I went to the local aviary today and they had some really mean things to say about owls.
I can confirm that most birds have a detectable amount of wiring behind the eyes - blinking lights and buttons and sliders and frizzy things that spark and chirp and beep. They also have a lot of soul that can communicate with ours because the programming is fairly compatible. Vultures are clever and curious, swans are clear and lawful, chickens have a lot of personality, caged parrots are dissociated and disinherited and frankly worrying, falconry-trained birds of prey are tremendously businesslike.
And owls are absolutely lovely beasts with their own irreplaceable validity. but they are basically stuffed with polyester fiberfill. They have one button, like a child’s toy dinosaur that opens and closes its mouth when you press the back of its head. And it isn’t even a sophisticated electronic button it’s just a lever that rocks back and forth to make the claws open and close. I think they may have actually evolved independently from sponges. Their skulls simply exist to create holes that funnel sound and light, and as a place to hang a giant hinged beak. An owl is just an empty tube like a windchime that the wind whistles through, and you can drop meat down it. They use the meat to generate feathers, and then emit the bones in pressed little packages like those machines that flatten a penny and stamp it with the logo of a theme park. I think that’s the gist of it - most birds are electronics of varying levels of sophistication, but owls are just a system of levers and pulleys. No elevator music in those skulls, just the wind echoing through empty caverns of slightly irritating design. Absolutely fantastic.
I remember my wildlife professor talking about capturing birds for tagging purposes, and how many species of birds were clever, observant, or would eventually catch on to the fact that these free meals led to getting grabbed/caught (Released just fine and with a snack, but still grabbed, measured and tagged).
Not owls though.
They’d look at the bait attached to a pole held by one human. Look at that human, and the human next to them, holding a large net. Look back at the bait. Back at the humans. Repeat a few times.
And every time, without fail. Even ones that had to have seen this play out before. Even ones that had previously been caught and tagged themselves.
They’d go straight for the bait.
Then be confused when, in fact, there was indeed a net thrown over them. Just like before.
And thats tremendously valid of them
I tell people that owls are fantastically evolved for what they do, which is catch moving prey at night. Anything else, they just don’t have the capacity for it.
We give our non-releasable animals enrichment. The vultures and corvids get puzzles, the falcons and hawks get destructables, the quail gets new hides.
The owls? They get their food on a different plate. Or, if we’re feeling daring, we’ll put it slightly under a piece of butcher paper. They never get it. They cannot comprehend that the food is there, just a little different.
We are going to start feeding some of our older owls bugs for their health and I’m genuinely worried that they won’t recognize them as food.
THIS IS RHE FUNNIEST SOUND THING IVE EVER HEARD ON THIS SITE IT MAJES ME LAUGH SO MUCH I LOVE IT IM SO HAPPY
Someone: How was your day
Me: ヽ༼ຈل͜ຈ༽ﾉ
You all have no idea how long I’ve been looking for this post!!! I’m so happy to see it again! It’s been 84 years and I can still smell the fresh paint. Holy shit thank you so much, Internet, I love you!!!
The Adventures of Prince Achmen. 1926. German. The oldest surviving animated film in history.
I am sorry BUT THIS IS NOT JUST “GERMAN” PLEASE DO NOT FORGET THE NAME OF THE ARTIST.
THIS WONDERFUL MOVIE WAS MADE BY LOTTE REINIGER! SHE WAS ONE OF THE PIONEERS OF ANIMATION!!!! SHE MADE OVER 40 FILMS IN HER CAREER USING A TECHNIQUE SHE INVENTED WITH HER HUSBAND! WALT DISNEY ENDED USING HER MULTI PLANE TECHNIQUE IN HIS OWN MOVIES! AND SHE FUCKING MADE THE FIRST FEATURE LENGTH ANIMATED MOVIE!! (she ended up fleeing Nazi germany eventually work in north america, both us and canada, on other movies.)
why would I camp somewhere named Hole Where You’ll Freeze To Death
Yeah I’m going on a camping trip to the Hole Where You’ll Freeze to Death. No I won’t be back soon.
If people are curious about what the video title means, I watched it some time ago, and it’s actually pretty important info to know if you’re going camping/backpacking: heat rises, and cold sinks, so the lowest point of the terrain can become much colder than the surrounding area, especially at night. If the temperature in these low-points drops farther than the temperatures your camping gear is rated for, you can definitely freeze to death.
“Don’t sleep in holes” seems like a pretty obvious statement to make a video about. But it isn’t talking about what we normally think of when we’re asked to describe a hole in the ground. The video is talking about low-lying meadows or depressions, often in cold mountains like the Alps, that are free of trees and large plants. They seem like good flat ground to camp on. And to compound the problem, maybe some poor sucker tried to build a now-abandoned log cabin or shack right in the middle of one that you may be tempted to sleep in, like the one in the thumbnail. But the reason the meadow is free and clear of trees, is because even pine trees, which grow in high altitudes and low temperatures, can’t survive the temperature difference. The downhill slope of the terrain collects the freezing air like water in a bowl, and with nowhere for it to go, it may become even colder than temperatures recorded at much higher elevations in the same area. And you’ll be right there in the middle of it, because it looked very nice in the daylight. Now? Not so much.
So don’t sleep in holes. Best case scenario is that you’ll have a very chilly night’s sleep and a lousy morning. Worst case is that you won’t wake up in the morning at all.
ALT
