in the forest of the night

Being alterhuman does not mean you have some ~special ability~ to interact with wild animals.

DO NOT go touching/chasing/ generally messing with wildlife. You aren't special and you could harm those animals, or be harmed by them. Even small things like bugs can kill you. You aren't immune to rabies.

If you scare wild animals by chasing them for species euphoria or whatever, you can genuinly kill them. Birders have a term for when it happens to birds, its called a Dread Flight. When you unnecessarily scare a wild animal, you are causing it to waste energy it needs to survive. Wildlife can't afford to waste energy. You're enjoyment is NEVER worth disturbing wildlife.

You do not have the training to rescue wild animals just because you're alterhuman. If you don't have the actual training to resue wildlife and you genuinely find an animal in need of help, CALL A FUCKING WILDLIFE REHABILITATION CENTER!!!! It isn't that hard to find the number for your local center and they'll tell you what to do, if anything, and help you if necessary.

If you are in the United States and not employed by a zoo or sanctuary or a veterinarian working with a facility, if anyone for any reason offers to allow you to touch a big cat, please do not do it.

No matter how much you want to, no matter how much it is a dream, understand that it is a violation of federal law that could get the facility the cat lives at in very serious trouble. It does not matter if it is through the fence, or in the context of a trained behavior, or if the cat is on a leash. Even if it feels “safe” or they swear the facility condones it.

It’s starting to appear that lots of zookeepers have not been informed appropriately about the scope of the law - or in cases where they do know it’s inappropriate, they are sometimes being overridden by their management and forced to allow encounters. (Even at accredited facilities!)

We do not know exactly what the penalties could be for that happening within an accredited zoo (yay badly implemented laws) but it typically comes down to being risk to a) the cat’s welfare b) the facility’s ability to have any big cats at all and c) someone, either the facility owner or the person offering, could go to jail or pay serious fines. There are two instances of this happening at AZA zoos that were leaked recently and we may now find out how bad it’s going to get for them.

Lots of facilities will have big cat pelts as educational biofacts that they will allow you to touch. You do not ever need to take the risk associated with touching a live big cat - generally anywhere, and especially in the US.

I literally got to touch three different big cat pelts today in one zoo visit (didn’t take a photo of the lion one). You! Don’t! Need! To! Touch! Live! Cats!

Most of the animals people want to touch something from (elephants, rhinos, cats) are protected under at least one and sometimes multiple federal laws. Those laws extend to cover their bodies after they pass. States may also have additional laws regarding what can be done with the remains of endangered species or marine mammals. IIRC I’ve been told by keepers that some zoos can’t even keep chunks of elephant tusks broken off of live animals (this happens, sometimes) because of ivory laws. Even if they’re just burying them on site, they have to keep detailed records to prove they’re not illegally selling the remains of protected species. So it’s a lot more complicated than just being able to keep and do whatever with the remains, even for businesses with all the right paperwork and compliance to own the live animals.

Next, you’ve got to process the remains to turn them into a biofact that can be used. I don’t know of any zoo that does this themselves. That means they’ve got to find a credible business that can clean skeletons or process pelts, make sure they can receive the remains (laws often prohibit movement of protected species across state lines, even if not alive), and then pay for the process.

Sometimes other institutions have a claim on the remains that could preclude other options, too. I know of a number of facilities with agreements with major museums or academic research groups who will take remains to study them or prepare them for display. I don’t know if the zoo can overrule them and say they’d like to keep a specific animal’s remains for other uses - probably very contract specific.

Then, right, you run into the same issues if you want to move finished biofacts between zoos. There’s a lot of laws that govern what can move where and if money can be involved, and it can require a lot of paperwork.

You also have to think about the fact that there are extreme cultural differences across the US regarding if it’s “okay” for zoos to use their animals that way. I grew up in the Pacific Northwest where the mentality is more… anti-exploitation focused? Even about good zoos. Let animals be animals, don’t commercialize them, etc. When I walked into a big Midwestern zoo a bunch of years ago and found a docent on the front plaza with an entire tiger pelt for people to pet - from a recently deceased animal that guests remembered - I was honestly kind of horrified? But after talking to a lot of people over the years I’ve really come to understand it’s a regional difference that seems to parallel how prevalent agriculture and hands-on experience with farming or game animals is culturally. There are still some things that blow my mind, though, like the time I found an elephant education cart with an entire taxidermied ear being used for outreach, or the lemur leg a docent had that was preserved bone and fur and all to show off the grooming claw.

All of the complications - logistical, legal, cultural, emotional - mean it’s much easier to get confiscated items loaned from US Fish and Wildlife to use for education. And this actually serves a second purpose! There is a massive warehouse in Colorado that holds a fraction of the illegal animal parts that USFWS has confiscated over the years. I’ve been and it’s… incredible and horrifying and really, really full. They don’t want to destroy the items if they don’t have to, but space is finite. So loaning out items as biofacts is a really good solution. It makes space and it provides a clearly legal avenue for educational facilities to access preserved pieces of protected animals. I also feel like using confiscated biofacts honors the animals, in a way, giving a second meaningful purpose to an item produced through senseless commercialized death.

Boy, I admit I don't have much in the way of resources onhand for that specifically; it's a bit out of my scope. I probably can't tell you anything Google can't. It sums up to, starseeds are a New Age concept proposing that certain people are extraterrestrial souls sent to Earth to guide humanity to some kind of ascension. It purports that certain people are born inherently "higher" while others are more "primitive" spiritually speaking, which is already a pretty yikes concept even before you get into the history of this movement and ones like it being deeply steeped in racism and eugenics. Suspiciously, whenever you see physical descriptions of these "higher races," the ones who aren't just bog-standard "greys" always seem to be pale-skinned and often blonde, at least from what I've seen (Pleiadians, one of the most well-known and "highest" races, are literally described as "Nordic aliens" or "indistinguishable from Nordic people").

