He realized his dogs have an unusual skill. Now he uses them to help save turtles.

By Cathy Free

John Rucker was a high school English teacher in North Carolina when he stumbled upon something interesting: Whenever he took his two dogs hiking, they would run into the tall grass and bring him back box turtles. Like a gift, his Boykin spaniels would gently lay them at his feet, unharmed.

He mentioned it to a few people, and soon, biology teachers from the University of North Carolina started reaching out to him and asking whether he would take their students out so they could put transmitters on the turtles to study them.

Several years later, the outings were so successful, Rucker was fielding calls from wildlife veterinarians and zoologists who were studying turtle populations.

“Because turtles aren’t easily detected in the wild by the human eye, I could see that I was on to something,” said Rucker, now 73.

Now, two decades later, Rucker’s spaniels are a highly in-demand, specialized team trained to sniff out box turtles by following their urine trails.

The dogs — Yogi, Ruger, Jenny Wren, Lazarus, Scamp, Skeeter and Rooster — travel across the country with Rucker helping to track turtle populations and identify threats and diseases.

someone accused her of having kept a CHILD SLAVE in a trunk in her university dorm room when she was 19 and also leading a sex trafficking ring. the girl who made the accusation kept adding progressively more and more absurd stuff to the callout every few hours until it was this elaborate wattpad story about how mitski had war criminal parents who altered the internet to disguise her real identity and how the accuser was secretly an informant for the FBI when she was 14 and got pistol whipped in an FBI fight and just more and more stuff. mitski herself had to step in and say it wasn’t true. it was literally qanon conspiracy theory hoax tier shit. 

the whole thing was just really fucked up- not only assigning so much theoretical fame and prestige to this woman that people were convinced these accusations didn’t matter or couldn’t do harm to her because she was uberfamous (and that anyone who promoted skepticism about them was being an idiot celebrity worshipper), but also the way ‘take accusations seriously and don’t dismiss them out of hand simply because you like a celebrity’ so quickly got warped into ‘refuse to apply a critical eye to anything anyone says ever and immediately accept it as fact and spread it as much as you can’. 

sun·light (noun) light from the sun. "a shaft of sunlight"

lord huron, setting sun || unknown || maggie rogers, the knife || sharon van etten, every time the sun comes up || hozier, sunlight || sean o'casey, three more plays: the silver tassie, purple dust, red roses for me || keaton henson, about sophie || lemoncello, stuck upon the staircase || topaz winters, portrait of my body as a crime i’m still committing

if it doesn't, then maybe it should, so, i wanna explain:

México🇲🇽

we are actually about to run out of water: 85% of the mexican territory is in a draught, the worst in 30 years, they say. and there's lakes that are disappearing.

government is spreading "tips" and "infographics" about how to save some water when they're allowing companies like coca-cola and pepsi; cemex, bonafont and bimbo to have leverage in aquifers and they let them own basically 70% of the water in the country thanks to the National Waters Law (Ley de Aguas Nacionales)

oh and just last night (may 3rd) the 12th metro line collapsed in México City and 23 people died. everyone is blaming it on the 2 previous governments' corruption for using cheap materials and rushing to finish it and inaugurate it before it was actually ready

Honduras🇭🇳

same as México, they're running out of water, so far three states are totally out of it, which is around 1.4 million people.

the press has been calling it the worst draught in the history of the country SINCE LAST YEAR

besides the government has stopped buying vaccines and they're leaving around 70% of the population without a vaccination...

Paraguay🇵🇾

there's no space left in the hospitals, the government stole the 1.6k million usd loan that the country got for health care related buys during the pandemic and left the hospitals alone to their luck. people have to sell their things; from their TV's and fridges to their cars, houses, bodies... there's actual people recurring to prostitution so they can buy medicine the government is supposed to be providing

Brasil🇧🇷

Nicaragua🇳🇮

Argentina🇦🇷

Guatemala🇬🇹

they've been having a hard economic crisis; again, surprise surprise, the government has stolen 14 million quetzales (1.8million usd) that was destined to the healthcare department: since the pandemic started people has been fired by hordes, there's no jobs, there's no money, there's no more safe hospitals or doctors to work in them, or equipment. and the president approved the 2021 budget in the middle of the night and took away money from the health and the education departments, leading to massive protests that, as you have guessed, were repressed with police violence.

Costa Rica🇨🇷

government actually created an espionage agency, the UPAD, they're fining people for being outside hiding behind the excuse of the pandemic; which is making hospitals collapse, they passed a recessive tax reform, the Electoral Supreme Court was scammed in the latest elections and they're actually seeking to create a higher rank power, a "superminister", higher than a president, who can hold the three powers of the nation (dictatorship, everyone?)

Uruguay🇺🇾

Perú🇵🇪

they're enduring a huge political crisis, they have to chose a president and their only two options are: a leftist man that wants to take all the agricultural land and divide it in equal parts, doesn't support lgbtttiq rights, privatize almost all services and more reforms that would lead to massive firings AND a woman that it's being investigated for fraud and money laundering and that descends from one of the biggest peruvian dictators and wants to get him out of prison.

this uncertainty of course has made the usd price to sky rocket (because what else is new) and now the prices of everything are rising as well, and the wages? they're staying still

reports on the presidential debate

El Salvador🇸🇻

another political crisis: the president along with the congress (which is mostly sitting his party) dismissed and basically fired the judges of the supreme court and the attorney general. and recommended/nominated new ones from his party, opening the way to the totalitarianism and welp, the end of democracy in the country: dictatorship.

the people is outraged and the international community along with the America States Organization are rejecting this horrid violation to the Constitution of El Salvador but the panorama is still uncertain.

Colombia🇨🇴

the government of Ivan Duque just has been in the process of passing a tax reform to collect around 25 billion Colombian pesos (around 6.5k billion usd) through taxes without raising the minimum wages; this would throw the country in an economic crisis that would impact the lower and middle classes and it would take products off the basic market basket.

the people of Colombia have been marching and protesting about this and the government has replied with police violence, they have their own anti-raid police, the ESMAD, and they have orders to shoot to kill, the process now has paused because of the protest.

there isn't yet an exact number on the death count but what the people is sure of is that they're gonna try to hide it along with the number of rapings and tortures the police has been conducting.

Chile🇨🇱

in 2019 chilean government rose the price of the metro/subway and there were protests and marches and manifestations, which led, of course, to policial repression, this was a whole ordeal that was condemned by the UN, now, the people is tired that the same government hasn't dealt properly with the sanitary contingency so they starter planing a huge strike; dozens of worker unions planning to march on april 30th to show that they're millions and they want the president out.

then the president was acused of crimes against humanity before the International Court of Human Rights for the repression of the 2019 protests...

Venezuela🇻🇪

well, if you haven't heard about the venezuelan crisis, you've been living under a rock: it's been going on for more than 20 years, venezuelan people live under a dictatorship (fucking incredible we still have those in the world), the police kills people that march and manifest, citizens don't have dignified access to: public transport, gas and gasoline, electricity, food, water, medicine and medical equipment let alone the covid vaccine.

and when the venezuelan people wanna leave the mediocre and deplorable conditions in which their government had made them live? conditions in which if you don't die of sickness, you get killed by a cop or killed in a robbery or killed on a raid? if you don't die of hunger you die of thirst? they raised the passport prices! and so the venezuelan people as a lot of people in Latinoamérica have to illegally migrate; and we all know how that's seen.

Puerto Rico🇵🇷

an immense femicide rise and Gender Violence alert.

Panamá🇵🇦

and all this happened within the last week.

donations and ways to help México and Colombia

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