <a href="https://retrieverman.net/2011/06/02/dogs-are-the-really-successful-wolves/" target="_blank">Scottie Westfall puts it</a>: "it had to be so easy, a caveman could do it". </i><br />
<i><br /></i>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-35886494267539127212018-09-05T14:14:00.000-07:002018-09-05T14:14:14.940-07:00The Saddest Harvest<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PTW_zCjBpvI/W41VJYZhi5I/AAAAAAAAxs8/s_sx5xjId2I_Jk1ilkmE_SrjaE4B3-szwCLcBGAs/s1600/IMG_20180901_075250.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PTW_zCjBpvI/W41VJYZhi5I/AAAAAAAAxs8/s_sx5xjId2I_Jk1ilkmE_SrjaE4B3-szwCLcBGAs/s320/IMG_20180901_075250.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
This is the third summer I've lived in this house, and it's the third summer I've made the sad collection you see in this jar: dead bumblebees collected from the back part of the driveway near the garage.<br />
<br />
I don't think their deaths are natural. The slow but noticeable pile-up of tiny fuzzy bodies starts in early July, long before the cold nights start taking their natural toll on the population, and I maintain two bee baths nearby so it's not likely to be dehydration, either. And of all of my yard, it's only these 100 or so square feet where they accumulate; I'll find the odd dead non-native honey bee or wasp scattered all over the yard, but nothing near the numbers of bumbles in this one spot.<br />
<br />
There is the possibility that this neighborhood simply has a lot of bumble bees. I've seen swarms of them on neighbor's lavender, and in my silk tree. The workers only live about a month, and it could be coincidence that I find so many in one spot. Maybe heat rising up from the asphalt happens to catch an abnormal number of weak workers already on their way out.<br />
<br />
But I can't help but think it's related to pesticides. We don't use them*, and neither do our immediate neighbors, but I can guarantee that previous owners did. The house was built in 1910, so it's been through every single wave of modern pesticide use, possibly starting with the old fashioned lead or arsenic-based ones, followed by organochlorines, then organophosphates and carbamates, then pyrethroids and neonicotinoids. Most of the most popular pesticides in the last century last a long time in the environment, and could have left potential residues.<br />
<br />
We have a curious lack of ants in the house, when many other locals have a huge ant population in their kitchens; we have a lack of wasp nests in the eaves, or under the porch, even this year, which has seen record numbers of wasps due to a mild winter. This probably means the perimeter and eaves were treated with pyrethroids in the last few years. And probably have been annually for decades, since pyrethroids first went on the consumer market. The soil and mulch left from previous owners, surfaces of the asphalt driveway, the foundation and eaves of the garage and the house, all probably have at least some residues of long-lasting insecticides.<br />
<br />
Bee declines are more on the public's radar now than a decade ago, but of course everyone wants an easy answer and a "quick fix". The push to to ban individual insecticides like imidicloprid or other neonicotinoids has the feel of a handy scapegoat, an easy-to-understand boogyman. What the science <i>is</i> clear on, however, is that the single biggest threat to pollinators (and most species, for that matter) is habitat fragmentation. Many of the same people so adamant about banning pesticides maintain pollinator food deserts in their own yards with a traditional manicured lawn.<br />
<br />
My opinion is that residential use of pesticides for "frivolous" reasons (killing pests in ornamental plants including lawns) should be a lot more restricted, instead of banning their use in agriculture. At the same time, farmers should be given incentives for increasing biodiversity on their land, and reducing chemical inputs and reducing waste across the board (that includes long distance shipping, burning or trashing harvests when prices go down, etc).<br />
<br />
I won't be having my soil tested because my actions would be the same no matter if it's pesticides or other things killing the bees: plant my vegetables in raised beds filled with fresh soil; mulch the heck out of everything else to bury any contamination; keep the bee-baths filled during the driest months; plant native flowers and shrubs that provide year-long food for pollinators, hopefully in a way that is so attractive from the curb I can convince my neighbors to follow suite.<br />
<br />
In the meantime, every time I see another sad little fuzzy body in my yard, I get to ponder the follies of modern living.<br />
<br />
Image description: A photograph of a glass jar holding about twenty dead bumblebees.<br />
<br />
*With a few, very tiny exceptions, such as fipronil or imidicloprid flea drops on the cat and dog.<br />
<br />
<b>References:</b><br />
https://xerces.org/bumblebees/<br />
https://xerces.org/pollinator-redlist/<br />
https://www.chemistryworld.com/news/what-you-need-to-know-about-neonicotinoids/3008816.article<br />
http://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-eu-ban-on-outdoor-use-of-three-neonicotinoid-pesticides/<br />
https://www.epa.gov/pollinator-protection/colony-collapse-disorder<br />
https://www.ars.usda.gov/oc/br/ccd/index/<br />
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/north-american-bumblebees-on-the-decline-41344352/<br />
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/the-american-bumblebee-is-crashing-too-293832/<br />
http://npic.orst.edu/ingred/permethrin.html<br />
http://npic.orst.edu/factsheets/chlordanegen.pdf<br />
http://npic.orst.edu/ingred/imid.html<br />
https://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2010/06/04/the-problem-of-lawns/<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-89715145552352664782018-07-16T16:19:00.001-07:002018-07-16T16:19:48.288-07:00Everyone Uses Bleach Wrong: A PSA with BONUS! Super Hero AnalogyI worked in an animal shelter once upon a time, and as you can imagine it was both rewarding and stressful; there were high highs, and low lows of all kinds, but there was one area that never failed to suck me into a twilight zone of misery: catching a volunteer or co-worker in the act of -- and then correcting on -- the improper use of chlorine bleach.<br />
