Rewild your yard already, geez
Kat Eschner's newsletter about human-animal relationships, Vol. 4 iss. 11
This week’s issue of The Quick Fox is brought to you by yards. The places, not the units of measurement.
I don’t have anything weighty to say on them (I’m *still sick*, huge bored yawn), but the story I wrote on global threats to fireflies earlier in the week got me thinking. Some people online responded to that story with total nihilism, but there is actually a lot that people with yards (and people who know people with yards) can do for fireflies and less charismatic insects, along with the other native plants and animals trying to eke out a living in an increasingly hostile world.
Plant native plants, especially native trees, and encourage the city to do the same. Don’t rake or mow. Guard sources of light pollution. Make sure there’s (moving) water around. #RewildYourYard. Sure, there’s lots of other stuff to be doing and saying, but here’s a concrete action you can take now for the species around you.
Image: A GIF from the South Park episode “Goth Kids 3: Dawn of the Posers” and a fine example of native species cultivation. (Credit: Giphy/South Park)
Roundup
Things I read this week, sorted by the amount of time I suspect it will take you to get through them.
Shortish
Police investigating viral Villeray alligator after report of toddler bitten (Montreal Gazette; Montreal, Canada)
Bumblebees are going extinct in a time of climate chaos (National Geographic; Douglas Main; North America)
Nighttime camera catches coyote and badger in absolute cahoots (Gizmodo; George Dvorsky; Gilroy, California, USA)
Bonus coyote/badger Twitter thread from behavioral ecologist Jennifer Campbell-Smith
Longish
Habitat loss, climate change make for an uncertain cricket harvest in Uganda (Mongabay; Thomas Lewton; Masaka, Uganda)
Did pangolins spread the China coronavirus to people? (Nature; David Cyranoski; Tokyo, Japan)
Indonesia softens stance on WWF termination as programs fall into limbo (Mongabay; Hans Nicholas Jong; Jakarta, Indonesia)
Please read me
My most recent work.
The last word
I’m concerned about the pangolins (scaly anteaters are already in enough trouble) after scientists IDed the species as the possible vector of the 2019 novel coronavirus to humans.
When civets were IDed as the vector for SARS, the Chinese government drowned thousands of them in disinfectant, writes Kate Mason in her book about the medical anthropology of SARS. I doubt that exact thing would happen to the pangolins, for a lot of reasons, but I definitely don’t think being IDed as potential 2019-nCoV hosts will do them any good.
Questions? Comments? Compliments? Complaints? Contact me at my email or on Twitter. If you enjoy this newsletter and would like to tip me, I am on Ko-fi.
All images in CREATURE FEATURE are used under Creative Commons licensing. Efforts have been made to ensure that photographs of living animals or natural scenes have been taken ethically, in responsible pet ownership conditions, at AZA-accredited zoos and aquariums or under safe, non-damaging conditions in the wild. If you see an issue with any image we share, please notify me.