A program in Borneo is paying villagers to photograph wildlife instead of hunting it, turning former hunters into protectors of endangered species. Through the KehatiKu program, run by Borneo Futures, more than 800 people in nine villages in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan province earn up to $200 a month by uploading photos and audio recordings of animals, with bonuses for rare sightings like orangutans. Their contributions have produced 378,000 confirmed observations, including Critically Endangered and Endangered species like the Bornean orangutan and Abbott’s gibbon. “Where previously they caught one bird and it was worth 50,000 rupiah, now they just need to take a photo,” the program’s Indonesia director told AFP, while a 72-year-old farmer named Imelda said, “we really, really want to protect them.” One farmer said the extra income is helping pay for his children’s college educations. Funded through 2028 with $300,000 in philanthropic money, the program is expanding to two more villages next month, and its managing director says there’s now evidence that local forests and wildlife are “valued more for conservation than exploitation.”
‘Through increased awareness and education
World Animal Day (October 4th)
seeks to create a world where animals are always
recognized as sentient beings and full regard is always paid to their welfare.’
-carole king, american musician
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source credits: Aaron Parnas, Borneo Futures Science For Change, Kehati Ku
‘Tis almost the season for voting, here are just a couple of winning candidates
Akeetna, a small town of around 1,000 people, is a base for exploring Denali, North America’s highest peak, and may have been the inspiration for the fictional town Cicely in the 1990s television show Northern Exposure. It is best known, though, for electing a cat as mayor.
On the main street in Talkeetna is Nagley’s, a general store whose history stretches back to Alaska’s gold rush era. Open since 1921, it started as a log cabin serving miners and trappers, and also previously served as a post office and a district territorial headquarters. Since the 1970s, it has always had a resident cat.
In 1997, when Nagley’s needed a new store cat, manager Laurie Stec found and adopted a Manx mix with a short tail whom she dubbed Stubbs. Stubbs became a local celebrity, greeting shoppers at Nagley’s and making his way every afternoon to the adjoining West Rib Pub & Grill, where he drank catnip-infused water out of a wine or margarita glass.
Talkeetna’s residents were unimpressed by the human candidates for Mayor and conspired to elect Stubbs as a write-in candidate. As fun as the story is, it’s apocryphal. Talkeetna is unincorporated, so it has no mayor. But that didn’t stop Talkeetna’s residents from naming Stubbs their honorary mayor, an office he held from 1997 until his death in 2017.
During his time in office, Mayor Stubbs seemed determined to use up his nine lives. He fell into a restaurant fryer, which was thankfully turned off and cool at the time. He was shot by teenagers with a BB gun and recovered. He jumped onto a garbage truck and accidentally hitched a ride to the outskirts of town before he was discovered and returned. In 2013, Stubbs survived an assassination attempt when he was mauled by a dog. He was rushed to a veterinarian in nearby Wasilla where he was sedated and treated for a punctured lung, a fractured sternum, and a gash in his side that required 12 stitches. Supporters donated money above and beyond his medical bills, and the excess was donated to local animal charities.
Stubbs recovered and returned to his post at the general store, but he passed away in 2017 at the age of 20. He was mourned by all of his constituents. The town carried on the tradition by naming Nagley’s younger store cats, twins Aurora and Denali, as the new honorary mayors. Denali passed away in 2022, but Aurora continues to serve from her office at Nagley’s.
BOSTON CURTIS THE MULE (Committeeman, in Milton, Washington)
In 1938, Democratic Mayor Kenneth Simmons nominated a “Mr. Boston Curtis” for Republican precinct committeeman in the town of Milton, Washington. With no opponents and also no additional information provided to the voters, Curtis was elected with 51 votes — and then subsequently revealed to be a mule. The mayor, a Democrat, had sponsored Boston’s candidacy as a prank, which apparently had a message – he went on to say that voters “have no idea whom they support.”
