One of my hermits is moulting

What should I do?
Nothing. Moulters already
have to suffer from stress.
Disturbing them will make it worse.
Place a cave over them
to provide darkness.
Most will harden.

How do I distinguish a dead hermit?
Look for a claw in the shell.
The eyes should be hollow
and translucent.
The eyes of dead hermits
are dark in colour, just like
when they were alive.

How long should I wait?
You are better digging
up a dead hermit
three months later
than stressing one to death
that was alive and could
have surfaced on its own.

Why is my hermit being lethargic?
This is normal behaviour.
Offer protein and calcium.
There is not much else you can do.
Sometimes they experience
difficulty shedding
so they give up and drop.



Advice from Hermit Crab Paradise website, extracted 29 April 2016. Submitted by Linda Goulden.

The very last of something

Sudan doesn�t know how precious he is,
his eye a sad black dot in his wrinkled face
his head a marvellous thing, a majestic rectangle
of strong bone and leathery flesh,
a head that expresses pure strength.
How terrible that such a mighty head
can be so vulnerable, lowered melancholically
beneath the sinister sky, as if weighed down by fate.
This is the noble head of an old warrior,
armour battered, appetite for struggle fading.



From A picture of loneliness: you are looking at the last male northern white rhino by Jonathan Jones, The Guardian, 12 May 2015. Submitted by Angi Holden.

FIRE!

Look over there!...An antelope�

BANG�

Monkey!!

BANG�

Snakes!

BANG!

�stupid crocodiles?

BANG!

�a lion??

BANG!

�why not rabbits?

BANG!

�an elephant

BANG!

Come on if you dare, mighty buffalo!

BANG! BANG!

Grrr! That�s us. Bold as brass. Keen as mustard.



Lines from Tintin in the Congo, Herg� (1930). Submitted by Cathy Barber.

On the division of animals

More often than not, the linguist or anthropologist just throws up his hands and resorts to giving a list � a list that one would not be surprised to find in the writings of Borges.
George Lakoff

Those that belong to the Emperor,
embalmed ones,
those that are trained,
suckling pigs,
mermaids,
fabulous ones,
stray dogs,
those that are included in this classification,
those that tremble as if they were mad,
innumerable ones,
those drawn with a very fine camel�s hair brush,
others,
those that have just broken a flower vase,
those that resemble flies from a distance.




From 'Other Inquisitions' in which Borges writes of a strange way of classifying animals in an ancient Chinese encyclopaedia. Via Futility Closet. Submitted by Gabriel Smy.

Help My Mastiff (Not My Business)

I am going to tell you the whole story.

And if can
help to save
my 14 months mastiff; a baby himself.

And if you still feel
like helping you can make some call
on the dog Bruce behalf.

I am trying to understand
that the dog bite a 9 year old kid
that looks like a football player.

My toddles were playing next to the dog
to the neighbors house
and this kid that we do not want

Which the neighbor told him not to go to the back yard
because of the dog. He was there in a minute
hitting the dog on the head

Which my 2 toddles was playing near by. The dog broke the leash
and bite he in the arm. And now
they are going to kill him.

How do we know if the boy was going
to hurt the toddles. There is a lake
like 20 feet away.

What did this boy really want
to do? I guess
we will never know, but neighbors said he is a trouble kid.

He has all his paper work
and not other report of bite. They said
because of the severe of the bit to his arm.

If the dog really wanted to do damage he can he easily
take his arm off or ate it. The boy
had to 36 stitches.

Now we have 2 thing at play here the boy
is really plummie boy with a lot of meat and the second thing the dog
have a huge mouth.

So One bit, easy 36 stitches.




A post on Craigslist in Pets, 29 May 2014. Submitted by Susan Cody.

Supper preferences

When these birds move their wings in flight,
their strokes are slow, moderate and regular,
and even when at a considerable distance

or high above us, we plainly hear the quill-feathers,
their shafts and webs upon one another,
creak as the joints or

working of a vessel in a tempestuous sea.
We had this fowl dressed for supper
and it made excellent soup;

nevertheless as long as I can get any other
necessary food I shall prefer his
seraphic music in the ethereal skies.



William Bartram, in Travels Through North & South Carolina, Georgia, East & West Florida, the Cherokee Country, the Extensive Territories of the Muscogulges, or Creek Confederacy, and the Country of the Chactaws. Spelling modernised. Submitted by Dawn Corrigan.

Sport

About midnight, having fallen asleep,
I was awakened and greatly surprised

at finding most of my companions
up in arms, and furiously engaged

with a large alligator
but a few yards from me.

One of our company, it seems,
awoke in the night, and perceived

the monster within a few paces of the camp,
who giving the alarm to the rest,

they readily came to his assistance,
for it was a rare piece of sport;

some took fire-brands and cast them
at his head, whilst others formed javelins

of saplins, pointed and hardened with fire;
these they thrust down his throat

into his bowels, which caused the monster
to roar and bellow hideously, but his strength

and fury was so great that he easily wrenched
or twisted them out of their hands, which

he wielded and brandished about and kept
his enemies at distance for a time;

some were for putting an end to his life
and sufferings with a rifle ball, but

the majority thought this would too soon
deprive them of the diversion and pleasure

of exercising their various inventions
of torture; they at length however grew tired,

and agreed in one opinion, that he had suffered
sufficiently, and put an end to his existence.



Taken from Travels of William Bartram by William Bartram, published 1928. Submitted by Dawn Corrigan.

Fleeting

The ocean is empty
again. Here and there

a small galaxy of scales
marks where a bluefin

swallowed a herring.
The victim's scales

swirl in the turbulence
of the departed

tuna now bearing off at
high speed. Then each vortex

slows and stops. The sinking
scales gleam like diamonds

from a spilled necklace
then they dim. Finally

they wink out at depth.



From Quicksilver, Kenneth Brower, March 2014, National Geographic. Submitted by James Brush.