<br />
Bleach is our friend. It is the most effective, cheapest, most environmentally-friendly option for killing most of the terrible germs out there. And everyone seems to use it incorrectly. Too many people treat bleach more like a magic talisman than a disinfectant, filling a spray bottle and spritzing it on everything in the style of Windex Mom in <i>My Big Fat Greek Wedding</i>.<br />
<br />
Bleach is like a comic book hero who has super strength only under the right circumstances. If the "bad guys" are hanging out somewhere wide open and clean, bleach is unstoppable. Other disinfectants like QAC's are more like stealthy assassins, sneaking in through the air ducts to get to the center of the bad guys' hideouts. The bad guys can learn to stop the assassins by simply blocking the air ducts, but they have no defense against the brute-force of bleach. (This is also why germs are not likely to develop resistance to chlorine bleach the way they can to the QAC's).<br />
<br />
Except... like all good super heroes, bleach has a major weakness: dirt (all organic material, actually). The moment bleach touches dirt, it loses all its power. The bad guys can hide inside a microscopic ball of organic matter all day long. It's like a giant, multi-room mansion to them, and all bleach can do is peek in the windows.<br />
<br />
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<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>Chlorine bleach does not work on</b>:<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Wood </b><br />
<b>Carpet</b><br />
<b>Plush toys </b><br />
<b>Most furniture</b><br />
<b>Fabric* (gray area, see below)</b><br />
<b>Dirty dishes</b><br />
<b>Dirty concrete</b><br />
<b>Dirty <i>anything</i></b><br />
<div>
<b>Dirt</b><br />
<br /></div>
Let me repeat this, because I've talked to a lot of people about this, from all walks of life, and it's always a hard sell: I swear to you, no matter what you've heard (or who you've heard it from): <b>Bleach will not work on porous or dirty things</b>. I'm sorry, you can't disinfect that cutting board you bought from the thrift store. Or the second-hand drift wood for your lizard's terrarium. We've all done it at one time or another. You're not the first one to dump bleach onto the slobbery dog toys, or litter-encrusted cat box, or into your parvo-contaminated lawn, or spritz it on your ringworm-covered clothes, and think that you killed a few germs. It really doesn't do anything except sometimes change the object's color.<br />
<br />
And I have more bad news: the same is true for all the other disinfectants out there; there is no such thing as a magic disinfectant that will solve all your organic material problems, no matter what certain brands' marketing implies. (With the possible exception of accelerated hydrogen peroxide and potassium peroxymonosulfate, but even those are only <b><i>slightly</i></b> better in the presence of organic matter. Plus they're much more expensive, and have higher health risks to users, than bleach).<br />
<br />
But do not despair! Microorganisms don't always need to be killed, they can be PHYSICALLY removed from their hideouts. Washing with detergent, tons of rinsing, hot dry cycles. Don't forget about that overlooked hero, Heat. The most important disinfection process of all, autoclaving surgical instruments, doesn't use any special chemicals at all, just heat.<br />
<br />
And sometimes you have to just bite the bullet and throw contaminated things away. If that thing is your yard, digging out the contaminated soil and throwing it away, or burying it in a thick layer of mulch may be a better answer than trying to clean it. Speaking of...<br />
<br />
<b>Soiled soil</b><br />
Yes, it's tough when an outdoor area is contaminated by something nasty and contagious. The most porous and dirt-laden place of all is the same place most likely to be contaminated when you have a sick pet. Most of our worst enemies like parvo, panleukopenia, crypto, and ringworm can live for a long time in the soil. Many pet websites (and a lot of veterinarians) recommend, in addition to other protocols, at least giving a chemical disinfectant a try on your yard if you've had for example, parvo dogs pooping there. I could probably get on board with the idea of giving it a try, just in case it kills a few baddies, except for one problem: if it doesn't work, (and the science tells us it probably doesn't) you won't be able to tell, and you risk getting complacent.<br />
<br />
<b>Fabric</b><br />
Dealing with contaminated clothing is almost as fraught as a contaminated yard. Yes, some bleach products are labeled to disinfect clothing - but in a very limited way: Adding the correct amount to a load of laundry in a washing machine run with cold water that doesn't contain very much organic material. In which case, the action of the detergent and water alone may physically remove more germs than the bleach will kill.<br />
<br />
The problem is, I've seen way more people using bleach incorrectly with clothing than any other application. I've observed multiple professionals (veterinarians, certified vet techs, nurses) recommend spraying contaminated clothing with a bleach solution (or other disinfectant, like a quat, usually). This isn't doing jack sh*t. I totally understand you want to feel like you're doing something, but using it this way isn't just useless, it may make things worse by encouraging less caution with the (still contaminated) clothing.<br />
<br />
<b>Proper use of bleach: an original mnemomic, just for you!</b><br />
<br />
If you have a non-porous thingy to disinfect, remember to<span style="font-size: large;"> <b>S.W.A.P.</b></span><br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">S</span></b>tay cool! Heat kills bleach (aka, it accelerates the loss of the chlorine ions before they can do their work). Mix with cold water only; if you're going to use in a washing machine, set it to cold; don't use bleach on something hot, like recently washed dishes.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">W</span></b>ash First! -- always pre-clean before disinfecting.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">A</span></b>lone! -- Bleach works best alone. Don't mix it with anything besides water. Unless you're experimenting with re-creating mustard gas, and want to burn your lungs out, then by all means.<br />
