Ask the Beasts, and They Will Tell You

Genes of an Icon: Bison

In the DNA of bison, scientists find clues to the animals’ past—and keys to safeguarding their future

Long before ships sailed to North America’s shores, before shopping malls and parking lots blanketed its plains, mahogany waves of muscle, horn, and hide thundered from sea to shining sea. American Bison (Bison bison)—also known as buffalo—have roamed the continent for some 200,000 years, since their ancestors crossed the Bering land bridge from Siberia into Alaska. When humans made the same trek between 15,000 and 20,000 years ago, bison became central to Indigenous people’s way of living: They ate the animal’s meat and fat, and made clothing and shelter from its hide, tools from its bones, rope from its hair, glue from its hooves. Later, the Europeans who arrived on the continent’s shores slaughtered almost all the animals, in order to break the will of Native Americans and clear land for railroads. Later still, people of both Indigenous and European descent began to work together to bring bison back. You can’t tell the story of people in North America without also telling the story of bison, and vice versa. Today, bison number about 530,000, scattered in distinct herds across the continent. Their recovery is one of the 20th century’s great conservation success stories, with the majestic beasts evoking the American wilderness as they stalk reserves such as Yellowstone National Park. Bison are “doing OK” right now, says Steve Yang, a biomedical scientist at the University of Saskatchewan’s (USask’s) Western College of Veterinary Medicine who is part of a major bison genetics project called Bison Integrated Genomics (BIG)...

American Badger (Taxidea taxus), family Mustelidae, ALB, Canada

Apparently you can do a saliva test kit at home:

Anyways, there is a mine outside of a Williamsport-like city in some Soviet-sattelite adjacent country. It's labor force was all from the local prison/prison camp. I am a mine inspector, and looking after mines is my job.

Something big had happened at this mine, and all sorts of mining officials were there. It turns out (after spending what feels like a lifetime milling about in the dust and slag piles) that the miners had discovered this giant tumor-like thing deep in the Earth. For all intents and purposes, it was alive- it bled when penetrated, it was actively growing and expanding into different parts of the mine, now that it had been freed from the space that it was originally inhabiting.

Time passed, and we were slowly figuring out stuff about the thing, but most of the government officials had left, it was pretty much just me and the prison officials working on it. One evening, we get a call that the military is coming to deal with this thing, so I go down into the mine to do one more inspection (or whatever it is that mine inspectors do. I feel like my subconscious isn't fully aware of what a mine inspector even does lol)

So I'm far below the surface, looking at this marvelous thing that we'd discovered. After doing what I was supposed to, I try to leave but discover that the entrance has been sealed with concrete. There's no way out, I'm trapped. I try to contact the surface but it becomes increasingly obvious that they want me to break the ceiling of the mine open to let the river in (like I said, we are in Williamsport. The Susquehanna is right there, presumably above us, sometimes in my dream the mine being structurally unsound from the river is a major concern) to destroy the thing. If that doesn't work, the military will bomb it

Obviously, I don't want to do that, primarily because it'll kill me in one of the worst ways imaginable (drowning in a dark enclosed space) but also because it'll destroy the thing we've been studying. Despite how strange and gross it is, the thing is the first truly original thing I've ever worked with, in a way it's my discovery, even if I didn't find it first, I've been taking notes on it and making observations, so I don't really want to kill it.

last week my grandpa died. i was really close with him.

couple weeks before that my best friend for the past 8 years officially abandoned me. then another one the week after. been pushed out of the only friend group ive ever had over the course of this year.

the place i considered my second home for as long as i can remember was sold to land developers. it’s going to be destroyed.

im having surgery in two days where i won’t be able to do anything for minimum a week. i’ve been so depressed ive been sleeping at least half of every day. started drinking.

Tawny Frogmouth (Podargus strigoides), family Podargidae, order Podargiformes, Australia

The frogmouths used to be included in the Nightjar/Goatsucker order Caprimulgiformes. As of 2019, they are now in their own order. Frogmouths are not as closely related to nightjars as previously thought.

Saint Helen

246 - 330

Feast Day: August 18

Patronage: archaeologists, converts, difficult marriages, divorced people, empresses

St. Helena also was known as St. Helen, Helena Augusta or Helena of Constantinople was the consort of Emperor Constantius and the mother of Emperor Constantine the Great. She is traditionally credited with finding the relics of the True Cross, with which she is often shown within Christian iconography.