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Turkeys (mom and chicks) wandered into my back yard today. Mom gave me a "what are you looking at" look when i peeked my head around the corner to see what they were.


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BigNorseWolf wrote:

I volunteered a few times at a raptor center. Job is pretty much go into the cages and pick up the liter the birds left behind with a grabber stick and a bucket. I get to the Great horned owl enclosure and there's a garbage can lid propped up by the door. Knowledge nature check: Great horned owls are notoriously bad tempered. So i go in with the garbage can lid and start cleaning up.

Sure enough the owl flies at me. THUMP. Right into the garbage can lid. The owl starts climbing back up onto his perch while I'm cleaning up (oddly enough it looked like it hadn't been clean in a few days so i'm here a while)

Other volunteer "Ooo.. forgot to tell you you weren't supposed to do that one he's a little..."

Keep cleaning, hold garbage can lid up. Give it a little give as the owl hits it so he doesn't rebound off it quite as hard and keep cleaning without looking at him.

"...you're good at that. Normally we do this in pairs"

"Who knew playing captain america as a kid would have a practical application..."

*thump*

I wonder if anyone else thought of Chris Pratt when you said raptor center.


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There's a reason they're the same word...


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Woran wrote:

I have pet rats.

...
rat in a sock

While we are posting rat photos...

Here is a photo of Brynhild, after her third or forth time chewing her stitches:{

In the end, she made a full recovery, and passed away of unrelated causes. Here is a little more about her story.

Currently we have 3 rats who are just amazing. I just wish they could live forever, instead of a few short years.


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Double Ought Stick

My forestry college was in the adirondacks. Middle of nowhere. Night before a Letter Printing asignment is due, i drop the 30 dollar ruby tipped technical pen on the ground and bend the tip, ruining it.

So i took a stick, whittled a point on it, cut a grove into it, and widdened out a small knot near the top for a reservoir. Write write write wittle wittle wittle write write whittle whittle...

I didn't get a great grade with it, but it was still the best grade I'd gotten on a writing asignment.

This is the same place where i broke my fingers playing basketball the week we were doing chainsaw exercises. I had my first two fingers taped to the third So i can only move my thumb and my pinkie. I managed to use those two fingers to go through the chainsaw drills...

And had points taken off because i was running the chainsaw at full speed the entire time. You know. because i'm clutching it with 2 fingers...

___

I am very cold resistant (see the great goose chase above). A fair bit of..ahem. Insulation along with never liking wearing my coat and i just got used to ignoring the cold.

We're doing a tree survey exercise. There's three feet of snow on the ground, I'm in a t shirt and sweat pants. My partner has on a t shirt, thermals, sweatshirt, jacket, carhart overjacket. Down below he has thermals, sweatpants, and carharts. He's so frozen i'm breaking trail the entire time.

Lunch rolls around. He's too chilled to move. I stamp the snow down, throw down my back pack sit on it and take out soup from a thermos. He looks down and goes ".... i hate you"


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I miss having pet rats...they are just great creatures!

Mine used to sit on the edge of my beer glass and share Guinness extra stout with me! And at one time, used to try and ride our ferrets like a bull...which is the funniest gorram thing I have pretty much ever seen.

And there was that time my wife hung a pair of my pants on their cage to dry...yeah...they were short shorts after that...

Live and learn, and avoid using rat cages as a drying rack :)

To be fair BNW, having cold resistance 10 prolly does evoke envy and mild annoyance from those without...not that it is your problem...they should pick better traits and or class features ;)

I like having woodland stride...folks are always like "what the hell man, how did you just get through that tangle without leaving a trail or getting snarled?"

normally I just go with "Druid" as my answer, but I am nice and hold branches for those without woodland stride.

Every 10 branches to the face avoided is a beer for me...works out perfect!

Scarab Sages

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Fergie wrote:
Woran wrote:

I have pet rats.

...
rat in a sock

While we are posting rat photos...

Here is a photo of Brynhild, after her third or forth time chewing her stitches:{

In the end, she made a full recovery, and passed away of unrelated causes. Here is a little more about her story.

Currently we have 3 rats who are just amazing. I just wish they could live forever, instead of a few short years.

Aw, look at her in her little sweater <3

We are now rat-sitting the rats of friends while they are on holliday.
We have female rats. They have male rats. We of course keep them separate. But they know that there are other rats in the house.

The men are now hopelessly in love. They have started upping the man-stink to be more appealing to the ladies. They are also acting all love sick, rubbing themselves on the bars closest to the ladies cage and making love noises.
The ladies are not impressed by this and mostly seem convinced the men are here to steal their food, which they are now hiding more vigorously then before.


That is priceless Woran!


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No wonder. The males probably would steal their food, given the slightest opportunity.


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Just found this thread.
My officially-favorite new thread.

Great stories! Thanks for insight into animal-kind, and the entertainment!
:)

That is all,...


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A friend asked me to take him to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area, so we're going this Friday. I have to miss 2 game nights (different groups), but usually I have to take these trips solo, so I drop whatever to take people who are interested.