<br />
Yes, I know they make "cleaner and disinfectant in one" products that had to have passed some efficacy tests before being sold. Buy them if you can afford it, but please, please, don't try to mix your own. Don't try to mix in an essential oil because you don't like the smell of bleach (yes, I once had to stop a volunteer from doing this at the shelter).<br />
<br />
<b><span style="font-size: large;">P</span></b>roper dilution! more is not always better. Believe it or not, for some germs, more concentrated bleach doesn't work as well as properly diluted bleach - I suppose it would be as if Super Bleach were all hopped up on Angry Acid and screamed the whole time he ran down the street before attacking the bad guys' hideout - announcing his presence so forcefully would give the bad guys a chance to run away (non-enveloped bacteria link). The perfect dilution of Bleach allows it to punch through the bad guy's defenses with exactly the right amount of force and speed to complete demolish them it before they know what's happening.<br />
<br />
OK, that's one of the worst mnemonics I've ever heard, but you get it.<br />
<br />
Now, go forth and kill some parvo!<br />
<br />
References:<br />
<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK214356/" target="_blank">Bleach factsheet from the NIH</a><br />
<a href="https://www.cdc.gov/disasters/bleach.html" target="_blank">Bleach factsheet from the CDC</a><br />
<a href="http://members.petfinder.com/~MA199/resourcePages/volunteers/shelterCleaning.pdf" target="_blank">Cleaning and disinfecting in shelters</a><br />
<a href="https://www.uwsheltermedicine.com/library/guidebooks/canine-parvovirus/disinfection-how-do-you-get-rid-of-it" target="_blank">UW FAQ on killing parvo</a><br />
<a href="https://www.sheltermedicine.com/library/resources/?utf8=%E2%9C%93&search%5Bslug%5D=will-accel-kill-parvo-in-grassy-areas-specifically-when-puppies-are-housed-in-outdoor-kennels-on-grass" target="_blank">UC Davis FAQ on killing parvo in yards</a><br />
<a href="https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/3622/Cloete_Resistance?sequence=1" target="_blank">Resistance mechanisms of bacteria to antimicrobial compounds</a> (PDF)<br />
<a href="http://cmr.asm.org/content/12/1/147.full" target="_blank">Antiseptics and Disinfectants: Activity, Action, and Resistance</a><br />
<a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0964830598000274" target="_blank">Bacterial resistance to disinfectants containing quaternary ammonium compounds</a><br />
<a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1564025/" target="_blank">How long can different germs survive on surfaces?</a><br />
<a href="http://rangelandwatersheds.ucdavis.edu/MWQIC/MWQIC/Cparvum_Survival_window.html" target="_blank">Air temperature greatly affects how long crypto can live on the ground: one day vs. 73 days</a><br />
<br />
Image description: a crude cartoon drawing of a anthropomorphized bottle of bleach, labeled "super bleach" and wearing a mask and cape, as it faces off against a blob of brown substance containing anthropomorphized microorganisms, who are frowning at the hero.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-61452194315481369262018-02-07T17:29:00.000-08:002018-02-07T17:29:07.580-08:00Who to blame for shelter dog euthanasias?So, you saw a sad advertisement on social media about shelter pets dying from "lack of homes". You got sad, then you got mad. Time to blame someone! Odds are good, whoever made the ad already has a target handpicked: Is it... breeders? "irresponsible" pet owners? Maybe the solution is to punish people more, to enact more laws, give the maker of the ad money?<br />
<br />
It feels good to blame "the other" for bad things. It's human nature. But let's all take a breath and consider what's really going on. Since the odds are good that the ad you just saw fudged or outright lied about some statistics, let's start with...<br />
<h2>
Real Numbers* </h2>
About 670,000 dogs are euthanized in US shelters per year. Of those, about 10% are euthanized for a good reason** (ie, the same reasons that a compassionate pet owner would). So, the number of deaths-from-lack-of-home is actually about 570k.<br />
<br />
Good news: There are about 78 million pet dogs in the US, so 570k dogs represents less than 1% of the dog population as a whole. Overall, we as a society are doing pretty good by our dogs. Let's not lose sight of that.<br />
<br />
More good news: this number has been dropping steadily and significantly for the last couple decades. Also, the numbers of dogs entering shelters has been declining, the percentage being adopted has been increasing, and the number of strays returned to owner has been increasing. Something to celebrate!<br />
<br />
Even more good news: even though it's still a large, sad number, there are actually more than enough homes available for these dogs***.<b> It is a <a href="https://www.nokilladvocacycenter.org/uploads/4/8/6/2/48624081/pet_overpopulation.pdf" target="_blank">complete myth that there is an "overpopulation"</a> of dogs in this country</b>. It might have been true in the 1960's or '70's, but now it is not. There are 17 million potential homes, and only 570,000 dogs killed for "lack of a home". The only real question is, how to get them into the hands of people who are looking for them?<br />
<br />
Logically, since things are already improving every year, if we want to end unnecessary euthanasia. we should focus on the things that work, and keep doing them but even better. The solution to needless killing has nothing with dog breeders, and actually not even all that much to do with the people who relinquish their pets to a shelter. The problem, and the solution, lies mostly with with the <b>decisions that shelters make</b>.<br />
<br />
Bottom line: well-functioning shelters have low euthanasia rates; poorly-functioning shelters have high euthanasia rates. All other factors are drops in the bucket compared to the importance of shelter policies and procedures.<br />
