Okay, but check out this video from mid-May 2022 of a Kestrel Dad who just kept piling up voles and mice beside his babies when the mom was injured/killed/mia’d by owls…but then watched one of his babies just swallow a lizard and went “OH. I can feed them small food!” and learned to tear it apart!
EDIT: There’s a not-zero percent chance that this could be the same dad???????? The source is the same–Robert E Fuller–but they could be different birds.
UPDATE: Not only has Mister Kes learned to feed his chicks all on his own…
….the three chicks who were taken out of the nest for intensive care after the mom disappeared were put back in, and he just started feeding them, too.
He’s a single father of six who does not possess the instincts to feed even one of his offspring, but he learned and adopted that behavior without difficulty and is now hunting and providing for six kids all on his own.
Not everything that happened this year was terrible.
Here's the top 2 stories from each of Fix The News's six categories:
1. A game-changing HIV drug was the biggest story of 2024
In what Science called the 'breakthrough of the year', researchers revealed in June that a twice-yearly drug called lenacapavir reduced HIV infections in a trial in Africa to zero—an astonishing 100% efficacy, and the closest thing to a vaccine in four decades of research. Things moved quick; by October, the maker of the drug, Gilead, had agreed to produce an affordable version for 120 resource-limited countries, and by December trials were underway for a version that could prevent infection with just a single shot per year. 'I got cold shivers. After all our years of sadness, particularly over vaccines, this truly is surreal.'
2. Another incredible year for disease elimination
Jordan became the first country to eliminate leprosy, Chad eliminated sleeping sickness, Guinea eliminated maternal and neonatal tetanus, Belize, Jamaica, and Saint Vincent & the Grenadines eliminated mother-to-child transmission of HIV and syphilis, India achieved the WHO target for eliminating black fever, India, Viet Nam and Pakistan eliminated trachoma, the world’s leading infectious cause of blindness, and Brazil and Timor Leste eliminated elephantiasis.
1. The EU passed a landmark nature restoration law
When countries pass environmental legislation, it’s big news; when an entire continent mandates the protection of nature, it signals a profound shift. Under the new law, which passed on a knife-edge vote in June 2024, all 27 member states are legally required to restore at least 20% of land and sea by 2030, and degraded ecosystems by 2050. This is one of the world’s most ambitious pieces of legislation and it didn’t come easy; but the payoff will be huge - from tackling biodiversity loss and climate change to enhancing food security.
2. Deforestation in the Amazon halved in two years
Brazil’s space agency, INPE, confirmed a second consecutive year of declining deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. That means deforestation rates have roughly halved under Lula, and are now approaching all time lows. In Colombia, deforestation dropped by 36%, hitting a 23-year low. Bolivia created four new protected areas, a huge new new state park was created in Pará to protect some of the oldest and tallest tree species in the tropical Americas and a new study revealed that more of the Amazon is protected than we originally thought, with 62.4% of the rainforest now under some form of conservation management.
1. Millions more children got an education
Staggering statistics incoming: between 2000 and 2023, the number of children and adolescents not attending school fell by nearly 40%, and Eastern and Southern Africa, achieved gender parity in primary education, with 25 million more girls are enrolled in primary school today than in the early 2000s. Since 2015, an additional 110 million children have entered school worldwide, and 40 million more young people are completing secondary school.
2. We fed around a quarter of the world's kids at school
Around 480 million students are now getting fed at school, up from 319 million before the pandemic, and 104 countries have joined a global coalition to promote school meals, School feeding policies are now in place in 48 countries in Africa, and this year Nigeria announced plans to expand school meals to 20 million children by 2025, Kenya committed to expanding its program from two million to ten million children by the end of the decade, and Indonesia pledged to provide lunches to all 78 million of its students, in what will be the world's largest free school meals program.
1. Solar installations shattered all records
Global solar installations look set to reach an unprecedented 660GW in 2024, up 50% from 2023's previous record. The pace of deployment has become almost unfathomable - in 2010, it took a month to install a gigawatt, by 2016, a week, and in 2024, just 12 hours. Solar has become not just the cheapest form of new electricity in history, but the fastest-growing energy technology ever deployed, and the International Energy Agency said that the pace of deployment is now ahead of the trajectory required for net zero by 2050.