It's also heavily linked to the idea of aliens "seeding" earth in the past, which is itself a concept steeped in racism and the ideas that a) different peoples are literally different species (some of which are of course "higher" than others) and b) historical people of color of course couldn't actually accomplish anything impressive or significant, it must have been aliens. It's also linked to the idea that Someday Soon™ there will be a great purge, I mean ascension, where the enlightened and spiritual starseeds will rise to a New Earth and everyone else will be left behind (which doesn't sound like the Rapture or like every dream of the Grand Revolution which conveniently doesn't care how many people it leaves behind or kills in the process of creating its new dream).

So. yeah. There's more to it, but that's about all I know off the top of my head and with minimal research (all of which comes up in the first few links of google results for various starseed-related searches). I don't really have any spectacular resources that have all this information in one place, but it's not hard to turn up with a little searching.

No of *course* my child isn't autistic, they are a special new form of humanity meant to lead us to a higher state of being ect ect ect

and yeah it’s very frequently both white supremecist and ableist. Physical “signs” of bei g a starseed/indigo child/earth angel are often being blonde, having blue eyes, being pale, being very empathetic, being very passive, facing persistent cruelty, and being able to easily “read rooms/intentions”. You might notice that these might also raise red flags for a kid being abused.

often comes with a lore background of being an alien or future being or spirit inhabiting a human body for the purpose of protecting/saving/educating/guiding humanity. They’re seen as paragons of kindness, gentility, and virtue. This often leads adults around them who believe this shit to outsource morality and decision making, use kids to vent to, and punish them for failing at these things.

adults who believe theyre one of these archetypes often have a savior/superiority complex around it and see themselves as above those around them.

Like seriously. Wolves we see in movies and media… Not how wolves behave. At all.

1. A lone wolf is cool, strong and, something to strive to be. FALSE.

Lone wolves have either lost, left or been pushed out of a pack. They are likely starving, lonely and/or looking for a new family or mate. Wolves are highly social and need companionship. They don’t want to be alone.

2. An alpha wolf is the biggest, baddest wolf in the pack who fights for their position. FALSE.

There are TWO Alpha wolves in a pack. They are mom and dad, the oldest and usually the smartest cause they have experienced the most. They are usually more timid and less likely to put themselves in danger because they are the only wolves in the pack that breed. If they die, the rest of the family will likely loose their way and eventually break apart.

Biggest wolves are usually the ‘betas’ who are children of the alphas (cause most everyone in the pack are puppies from mom and dad) and are generally more likely to investigate.

3. Wolves are brave and will hunt down intruders to there territory. FALSE.

Wolves are HUGE scaredy cats. They are naturally neophobic after about 6months to a year. Something new and different shows up in there territory, they are likely to avoid or keep their distance. They are NOT going to attack unless food or puppies are involved. They are great at communicating and you will know you need to back off long before you are in danger. This also means that no, that ‘wolf dog’ is not going to be a loyal and protective pet.

4. Wolves adopt. This is true.

Wolves are puppy crazy. Like they love puppies (for the most part) and its very common for packs to adopt puppies into their family. No issues with breeding cause, only mom and dad are allowed to do that. this is a way that puppies breed in captivity have been introduced to the wild, by being left near known nursing females and the pack will often come find them and bring them home. You want to known how much they love puppies? Wolves will give up their own meals to make sure puppies get fed first. Wolves can gorge themselves on up to 20lb of food and have been seen regurgitating for puppies and pregnant mothers.

Please stop demonizing wolves.

The “alpha wolf” myth is, also, toxic and harmful and used to support nasty stuff in human society.

A wolf pack is a family. It’s mom, dad, the kids who haven’t left home yet and are helping look after the younger kids.

Wild wolves are hard to observe because they hear us before we hear them and tend to slip away. I’ve had the great privilege of seeing a wild wolf precisely once in my life.

Oh, and you cannot mistake a wolf for A. a dog or B. a coyote.

I got to pretty much directly compare wolf and coyote.

In addition to being quite a bit smaller, coyotes tend to bounce and cover ground that way, their action is more elevated. They’re very upright.

Wolves move closer to the ground and tend to glide.

MAYBE you might mistake a stationary coyote for a wolf, but when they move the difference is quite stark.

A dousing of weekend rain illuminates the moss in the old growth hemlock forest along Little Laurel Run in Coopers Rock State Forest. The gifts of late May in Central Appalachia's old woods include false Solomon's seal (Maianthemum racemosum), Indian cucumber (Medeola virginiana), speckled wood lily (Clintonia umbellulata), and mapleleaf viburnum (Viburnum acerifolium).

Well I'm not really sure how to answer that question because everyones experience is different. But here's some of my advice:

Don't compare yourself to others. You don't need to have everything figured out as soon as possible, don't rush yourself. It's fine to not be sure.

Remember that your experiences are valid

Doing research might help! Seeing all the different ways people experience alterhumanity may help figuring stuff out!

Similar to the last point; doing research on the specific animal/s!

Think about if you identify as that said animal. On what level? In what way? Etc

She needs money badly now to get a new temp place to stay and food since she can’t work due to injuries sustained during the assault.