<br />
What do "good" animal shelter policies look like? They have pet retention <a href="http://beyondbreed.com/the-revolving-door-a-poverty-problem-not-a-pet-problem/" target="_blank">programs</a>, they work actively to promote adoptions, actively work to reunite lost pets with their owners... etc.<br />
<br />
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What does a "bad" animal shelter look like? They don't do the things listed above. Here's some <a href="https://yesbiscuit.com/category/animal-shelter-abuse-2/" target="_blank">examples</a>.<br />
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Some <a href="http://www.nathanwinograd.com/there-ought-to-be-a-law/" target="_blank">more examples</a> contrasting good vs. bad policies, and how they affect euthanasia rates.<br />
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Here's <a href="http://www.nathanwinograd.com/transforming-your-community/" target="_blank">a story</a> of how a bad shelter became a good one.<br />
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You still mad about dogs being killed? Good! Use that anger to personally improve the kill rates in your local shelter. If it's already a good shelter, or is on the right track, you can volunteer or otherwise support them. If it's a bad shelter, you can help them get on the right track, or, if they're stubborn, you can speak out, protest, boycott, attend city council meetings... all that <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/pets/yourwholepet/article/Is-pet-overpopulation-a-myth-Inside-Nathan-2520132.php" target="_blank">good stuff</a>. Be an actor, not a keyboard warrior. And <b>don't share memes without checking them out first</b>.<br />
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Maybe you're already very active in the rescue community, and you're angry because it seems like, where ever you turn, you see irresponsible people dumping their pets at shelters. I'm here to remind you that what you see is never the full story, if you knew what people go through when they surrender pets, you wouldn't be so quick to judge, and, even if they are the worst people in the world, they represent a tiny, tiny fraction of dog life in the US. Don't let your anger blind you to the fact that things are getting better all the time, not the reverse. <b>Don't use your anger to spread lies and fear monger.</b> Don't lash out at potential allies like dog breeders. Look at the numbers above and take a moment to celebrate before turning back to the work.<br />
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*There is no national organization that tabulates these stats, they vary from state to state, and even from shelter to shelter. I'm using the best estimates available at this time.<br />
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**"Good reason" is extremely subjective, and is open for discussion, most knowledgeable people in the field agree that an appropriate "kill rate" for shelter population is somewhere between 1%-20%. I've taken a middle number here for math purposes.<br />
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***This is grossly oversimplified, because clearly not every dog will be right for every family, and the US is just too physically large to move dogs around easily, and we can talk about the issues with these numbers, BUT, the point is clear: you can't say that an "overpopulation" exists.<br />
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<b>Sources</b><br />
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<a href="https://www.aspca.org/animal-homelessness/shelter-intake-and-surrender/pet-statistics" target="_blank">Pet Statistics for 2016 (ASPCA</a>)<br />
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<a href="https://www.aspcapro.org/research" target="_blank">ASPCA Research Articles</a><br />
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<a href="http://file.scirp.org/pdf/OJAS_2015100914300959.pdf" target="_blank">An Exploration of the Re-Homing of Cats and Dogs in the U.S. </a>(PDF)<br />
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<a href="https://www.nokilladvocacycenter.org/shelter-reform.html" target="_blank">Shelter Reform Toolkit</a>s<br />
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<a href="http://btoellner.typepad.com/kcdogblog/animal_shelters/" target="_blank">KC Dog Blog</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.sheltervet.org/assets/docs/shelter-standards-oct2011-wforward.pdf" target="_blank">Association of Shelter Veterinarians Shelter Guidelines</a> (PDF)<br />
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<a href="https://yesbiscuit.com/2013/12/22/unwilling-the-bias-against-poor-people-who-want-to-save-shelter-pets/" target="_blank">YesBiscuit!</a><br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-16592819372317710462017-09-23T21:11:00.000-07:002017-09-23T21:12:21.707-07:00Apple cider without a press<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/31865702462/in/photolist-QxS4a9-ittbsN-dBHw1C-dBC6uc-dBC6Hx-asyVC-9sjq8" title="IMG_20161110_103013"><img alt="IMG_20161110_103013" height="480" src="https://farm1.staticflickr.com/451/31865702462_21435f0aa2_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script><br />
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Do you have apples and a wish for fresh cider, but don't have the money/time/space to buy/rent/build a cider press? Then I have the solution for you!</div>
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Freeze 'em. Thaw 'em. Core 'em. Squeeze 'em with a lemon juicer. Strain, pasteurize.<br />
It does not take as long as you'd think to hand-squeeze cider; frozen and thawed apples are softer than lemons.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-50019774858954813112017-05-10T21:05:00.000-07:002017-09-23T21:10:45.327-07:00Harbor Seals, WaldportNo wonder orcas like them so much; they look like sentient sausages.<br />