2. Battery storage transformed the economics of renewables
Global battery storage capacity surged 76% in 2024, making investments in solar and wind energy much more attractive, and vice-versa. As with solar, the pace of change stunned even the most cynical observers. Price wars between the big Chinese manufacturers pushed battery costs to record lows, and global battery manufacturing capacity increased by 42%, setting the stage for future growth in both grid storage and electric vehicles - crucial for the clean flexibility required by a renewables-dominated electricity system. The world's first large-scale grid battery installation only went online seven years ago; by next year, global battery storage capacity will exceed that of pumped hydro.
1. Democracy proved remarkably resilient in a record year of elections
More than two billion people went to the polls this year, and democracy fared far better than most people expected, with solid voter turnout, limited election manipulation, and evidence of incumbent governments being tamed. It wasn't all good news, but Indonesia saw the world's biggest one day election, Indian voters rejected authoritarianism, South Korea's democratic institutions did the same, Bangladesh promised free and fair elections following a 'people's victory', Senegal, Sri Lanka and Botswana saw peaceful transfers of power to new leaders after decades of single party rule, and Syria saw the end of one of the world's most horrific authoritarian regimes.
2. Global leaders committed to ending violence against children
In early November, while the eyes of the world were on the US election, an event took place that may prove to be a far more consequential for humanity. Five countries pledged to end corporal punishment in all settings, two more pledged to end it in schools, and another 12, including Bangladesh and Nigeria, accepted recommendations earlier in the year to end corporal punishment of children in all settings. In total, in 2024 more than 100 countries made some kind of commitment to ending violence against children. Together, these countries are home to hundreds of millions of children, with the WHO calling the move a 'fundamental shift.'
73. Space exploration hit new milestones
NASA’s Europa Clipper began a 2.9 billion kilometre voyage to Jupiter to investigate a moon that may have conditions for life; astronomers identified an ice world with a possible atmosphere in the habitable zone; and the James Webb Telescope found the farthest known galaxy. Closer to Earth, China landed on the far side of the moon, the Polaris Dawn crew made a historic trip to orbit, and Starship moved closer to operational use – and maybe one day, to travel to Mars.
74. Next-generation materials advanced
A mind-boggling year for material science. Artificial intelligence helped identify a solid-state electrolyte that could slash lithium use in batteries by 70%, and an Apple supplier announced a battery material that can deliver around 100 times better energy density. Researchers created an insulating synthetic sapphire material 1.25 nanometers thick, plus the world’s thinnest lens, just three atoms across. The world’s first functioning graphene-based semiconductor was unveiled (the long-awaited ‘wonder material’ may finally be coming of age!) and a team at Berkeley invented a fluffy yellow powder that could be a game changer for removing carbon from the atmosphere.
After the Rim Fire of 2013, this amphibian population declined by 50%. Now, they're getting a chance to start again in their native habitat.
"For over a decade, the Yosemite toad has been recognized as a federally threatened species, after experiencing a 50% population decline during the Rim Fire of 2013.
The wildfire, which encompassed a mass of land near Yosemite National Park, made the amphibian species especially vulnerable in its home habitat.
Native to the Sierra Nevada, the toads play a key role in the area’s ecosystem — and conservationists stepped in to secure their future.
In 2017, the San Francisco Zoo’s conservation team began working with the National Park Service, Yosemite Conservancy, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, California Department of Fish & Wildlife, and the U.S. Geological Survey.
The goal of all of these stakeholders? To raise their own Yosemite toads, re-establishing a self-sustaining population in the wild.
“Over the past several years, SF Zoo’s conservation team has been busily raising hundreds of these small but significant amphibians from tadpole stage, a species found only in the Sierra Nevada, for the purpose of reintroducing them to an area of Yosemite National Park where it was last seen 11 years ago,” the zoo shared on social media.
By 2022, a group of toads were deemed ready for release — and at the end of June of this year [2024], 118 toads were flown via helicopter back to their habitat.
“It’s the first time anyone has ever raised this species in captivity and released them to the wild,” Rochelle Stiles, field conservation manager at the San Francisco Zoo, told SFGATE. “It’s just incredible. It makes what we do at the zoo every day worthwhile.”
Over the past two years, these toads were fed a diet of crickets and vitamin supplements and were examined individually to ensure they were ready for wildlife release.
Zoo team members inserted a microchip into each toad to identify and monitor its health. In addition, 30 of the toads were equipped with radio transmitters, allowing their movements to be tracked using a radio receiver and antenna.
The project doesn’t end with this single wildlife release; it’s slated to take place over the next five years, as conservationists continue to collect data about the toads’ breeding conditions and survivability in an ever-changing climate. They will also continue to raise future toad groups at the zoo’s wellness and conservation center...
