Howler FX

Maleficent is finally a reality!!! I just got back from a quick shoot with Leah Kelley Photography, and I’m SO happy to share these with you guys! This… is officially… my favorite cosplay ever.

UNDERSTANDING MARINE MAMMALS -  The Mammal Collection at UAMN has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the North Pacific Research Board, which supports peer-reviewed scientific research in the Gulf of Alaska, Bering Sea, Aleutian Islands and Arctic Ocean to inform effective management decisions and support the sustainable use of marine resources.

The money will be used to rehouse and curate 20,000 marine mammal specimens at the museum. It includes support for one graduate and one undergraduate student to work in the collection. The grant will also allow the museum to purchase several new specimen cases.

The work will help researchers study the museum’s world-class collection of marine mammals, including specimens like this crabeater seal skull from Antarctica (photo, bottom). With over 21,000 specimens, UAMN’s marine mammal collection is larger than those of the next three museum collections combined.

Curator Link Olson says it is an important resource for research and growing quickly. “Due to Alaska’s vast coastline and the close working relationship among the museum, subsistence users, and both state and federal agencies, our marine mammal collection continues to grow at a rapid pace.

"This grant will enable us to properly house a backlog of specimens so that they’re more readily available to researchers."

In the past decade alone, UAMN’s mammal collection has loaned material from more than 4,000 marine mammal specimens to scientists around the world.

If anyone wanted to see where that werewolf with skinny jeans was from, here’s my final project for this semester in Illustration! It’s just a cute little thing about body image and being proud of who you are.

I AM SO FUCKING DONE WITH THIS WEBSITE LIKE I CANNOT.

~*~*~*LUPA’S 5000 ETSY SALES CELEBRATION GIVEAWAY!!!!!*~*~*~

So over the weekend, the Green Wolf Etsy shop got its 5000th sale—woohoo! This was a great thing to have happen on the heels of unveiling my redesigned website, the greenwolf.com :)

As a way of saying thank you, I am giving away not one, but four fabulous prizes! Here’s what I’m giving away, one to each of four winners:

Giveaway #1: One red coyote headdress, made by me, with absolutely beautiful coloration! He’s completely finished and ready to wear. His tail’s a little poor, and he’s got a few flaws on his muzzle, but for a damaged, craft-quality hide he turned out into a lovely headdress!

Giveaway #2: One shaped red fox mask with matching tail. The tail doesn’t yet have an attachment, which means the winner gets to choose whether it’ll have a hand-braided leather belt loop, a carabiner, or one of my traditional braided leather belts. 

Giveaway #3: A signed copy of New Paths to Animal Totems: Three Alternative Approaches to Creating Your Own Totemism, AND you’ll get a signed copy of Plant and Fungus Totems: Connect With Spirits of Field, Forest and Garden when it comes out in May 2014! 

Giveaway #4: My animal menagerie set of six animal claw and tooth necklaces!

How Do I Enter?

You can reblog this post here on Tumblr, OR post a link to it on another social media site like Facebook, Google Plus, or Twitter. Just make sure I know where it’s been posted.

The Rules

Entrants must be US residents 18 years or older. (Apologies to younger and international folks.) You do NOT have to be following me (though follows are always appreciated!) and followers will not be privileged over non-followers. You must have your ask box open or otherwise have an easy way for me to contact you.

You can only reblog twice per week, with a week starting on Sunday and ending on the following Saturday. Any entries over two per week will be discarded. The giveaway ends at 6pm PST on Thursday, April 3, 2014, rain, shine, or site crashes.

I feel like all this sudden surprise that this contestant when “Too far” is really just people trying to absolve themselves from guilt.

Everywhere you turn people push, idolize and glorify rapid weight loss. America watches Biggest Loser and collectively congratulates the contestant that battles their “food demons” with the most strength and self discipline.

Americans will literally watch a contestant work out for 12 hours a day and cut their calorie count to 1/4 of the recommended daily value and see them as an example if strong will and determination.

The best way to fatally wound a wolf without killing it instantly is to shoot it in the gut, preferably with armor-piercing ammunition. Unlike soft lead-tipped bullets, which mushroom inside the body cavity and kill quickly, heavy-jacketed AP ammo pierces the target and blows out the other side.

This has two advantages: The first is that, especially with a gut shot, the animal will suffer. It will bleed out slowly, run a mile or so in terrified panic, and collapse. Then it will die. The second advantage is that, if you’re hunting illegally (out of season, at night with a spotlight, or on land where you shouldn’t), there is little forensic evidence for game wardens to gather. No bullet will be found in the cadaver. Most importantly, the animal will have traveled some distance from where it was shot, so that tracing the site of the shooting is almost impossible.

I gleaned these helpful tips from a nice old man at a saloon in Salmon, Idaho, which last December was the site of the first annual Coyote and Wolf Derby. 

This is not honorable hunting, not the sort of hunting I support. And it’s sad that the vestiges of irrational hatred for wolves still exists, the type that was described by Barry Holstun Lopez and others. 

But that’s not the full story. Further north, hunting is one of the ways people, indigenous and otherwise, have to make money. In a colder climate where the agricultural season is really short, where there are fewer people and generally fewer economic opportunities compared to further south in the lower 48, hunting and trapping can be a really valuable way to make sure you have money for food (which can be insanely overpriced), fuel to stay warm, etc. 

Or another

I’m gonna meetcha

I’m gonna