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<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/36720478916/in/dateposted-public/" title="IMG_0916a"><img alt="IMG_0916a" height="533" src="https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4383/36720478916_0bd712d8b5_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-69441193264137296282017-04-09T12:49:00.001-07:002017-04-09T12:49:32.425-07:00GardenWe bought a house in autumn 2016. It's in an old neighborhood with lots of old, established trees and shrubs and things. I'm trying to replace all the invasive ornamental plants with native ones. Here's the progress so far:<br />
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Pulled out all the english ivy that's creeping in from the neighbor (some day, I'll see if they'll let me kill all their ivy, too), and pulled out all this viney ornamental weed in the shade garden, whatever it was (it used to cover all the ground between the house and the path below).<br />
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Despite some slug damage, the wild ginger I transplanted last autumn is doing well, so I went out to the parents' property and liberated some more, plus some other native plants, mostly for the shade garden. Scored some sword ferns, oxalis, bleeding heart<br />
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I also got a couple cuttings of salmon berry, and salal.<br />
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We'll see how they root.<br />
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This clump of dirt and moss pictured above is actually a very old sword fern that was living next to my parent's house.<br />
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Here it is the oldest photo I can find of it, c. 1985, but it might have been growing there for many years before that. The house was originally built in the '30's or '40's. Dad's been thinking of killing it for years because it blocks one of the vents, so I saved it. Let's see how it likes being a suburban fern.<br />
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On a related note, it is surprisingly hard to find out how long a sword fern can live. Individual fronds only live a few years, but the rhizomes can obviously live for decades. If anyone knows of a reputable source that has this info, I'd love to know.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-1987933021914874042017-03-21T09:10:00.001-07:002017-03-21T09:10:43.105-07:00Bird doodles<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-63242658956777818832017-03-07T19:22:00.000-08:002017-03-07T19:22:17.876-08:00Me at Parties<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-81033235856743546662017-03-07T14:26:00.003-08:002017-03-07T14:26:48.379-08:00Grumpy American Robins<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/32177911955/in/dateposted-public/" title="IMG_0366a"><img alt="IMG_0366a" height="462" src="https://c1.staticflickr.com/1/496/32177911955_1e4bf41922_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script><br />
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<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/32868750882/in/dateposted-public/" title="IMG_0505a"><img alt="IMG_0505a" height="491" src="https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2049/32868750882_e6185a4c30_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-8545088252036391422017-02-22T13:25:00.000-08:002017-02-22T13:25:27.606-08:00I Love You But No: An Open Letter to Animal Rescuers<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Hello, animal rescue peeps. I love you. I really do. Working with rescuers this last decade has shown me the sort of dedication, bravery, and strength that songs are written about.<br />
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But you can be so fucking ridiculous sometimes.<br />
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And I'm not talking the "fostering ten different dogs at once" kind of ridiculous, though there's plenty of that. Or the "trying to do everything by yourself without researching resources" ridiculous, though there's sadly too much of that, too. Or the "driving a hundred miles to transport a sick kitten to the only vet clinic who would treat it", kind of ridiculous.<br />
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I'm talking the judgmental kind. Sorry, but you know in your hearts it's true. You even agree with me with one half of your brain, while the other half is already poised over the "Flag" button on Craigslist, searching for the barest hint that someone, somewhere, is rehoming a pet using methods you don't approve of and/or for reasons you don't agree with.<br />
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I love you, my fellow animal lovers, but stop, please.<br />
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We don't know better than the average pet owner. We don't need or deserve to be gate-keepers to pet ownership. None of us has a PhD in rehomology. The only difference between a "rescuer" and Average Jane Pet Owner is the amount of time we spend on pet-related things. We've made it our hobby, and it's an important one! We do good things with this hobby. We probably make the world a little better through our efforts... but that doesn't make us better than anyone else.<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">A Handy but Incomplete List of Shit Rescuers Need to Stop Doing</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">1) Stop the social media punishment</span><br />
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It felt good to post picture of a skinny dog and get that chorus of agreement from followers, didn't it? It felt good to flag all the Craigslist rehoming posts that one day, didn't it? It felt good to take all your frustration and drape it haphazardly on the shoulders of a stranger on the internet. They probably deserve it, and people agree with you, so it's ok, right?<br />
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Did you do those things because you honestly thought it would help any animals, or because you knew you'd get an ego boost?<br />