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‘when you turn an election into a three-ring circus,
there’s always a chance that the dancing bear will win.” -nancy isenberg, author
( not gracie, but a cute giraffe modeling being in a similar situation)
A 3-year-old giraffe named Gracie escaped from her enclosure at a Texas Hill Country ranch nearly two weeks ago and remains missing despite helicopter searches, reported sightings, and a $5,000 reward. Ranch owner Vic Jones believes she wandered through rugged terrain and exited through the wrong side of a gate. Authorities say Gracie poses little danger to people because she is in a remote, heavily wooded area with abundant vegetation and will have no problem finding food. Local officials and residents continue searching, though leads have often arrived days after she moved on, making recovery difficult.
how do you lose a giraffe?
can you not see her?
she’s on the lam
she’s very tall
she’s clever
she’s quick
i’m on team gracie
hope she finds a great place to live and be free
go, gracie, go!
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‘sometimes the best hiding place is one that’s in plain sight.’
“trotting together we know our way, through bright sun of morning our cares, cast away; our ponies fly over fields and streams, working together, weaving our dreams.
From ” Ponies,” Celebrate the Seasons” ― Suzy Davies,
These animals, crafted from cardboard and plywood, make up “The Herds,” a public art project that recently set off from the Democratic Republic of Congo on a journey through major cities in Africa and Europe. The goal is to raise awareness about how the climate crisis is endangering the very animals represented by the life-size puppets. “We believe thousands and thousands of people are watching us,” project member Siphokazi Mpofu told AFP. “We believe out of these thousands, maybe 10 will take out something on what we are doing and then take it back to their communities, to their cities.”Watch a video of the herd in motion.
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‘The wildlife and the natural beauty of this earth are the heritage of all generations to come.
Beavers completed a million dollar dam project in 2 days
Beavers know a thing or two about efficiency — and this story is evidence of that. Last week, a beaver colony in the Brdy region of the Czech Republic cut out the middlemen and built several dams right where they were needed, all in the span of about two days. For context, the local government had a plan in the works since 2018 to restore waterways in the area, but the animals essentially beat them to it.
“They built the dams without any project documentation and for free,” Bohumil Fišer, head of the Brdy Protected Landscape Area Administration, said in a translated statement, per Radio Prague International. He added that the beavers saved the government around 30 million Czech crowns — the equivalent of $1.2 million.
The beavers’ craftwork will go a long way, benefiting the rare stone crayfish, frogs, and other wetland species. “Beavers always know best,” added Jaroslav Obermajer, head of the Central Bohemian Office of the Czech Nature and Landscape Protection Agency. “The places where they build dams are always chosen just right — better than when we design it on paper.”
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“clearly, animals know more than we think, and think a great deal more than we know.”
*irene m. pepperberg
*author of: ‘alex me: how a scientist and a parrot discovered a hidden world of animal intelligence and formed a deep bond in the process’
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source credits; nice news, brdy protected landscape area administration
I had no idea this was a thing, and my world was made better by learning that this happens.
Each year in Italy, grazing animals are moved from high pastures down to the plains. Newborn lambs are unable to make this journey on their own. Instead, they ride in the pouches of a specially made saddle on the back of a donkey or a mule nanny. They are taken down at rest stops and returned to their mothers for a bite to eat and a bit of nuzzling.
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“animals are such agreeable friends—they ask no questions; they pass no criticisms.”
Cows have best friends. Lists of the world’s most intelligent animals don’t often feature cows, but they have more emotional depth than they get credit for. A 2011 study by scientists at the University of Northampton in England revealed that not only do cows have best friends, but they also get stressed out when separated from their BFFs. The research was conducted by comparing heart rates and cortisol levels during 30-minute sessions in which a cow was penned with a “preferred partner” it was known to have a close bond with, then a “familiar but non-preferred individual.” When the besties shared a pen together, their heart rates were lower and other signs of stress were also reduced.
Cows aren’t the only animals that form friendships. Chimpanzees and bonobos do, too, as do several others, including dolphins, horses, certain birds, and marmots. Dolphins can identify their friends by taste, whereas most other creatures are known for simply grooming, remaining in close proximity to, and touching their besties — capuchin monkeys, for example, gently stick their fingers in one another’s eye sockets as a bonding ritual.
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source credits: gary larson image, university of northampton, vegnews.com, interesting facts
A group of lemurs is called a conspiracy. Lemurs are social animals and live in mini communities of around 10-25 members. As a result of this, they often work together, or ‘conspire’ to outwit predators using a technique called ‘mobbing’.