Going to an area I was last in about 7 years ago. I was there with my dad and dog. We stopped on a lake I had really been looking forward to because it had some of the tallest hills in the region (no mountains in Minnesota, well... 1 technically) and the contrast with bluffs and lakes is pretty. We found a campsite we like in the early afternoon and took the rest of the day off. I hadn't really set up camp, but put my sleeping pad on the ground and took a nap with the dog snuggling next to me (it was a warm May day).

I woke up to the sound of my dad making indistinct yelling. Out of instinct I grabbed the dogs collar, then sat up to look around. About 30-40 feet from me was a good sized black bear.

sidenote: a friend of my dad's has the record for a bear shot and killed in the state. He has it stuffed in his apartment. The one staring at me was probably smaller, but they always look bigger when you confront them.

He was between me and the water, but kind of behind a rock and on slightly lower ground. He was also next to all of our gear. I started yelling, the dog started barking. To anthropomorphize a little, the bear looked at me and had this really puzzled look on his face. Then after was seemed like minutes, but probably 20 seconds, he took off running straight towards my dad. He passed by him, just a few feet away.

Right next to our gear was a large pile of bear poop. I like to think that we scared it out of him.

Normally I don't build fires in the BWCA, just a lot of work, so much easier to use my stove. That night we kept a fire going though. The bear didn't come back.

Scarab Sages

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Sissyl wrote:
No wonder. The males probably would steal their food, given the slightest opportunity.

Oh most certainly. But probably after love-making.

At the moment my living room smells like a teenage locker room (minus the insane amount of deodorant.)


Boy rats...full of MaCHEESEmo...

Scarab Sages

Yeah, they are nice and stinky now, and their fur has gone extra fatty so it holds that stink better.


::boy rats:: Ladies...we got all musky and oily for ya...

::lady rats:: well...when you put it that way...


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*ponders selling axe body spray for rats*

Just need to explain the concept of valuable shiny vs junk shiny to them...

Scarab Sages

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GM_Beernorg wrote:

::boy rats:: Ladies...we got all musky and oily for ya...

::lady rats:: well...when you put it that way...

Its one big soap.

We've been letting them snif each other trough the bars of the cage so they know who they are dealing with. Hearing and smelling from a distance is fine, but a few nose touches is good so its all less stressfull.

Except of course when you're a boy rat and you touch noses and OMG its a real female and I touched her and what now OMG panic mode run away.

The ladies so far find the boys a lot more interesting when they touch noses. Except for Zena, who wants to bite them.

Zena wants affection on her own terms. Pet me or pick me up? No way. Big protest. She accidentally walks into your hand? Ok, then fine. Now that I'm here anyway you may pet me.


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Woran wrote:
Zena wants affection on her own terms. Pet me or pick me up? No way. Big protest. She accidentally walks into your hand? Ok, then fine. Now that I'm here anyway you may pet me.

In her next incarnation she'll be a cat. Only a few more steps to the Nirvana...


Ninja'd buy Drejk, yeah, someone should tell Zena that those are ::gasp:: cat-likes behaviors!

Our rat Bria may have well been a black lab in her previous life, I swear that rat rolled over for tummy rubs and licked faces (and tongues, yep, don't ask, it's sorta...weird) like she was a canine.

Not that I minded...she was my tiny "sorta like a dog" pal.

And she had good taste in beer ;)

Scarab Sages

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I love that rats all have their individual personalities.
Big White is big, and white. And loves eating the most. But also likes to wedge herself between my leg and laptop when I sit on the couch. Or sit on my shoulders when I do the dishes (dishes are fascinating)

Zelda has astma, so If she's sleeping on her head, or excited about something, you can hear her puffing away. She's a bit of a scaredy cat, so if you sneeze or drop something she hides away. But she loves playing with toys.

Zena is Zena. And a Rex. So she is sooooooooooo soft.

Zelena is scared of everything. Its her personality. Very anxious rat. But loves exploring. She wont sit in your lap. But blink and she's at the other end of the room in your book case, happily exploring away.


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In highschool, we were playing dungeons and dragons on a concrete spillway of a rather large drain. (yay, ambiance). A few blocks up, some people heard us playing and yelled down

"what are you doing?"

"Playing dungeons and dragons

"what, like sacrificing people to satan and stuff?

One of the other players starts to do the whole no its just a game spiel, i stop them and start changing scientific names from an herb guide book and faux latin

"denstabula punctilabula quercus alba in quinitum draconis BRING ON THE VIRGIN

From down the pipe we hear "Ahhhhhhhhhh" running away. Nothing "aahhhhhhhhhh" as they neared another drain , nothing and then a very faint "ahhhhhhhh" as they passed another one.

Scarab Sages

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I like going to the zoo.
I like going to the zoo and petting things I am not supposed to.

One time, we were walking past the rhino. He's in his bachelor pad and has just finished rolling in his mud pit. Now he's taking a nap in the sun to let the mud dry up.