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This sort of <a href="http://www.npr.org/2011/05/20/136465083/psst-the-human-brain-is-wired-for-gossip" target="_blank">tribalism is dangerously seductive</a>. Sometimes, venting is important. Trust me, I totally understand the importance of letting off steam. Shelter work is a stressful and underpaid, and you end up seeing humanity at it's worst. But too much "venting" is not healthy, and in aggregate, this avalanche of negative, often illogical and anti-factual "venting" is counterproductive. It hurts the reputation of rescue in general and pushes away the very people who need help or advice the most.<br />
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Obviously, there are real monsters out there. And there are probably times when they need to be outed. Odds are very, very high, however, that <i>you</i> don't need to be the one doing it, <i>or even commenting about it</i>, especially if you don't know the full situation. A good rule of thumb is: if it makes you feel smug, think twice, or thrice, before posting.<br />
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And on the topic of sharing...<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">2) Stop making up sad stories</span><br />
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When a dog comes to you with an unknown history, resist the urge to make one up. Not every skinny dog was starved (for that matter, not every "skinny" dog is actually skinny - many people, even vets, have a hard time judging a healthy weight). Scars are not necessarily from fighting. Timid does not mean past abuse. 'Scared of men' does not mean past abuse. And fer the love of pie crust, <i><b>do not</b></i> use the term "bait dog" unless that dog was literally confiscated from a fighting operation with a sign around its neck labeled "bait". "Bait dogs" are not nearly as common as rescuers think they are.<br />
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Sometimes these sob stories sell, in fact it may be useful to think of abused or crippled animals as a "niche" market with a small but steady subset of adopters who are looking for that specifically. A well-publicized story can also lead to more potential adopters coming in the doors. Often, though, the only thing they do (besides stoke the ego of rescuers) is contribute to the myth of shelter dogs being broken castaways, and surround the shelter or rescue with a cloud of negativity, ultimately resulting in fewer adoptions. Cute pictures and <a href="http://www.maddiesfund.org/the-shelter-pet-projects-greatest-hits.htm" target="_blank">upbeat</a> advertising will win in the long term.<br />
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Keep the speculation to yourself unless something is glaringly obvious or confirmed by a behavior or health expert.<br />
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Speaking of:<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">3) Stop sharing abuse stories</span><br />
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If it bleeds, it leads, but even if corporate news and click bait sites focus on all the bad shit that happens in the world, stop sharing and amplifying it, <i><b>unless</b></i> there's a specific, positive solution you're sharing at the same time, like a GoFundMe for an injured pet, for example. Rescue folks are some of the worst at this, and their feeds end up being 75% horror show, interspersed with pics of your foster animals. It's jarring. I mean, feel free to vent on your personal page if you don't also use that page to promote adoptions at the same time. I unfollow people who share senseless suffering just for the rubber necking, misanthropic factor, and so do a lot of potential adopters.<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">5) Stop attacking breeders</span><br />
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I would be so happy if I never saw another "don't breed and buy while shelter pets die" PSA. I understand how easy it is to see a litter of puppies for sale at the same time shelters are killing healthy dogs and assume that one leads to the other. It doesn't. The ven diagrams don't overlap much. Firstly, we know that "pet overpopulation" is a myth. Yes, there are missed nuances here, but the numbers <a href="http://www.nathanwinograd.com/?p=1390" target="_blank">here</a> are real, and they don't lie. Shelter kill pets because homes aren't coming to them, but that's not the same thing as there being a "lack of homes for pets".<br />
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Secondly, we have <a href="https://www.petfinder.com/pet-adoption/dog-adoption/pets-relinquished-shelters/" target="_blank">statistics</a> on why people surrender their pets, and the two main reasons are a change in lifestyle, or the pet's behavior, neither of which have much to do with origin of the pet. There not mass of excess puppies, in fact, most surrendered animals are over five months old (and anecdotally, I can say that in my area young puppies and kittens always have more demand than supply).<br />
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When you bad-mouth breeders, you alienate them and their clients, all of which are potential customers or allies.<br />
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And while we're on the subject:<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">3) Stop the ridiculous adoption screenings </span><br />
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This issue is slowly starting to change as the public share more of their horror stories of <a href="https://www.thedodo.com/adoption-applications-perfect-family-1190660240.html" target="_blank">being denied</a> pet adoptions for absurd reasons. Adoption counseling and "open adoptions" are becoming more popular at shelters, and I'm glad.<br />
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We need to understand just how few pets actually need the shelter/rescue network to find homes. <a href="http://btoellner.typepad.com/kcdogblog/pet_ownership/" target="_blank">Seventy percent of pet owners</a> get their pets from somewhere other than a shelter or rescue. That means the majority of pets are bred, born, raised, sold, homed, and rehomed all without permission or<a href="http://btoellner.typepad.com/kcdogblog/2014/06/open-adoptions.html" target="_blank"> screening</a> from rescuers. And here's the key: most of them do just fine.<br />
