Nuisance behaviors are normal behaviors that annoy or may pose some danger

Avoid thoughts about it being spite, dominance, or vengeance- this creates an adversarial relationship with your pet in your mind. Makes you less likely to recognize what your cat actually needs to help

Punishment should always be last option, not first. Why? Because if the punishment is delayed or inconsistent (you sleep, leave the house, etc), cat only learns that "sometimes this person just goes ballistic at me for no reason" which in turn creates *anxiety*.

Scratching? Scratching is psychologically necessary. Even declawed cats will do this even though it causes them pain.

Protect furniture with a cover. Not aversives like sticky tape, just protect. Look at what textures, heights, sturdiness, orientation, location cat is scratching. Do best to replicate with something they *can* scratch. Encourage them to use with play, attention, treats.

Climbing counters? Cats want to be high AND social.

Keep tempting items off counters. Provide nearby climbing opportunities that are slightly higher than counter. Put treats there to encourage use.

Do NOT punish when up high or on slick surface. Startle response means they can easily land wrong and break a bone.

Pouncing on ankles? Cat needs more opportunities to express hunting behaviors AND interact with you.

If pouncing through doors, keep basket of noisy toys nearby and toss a toy through door to get cat to pounce on that instead. Provide more enrichment.

small animal fur farms are bougie bullshit but just admit you want a ~special pet~ rather than spin it as something non selfish

*not all fur is bad. large animal fur is incredibly useful and when well kept can last decades longer than plastic polyester bullshit

Nut weevil (genus Curculio) on a USB cable

yes! while they do have differing ecologies—mantises generally are elongate, diurnal predators and cockroaches generally are flattened, nocturnal detritivores—it’s not so surprising if you take a closer look:

they are one another’s closest relatives, being grouped together in the superorder Dictyoptera, which is revealed by their many shared anatomical features.

if you compare the wing structure on these two, you’ll find the veins are very similar. to get a mantis out of a roach, evolutionarily speaking, all you’ve got to do is elongate the pronotum (roach head shield, mantis ‘torso’), elongate the legs, and enlarge the eyes.

mantises and roaches also both produce “oothecae,” tough eggcases in which eggs are protected from the environment. mantis ooths are often made of sturdy, hard foam, while roach ooths are leathery and purse-like.

the raptorial legs of mantises aren’t too greatly modified from a roach forelimb, either. roaches already have spiny legs for digging and defense; with additional spines organized in rows, there’s a powerful grasping foreleg.

additionally, some of the most basal (least changed from the original ancestor) mantises retain a number of very roach-like features, such as flat bodies, a short pronotum, and long cerci (“butt antennae”). Chaeteessa doesn’t even have the long spike at the end of the tibia segment! although I’m not entirely sure if all of these roachy structures are necessary primitive and not secondarily derived, these two do give a good look at how mantises might’ve looked before they evolved the characteristic spindly green forms you recognize today.