And then he rips the most god-awful fart.
Eye watering, gag-inducing, rotten plant matter smell.

*everyone* ran away. It was so bad.


LOL!

Too. Much. Fiber!


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If it's green and wriggles it's biology
If it stinks it's also biology.
If it doesn't work it's still physics.


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There is a children's song in there somewhere...

Pigs snort and rhinos fart,
If you like science, don't read breitbart

Scarab Sages

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BigNorseWolf wrote:


If it stinks it's also biology.

Or chemistry. There are some powerful stenches hiding on lab shelves.

Years ago I worked for a chemical supply company, with a lab and a warehouse full of various chemicals. One day an employee knocked a 500ml bottle of a chemical related to pyrrolidine off the shelf, and it shattered. We evacuated the warehouse, the lab, and the office. We left every door in the place open overnight, with no fear of thieves. If they could get inside to steal anything, they would have earned it. That was the worst smell I've ever experienced.


Noted, do not spill Pyrrolidine's related smelly cousin!


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
BigNorseWolf wrote:

Bat boxes might help, if there's somewhere safe they can go. Otherwise just watch and enjoy. They're an animal thats dealing fairly well with humans. They love our houses, like the lights, and we're not really hunting them for food.

Bat boxes? These like bird houses for bats?

I mostly just enjoy watching them fly around. While it would be cool to have one as a pet, I'm sure that's not the best for the animal.


Exactly like birdhouses for birds, except they provide a safe roost for bats, very easy to build too


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Drive home from gencon

See eyes on the side of the road

"CRITTER!"

Skid to a stop. Possum runs circles in front of the car and then trundles off to the side of the road

"Someone needs to tell them the druid isn't driving"

Bat flies up to my window and starts flapping around

"Oh come ON...."


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Yesterday we had a photo session with two foxes... I need to upload the photos (new phone -> new camera).


Seems you are very popular with the mid-west creatures of nature BNW.

They are just...batty about druids out that way ;)


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also, bats are adorable!

Scarab Sages

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GM_Beernorg wrote:
also, bats are adorable!

Yes, they are.

YouTube, Imgur, and the like have done a lot for bats' reputation. Baby bats wrapped in tiny blankets, yawning bats, and bats gleefully eating fruit are all much more positive images than the classic "vampire bat feeding on a large herbivore" pictures that were common a few decades ago.


the leaf nosed bat and big eared bats are personal favorites of mine, along with the good old common brown bat


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I saw a bat once, crawling on a grass in the early aftrnoon, it was adorable. When I returned with gloves and some water just in case (it was terrible hot then) it was already gone.

Scarab Sages

GM_Beernorg wrote:
the leaf nosed bat and big eared bats are personal favorites of mine, along with the good old common brown bat

You HAVE to google honduran white bat.


Those guys, I love those little guys, they are awesome!

Thanks for reminding me of them Woran!

Other white bats (in this case the northern ghost bat)

northern-ghost-bat/

I want a pet bat badly....wonder how feasible that actually is...


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Careful of bats with white noses...it's a fungal infection.


yeah, white-nose is not cool, had to learn about that before caving in Lava Beds in fact.


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There's no known risk to humans (directly) from white-nose syndrome. The danger is instead ecological. If you see a bat with WNS, it's probably already too late for your area.

Yup, it's largely spread by cavers (humans) who bring contaminated soil from one cave to another.


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No longer a problem here in the Northeast. They're all dead. (slight exaggeration)
Somewhere over a 90% mortality rate in the first couple years.

Appears to only affect cave-hibernating bats, so those that spend their winters elsewhere are still fine.
More important than ever to avoid disturbing any bat hibernacula, though. Which I'd expect anyone likely to go caving to know by now, but still.


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+1's for Iron and thejeff...cause of that thing that GI Joe would always say :)


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

We've got 3 species of bat here in Nebraska: Large Brown Bat, Small Brown Bat, and Red Bats.
I've looked them up online, and they all have "tails", or a flap of wing between their hind legs. The ones I see flying around do not have this.
I've been trying to identify which bats these are, but most of the ones I find apparently aren't native to this area...


We don't have nearly as many nor as large of bats as we need to in Illinois. I know this because we have SO DAMN MANY LOCUSTS! It's loud. That's all I'm saying. It's very loud. And I want it to end.


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Cicadas are crazy here. Luckily, I have two cicada hawk wasp nests in my back yard. Those things are huge (up to 2 inches in length) and don't care about people. I've seen them fly back to the nests carrying the cicadas, which are just as big as them or larger, and it's pretty cool to watch.


We have those too. Many years ago (22ish?) I worked delivering ice to various stores/gas stations/etc. Partner and I were driving along through a small town and all of a sudden one of those wasps landed on the near-vertical windshield, hanging on with only two legs while carrying its prey in the back four legs. Then it just started walking up the windshield. First time either of us had ever seen one, and it freaked us both out since we had no idea they didn't go after people.


Oh, and we have a lot of bats here. They're just lazy.


Too full of locusts?


Not if my backyard is any indication.

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