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Some rescuers run themselves ragged trying to police the pet-rehomers on Craigslist or Facebook because they seem to think that no one could possibly do a good job without their input. This is off-putting to the majority of pet owners, aka customers.<br />
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I agree that it would be great if shelters acted as a central resource or for pet owners, a place they would go to first for pet related questions, even (especially!) pet owners who never got their pet through a rescue. There is a lot of ignorance and misinformation out there. That will only work if shelters and rescuers stop being <a href="https://yesbiscuit.com/2012/06/20/the-killings-will-continue-until-morale-improves/" target="_blank">hostile</a> to the needs and wants of the public.<br />
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Which leads to the biggest one:<br />
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<span style="font-size: medium;">5</span><span style="font-size: large;">) Stop thinking shelters would not be needed if people were just more <i><b>responsible</b></i></span><br />
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Most rescuers I know (myself included, not that long ago), have this vague idea in the back of their heads that the ultimate goal is to put themselves out of work. One day, one way or another, we'll stop the "irresponsible" people from <a href="https://yesbiscuit.com/2012/01/11/dumping-dump/" target="_blank">dumping</a> their pets and all shelters everywhere will close their doors forever.<br />
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Many people have written extensively about how shelters will always be needed, even in Utopia. It becomes more clear when you look at the real reasons people surrender pets to shelters (see above). Most people give up pets because of unexpected lifestyle changes that make it difficult or impossible to keep them, which can happen to anyone.<br />
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Wait. If your first response to that last sentence is something along the lines of, "they <i>should</i> have predicted..." or "I would have made different choices..." or "no one should get a pet if they can't see into the future!" maybe take a breath and consider a time that something unexpected happened to you, or you didn't have perfect judgement, or were completely overwhelmed by circumstances, or made a decision based on ignorance and later learned better. Be kind to yourself and others for past mistakes.<br />
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This attitude leads to a kind of apathy towards the very concept of animal rescue: "everyone but me and my friends are <a href="https://yesbiscuit.com/?s=irresponsible" target="_blank">awful</a>, therefore rescue is ultimately hopeless". It contributes to burn-out and compassion fatigue and encourages illogical, reactionary responses to the perceived "root of the problem"; "control and punish the wrong-doers, and all our problems will be solved!" (Which is another seductive, tribalistic mindset that radiates from deep in the <a href="http://www.copingskills4kids.net/Reptilian_Coping_Brain.html" target="_blank">hindbrain</a>).<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;">Keep your eye on the prize.</span><br />
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Focus on the fact that, as a rescuer, you are a small but integral part of an unofficial, but nation-wide animal rescue network, which is itself a small but important part of pet ownership in general. Taking a <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/video/this-brooklyn-woman-may-be-a-dog-s-best-friend-507064899573" target="_blank">holistic and compassionate view</a> of pet owners who are having problems can be both humbling and uplifting for everyone involved. Thankfully, this is becoming more common in the animal shelter community. Don't fight it, don't take the old road that assumes everyone (but you and your friends of course) are probably terrible and untrustworthy. In the long run, you'll save more lives and be happier.<br />
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Sincerely,<br />
<br />
Suzanne<br />
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Image descriptions: At the top is a photo of a dog in a kennel in an shelter, throwing back his head and howling; interspersed throughout the posting are screen caps of random, judgmental social media comments from animal rescuers: 1) "Sometimes I think there should be a psych and competence test before allowing someone to own a pet." 2) "the parents are clearly monsters. That kid must be heartbroken." 3) maybe they should have put these weak children up for adoption instead." 4) "you have not made a compelling argument for breeding this dog, because you can't. You see, (redacted), a very high percentage of posters here have been or are involved with homeless animals in some capacity. When these folks are out of work, then we'll talk. Mk?"Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-86641345109313298982017-02-21T09:38:00.001-08:002017-02-21T09:52:39.818-08:00Rain walk<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/32982685066/in/dateposted-public/" title="IMG_0451a"><img alt="IMG_0451a" height="640" src="https://c1.staticflickr.com/4/3931/32982685066_bbcee982a7_z.jpg" width="493" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-42361878292063479322016-12-30T21:52:00.000-08:002017-01-03T14:23:10.268-08:00Unlikely Friends<br />
<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/32037937165/in/dateposted-public/" title="IMG_9785a"><img alt="IMG_9785a" height="447" src="https://c6.staticflickr.com/1/771/32037937165_2945bd4834_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script>
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<a data-flickr-embed="true" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/32037935525/in/dateposted-public/" title="IMG_9784a"><img alt="IMG_9784a" height="449" src="https://c6.staticflickr.com/1/302/32037935525_0f54ea220b_z.jpg" width="640" /></a><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//embedr.flickr.com/assets/client-code.js"></script>
