Galapagos Complaint Department

Giant tortoises destroying your garden? Boobies crapping on your porch? Tell the Galapagos Complaint Department

Help Katherine McCleod get to the Galapagos Islands to collect complaints and get what will surely be a rad watercolor in the mail, or a copy of her future book…

(..and yes, I know this is a turtle)

For Nonhumans Only

Dear Animal Kingdom,

Feel free to check out the front window of 509 Cultural Center and the Tenderloin National Forest in SF. There’s something playing for you there. And if you get there fast enough, maybe some sunflower seeds. Also, stick around for the rest of Streetopia. It’s going to be great.

Sincerely,

Laurel

Animals Are Outside Today

Check out Colleen Plumb’s Animals are Outside Today.

From her artist’s statement:

In 1928, Henry Beston stated regarding animals in his book, The Outermost House: “They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth.” Animals Are Outside Today is a journey examining underneath this net, offering us the chance to contemplate our intersections with animals and consider the multi-layered impact humans have on other living beings.

Thanks Christina Seely for the head’s up.

There’s Nothing I Can Do For You

This is totally off topic, but are there more rubber ducks in the world than actual ducks? I think the answer is probably yes. Same goes also for plastic pink lawn flamingos. And probably most stuffed animals (pandas, elephants, tigers and polar bears, for sure).

Smoke Break

“Captain Jiggs smokes a cigarette after getting a haircut” is the note scrawled on the back of this photo inside the archive of American Museum of Natural History. The Captain belonged to a woman named Gertrude Lintz who used to drive her pet chimps and gorillas around New York City in the passenger seat of her car and dressed them like little hairy humans throughout the 1920s and 30s.

Last fall, Shirley, an Indonesian orangutan addicted to smoking was forced to quit.

She wasn’t alone. Orangs can become addicted to nicotine just like us.

Tomorrow, April 22 at 1pm at the Headlands Center for the Arts I will spend exactly 8 minutes talking about animals on drugs. Come one come all.

(Next week: animals and alcohol)

Let’s Bonobo

So I have been writing about bonobos the last few days and since I can only talk about what I am working on, I’ve been chatting about them a lot. Most people though, have no idea what I’m talking about. They let me rattle on for a bit and the bravest will eventually interrupt me to say sheepishly, “what’s a bonobo?”

Answer: a great ape (like us, gorillas, chimps, and orangutans). I think they are not as famous though for a few reasons. 1. They’re rare. 2. They have never had a charismatic lady spokesperson (like the chimps have Jane Goodall, the gorillas had Diane Fossey and the orangs have Birute Galdikas) or been the subject of a major Hollywood film. They do have Frans de Waal though who has written beautifully and at great length about their deep reserves of empathy, wanton sexual proclivities and otherwise fascinating nature. There is also Kanzi, the famous linguist who has worked with the American psychologist Sue Savage-Rumbaugh for years at the Great Ape Trust in Iowa. He collects firewood, can start a fire and likes to cook over it.

My dream place to visit is the Lola Ya Bonobo Sanctuary in the Congo, where orphaned bonobos are raised by human “mamas,” taught good bonobo life skills, and then released to a sanctuary.

At the Milwaukee Zoo they like hanging out on the ceiling.

Thank you TED

Laurel at TED, Photo by TED senior fellow Teru Kuwayama

I am still in a fog from TED last week in Long Beach. It was a magical eight days. I am beyond grateful to the TED Fellows program for bringing me, for giving me and the animals a platform, and for throwing me into a community so vast and interesting that a week later I am homesick for something that three weeks ago I didn’t even know existed. Two of my favorite talks:

Talks that are not up on Ted.com yet that I am eagerly waiting for are Jon Ronson‘s on psychopaths and Sarah Parcak‘s on doing archeology from space. Not to mention EVERY single one of the TED Fellows‘ talks. We were neuroscientists, performance artists, inventors, humanitarians, marine biologists, doctors, designers, engineers, musicians and more. We were from Sri Lanka, Kenya, England, France, Korea, Uganda, Lebanon, Mexico, Ireland, Venezuela, Ethiopia, Pakistan, India and the US. We ate, we drank, we talked into the wee hours, we schemed, we got nervous and wildly relieved, we planned to stockpile free snacks and then forgot, and we even tried to sneak onto someone’s yacht. My respect and affection for these individuals knows no bounds.

This has never been more true

And on Boing Boing, how to tell if a mouse is depressed. Like many other animals models though, I’m afraid this one tests mouse endurance, swimming ability and possibly option-weighing, more than it tells us about mouseish sadness.

Dog Day Afternoon (and Morning and Evening)

Her name is Lemon.

I’m a buffalo, I do what I want

I’m back in SF, trying to finish the book but my headheart is full of buffalo, wolves, eagle cries, and the good people of the Buffalo Field Campaign. Go volunteer right now. They’ll put you up inside a cabin that feels like a pirate ship. They’ll feed you three meals a day. If you’re lucky, at least one will include road kill. There’s a dog named Dingo and a cat that drools on command. And you get to cross country ski every day to help out the buffalo.

Ps. If you can’t volunteer, send them dollars. Or buy a calendar. Or some buffalo nickels for your hair.

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