I’m Not A Songbird. I’m A Screm Bird!

People ask me why I find myself hopelessly in love with biology and want to major in genetics. Here’s why:

I have this fish tank. A glass box of water I put sand and rocks in. But the point of a fish tank are the things that are alive. I have plants that reach outstretched hands to the light and grow to the barrier between the clear fluid they live in and the clear gas we breathe. In one single leaf so much chemistry takes place, photosynthesis makes ungraspable light into life supporting substance.

And in my fish tank I have a fish. A fish that can be found lifeless in cups in pet stores, but I’ve seen this fish thrive. I’ve seen him change color due to jumping genes. I’ve seen him play in the filter meaning he makes decisions. Something so small exists and lives and makes choices. It baffles me, truly. Such vibrant color that I can only compare to something man made and yet it was nature that did it first.

I see this little world that I have placed on my shelf. Cared for by me; dependent on me. It amazes me the human emotion I have for them, and how far humanity has gone that I can dose the tank and manage it on a delicate scale.

And sometimes I wonder, what if we exist on a glass box on someone’s shelf? One way glass we can’t look out, but if we could, everything would be different? What if we are all a fragment of someone’s novel or a C+ science project? Life is so so amazing, it’s baffling.

Cockroaches!

Jessi tries to convince you that cockroaches are cool! After the video I bet you'll agree that even though some can be pests, there's way more cool things ab...

Cockroaches are highly underrated animals. Madagascar hissers have complex social groups, fascinating communication, and studies suggest that they can even differentiate between individual humans (i.e. they don’t hiss defensively when picked up by someone that they know).

I love my three pet roachlings and would actually highly recommend Madagascar hissing cockroaches as a great low maintenance pet. They are easy to handle, fascinating to watch, and incredibly easy to care for. Plus they only live 2-5 years so they aren’t a hugely long term commitment.

Deer at cemeteries.

Do you have any cursed facts about deer? They are my favorite animal.

there’s an entire subset of deer that have sabre fangs instead of antlers!

this is because the very earliest deer on the planet had both antlers AND fangs, but over time deer diverged into two separate lineages that had either antlers OR fangs and they’re both still around today!

⛅

“May we raise children who love the unloved things”

by Nicolette Sowder

May we raise children who love the unloved things–the dandelion, the worms and spiderlings. Children who sense the rose needs the thorn

& run into rainswept days the same way they turn towards sun…

And when they’re grown & someone has to speak for those who have no voice

may they draw upon that wilder bond, those days of tending tender things

and be the ones.

After ten years and probably over a hundred individual skulls, I finally did it. I finally found one.

I found a white-tailed deer with a vestigial canine tooth

Those Legs!

Shout-out to the little girl at work who started crying when she saw a tarantula not because it was scary but because “it’s so fuzzy and I can’t pet it because there’s glass”.