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A western fence lizard (<i>Sceloporus occidentalis</i>) and a northern alligator lizard (<i>Elagaria coerulea</i>) sharing the weak sunlight of a cool spring day in Oregon (taken last April. Because I'm slow these days).<br />
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They look very similar, and occupy similar niches, but they're not too closely related. It's probably the equivalent of a pig and a deer cuddling up together.<br />
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-36595556692925290632016-10-24T14:26:00.001-07:002016-10-24T14:26:57.952-07:00Ginger-Lovers Nutty Apple CrispMy twist on apple crisp the way I like it. Well, love it... I actually died when I took the first bite, so this is my ghost speaking to you from the beyond the grave about this very important recipe. (Sorry to those who have any kind of food allergy, because this hits pretty much all of them).<br />
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<b>Apple mix:</b><br />
5 large apples, peeled, cored and chopped into little squares (or a 50:50 mix of apples and pears. Yum)<br />
Tsp of cinnamon, maybe some nutmeg, pinch of cloves also good<br />
about 1/4 to 1/2 cup of finely diced candied ginger (yeah, you read that right. I said ginger lovers, didn't I)<br />
about 1/2 a lemon worth of lemon juice<br />
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<b>Toss that all together and dump into a square glass baking dish.</b><br />
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<b>Topping:</b><br />
1/4 cup flour<br />
1/2 cup brown sugar<br />
6 tablespoons butter (salted, sweet cream)<br />
Pinch of salt<br />
Maybe some more cinnamon<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Cut that all together, then mix in:</b><br />
1/2 cup oats<br />
1/2 cup chopped roasted hazelnuts (if you scavenged them from your neighbor's yard and roasted them yourself, you get bonus points), pecans or walnuts would also work swell<br />
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<b>Dump topping over the apple mix and bake at 350 for about 45 minutes</b><br />
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<b>Really good with vanilla ice cream. Tastes like autumn and Christmas both. Kinda spicy.</b><br />
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If anyone actually makes this recipe, I really would like to know. Not many people love ginger the way I do.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-22514669473142433842016-10-24T13:40:00.000-07:002016-10-24T13:40:49.078-07:00Inktober 2016, favoritesI've been doing daily updates on my <a href="https://www.instagram.com/cyborgsuzy/" target="_blank">Instagram</a> for <a href="http://mrjakeparker.com/inktober" target="_blank">Inktober</a> this year, but here's some of the better ones:<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8209843.post-20204692558183868182016-09-26T07:00:00.000-07:002016-09-26T07:00:08.553-07:00Old StumpsNear Ye Olde Homestead lie many acres of forestland that were harvested about 70 years ago. Unlike today, where saplings are planted within a year after harvest, the old standard was to leave a few adult trees to re-seed the area naturally. You can still spot these parents because they're significantly larger and scragglier than their children. You can also still find many old stumps with a springboard notch still visible on the downhill side. Chainsaws were still <a href="https://oregonhistoryproject.org/articles/historical-records/timbermen-using-chainsaw-lacomb/#.V-hXIfArKUk" target="_blank">not very common back then</a>, so handsawing was still a thing. This generally meant two man teams; one on the ground, and one on a springboard shoved into a hasty notch on the downhill side.<br />
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Searching for springboard notches while hiking is now a classic PacNW pasttime.<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/16257929476" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="460a by Suzanne Phillips, on Flickr"><img alt="460a" height="640" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8604/16257929476_f51a165485_z.jpg" width="360" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/16097722429" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="458a by Suzanne Phillips, on Flickr"><img alt="458a" height="500" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8629/16097722429_6aca26f523.jpg" width="281" /></a></div>
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I ran across this extra special stump during a Chritmas hike. It must have been a bitch for those poor loggers back in the day: they tried really hard to cut it closer to the ground, with four saw marks (note how ragged the saw marks are, too, showing that it was a hand saw, not a chainsaw),<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/16257932736" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="456a by Suzanne Phillips, on Flickr"><img alt="456a" height="281" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7555/16257932736_e9feef97f0.jpg" width="500" /></a></div>
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before they gave up and cut six feet higher up the trunk. (That's the notch from the springboard they eventually put in).<br />
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/16096322918" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="457a by Suzanne Phillips, on Flickr"><img alt="457a" height="500" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7523/16096322918_176ddd9c08.jpg" width="281" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cyborgsuzy/16282071371" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="455a by Suzanne Phillips, on Flickr"><img alt="455a" height="320" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7576/16282071371_9e6754467a_z.jpg" width="180" /></a></div>
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There's also signs of what I think are healing in the bark. It lived as 'living stump" for at least a few years before finally succumbing completely to rot. (Now home to numberous invertebrates, mosses, lichens, and a robust salal plant.) Nearly every one of these old stumps is a nurse log. Huckleberry and hemlock love them especially.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0