While the future of the Yosemite toad is still up in the air — and the uncertainty of climate change makes this a particularly audacious leap of faith — the reintroduction of these amphibians could have positive ripple effects for all of Yosemite.
Their re-entry could restore the population balance of invertebrates and small vertebrates that the toads consume, as well as balance the food web, serving as prey for snakes, birds, and other local predators.
“Zoo-reared toads can restore historic populations,” Nancy Chan, director of communications at the San Francisco Zoo, told SFGATE.
Stiles continued: “This is our backyard, our home, and we want to bring native species back to where they belong.”
See, I think horse people are Like That because you can't do anything with a horse without entering into The Mind of the Horse. Like yeah, to ride a horse you need an intimate understanding of how its body moves and how your body is in contact with it and everything it is seeing and hearing and feeling in its own body and how your body responding to the horse's movement and reactions creates feedbacks upon the horse's response—which in itself is borderline spiritually merging yourself with the horse consciousness —but you can't even clean a horse's feet or lead it into a pasture without some power to understand What It Is Like To Be A Horse, because a horse is a Giant Beast with strong instincts that can drive it to kill or maim in a heartbeat, and it's the horse's trust and confidence in you and by extension your trust and confidence in the horse that keeps you both safe.
So being a horse person seems to be 90% stuff like standing in the stall trying to telepathically Enter The Consciousness of the Horse to try to unlock why the horse is fucking scared shitless of mops
and subsequently to Understand the Deep Psychological Foundation of Horse Self-Confidence so as to create a Scenario where the horse can encounter a mop and feel empowered and strong rather than Murderously Terrified
@osedaxworm yeah i think the "why" comes into play when they're trying to figure out what the common thread is in the set of related things that make the horse freak out
A lot of the people I was reading about had horses that came from previous owners and it seems like a long string of bad training practices in the past can leave the owner of a rescued horse with a LOT of work
The most wild thing about horse training to me is that the horses start to try and do it back if you telepathically Enter The Consciousness of the Horse correctly.
I acquired an abused and neglected horse a few months ago. She spent the earlier days of our interactions trying to bite me, kick me, run me over, and buck me off through any means necessary. I empathized with her. I was very gentle with her and showed her that I didn't plan on bringing her any additional harm. She started letting me introduce her to people, and she even started letting the vets I brought in help her instead of trying to fight them.
A couple of weeks ago, I asked her to jump over a scary obstacle for the first time. She was really uncertain and kept checking in to make sure I thought it was fine, and when she realized that I was sure, she did the horse equivalent of saying, "well, okay, we can give it a shot since it seems like you really want to". Lately when she's unsure if something is okay, or when she doesn't want to do something, she's taken to simply stopping instead of bucking. I think she's trying to take care of me. We still need to get through the stopping problem, but I'm beyond grateful to her for trying to keep me safe even when she's feeling strong emotions.
The past few days, she's spent a lot of time licking me from head to toe. Not even just my skin, but my clothes, too. This wouldn't be super significant, except that I have a dissociative disorder, and I've been in and out for the past few days. It seems like she's trying to keep me here.
If you try to understand the horses, they try to understand you. They're truly unlike any other kind of animal I've worked with in how deeply they try to understand their people.
Horses are deeply perceptive animals and to some degree understand human emotion and empathize with it. They do start to see you as their herd mate, their friend, their protector, and in return they will protect you in their own way.
I can sit outside on the ground in my field with my horses, and if I'm feeling happy and relaxed, they think, "Oh, our human is resting here. We will stand vigil." And one will position themself over me. Others will stand watch. And the great thing is, if you take up the position of standing vigil among horses that trust you, they'll say, "My human is here watching over me. I can rest now too." And having a horse trust you enough to lie prone on the ground and sleep is a wonderful feeling.
Alternatively, they pick up when things are wrong too. If I am scared, you can believe they will be wary, which is why it's so unbelievably important to work through fear rather than expressing it uncontrolled when you're around a horse. They will respond how you do. They also can tell if I'm upset. Going back to the situation where I go out and sit in the field. I've done that a couple times while deeply upset. The horses that aren't mine, that I don't share as close of a bond with, are a little unnerved by it. They investigate, but ultimately are more worried. However, the horses that I do have a bond with have seen me and thought, "There's something wrong with my human. They're upset about something. I might be able to help." Now, their version of helping is standing over me, chewing on my hair, pulling on my shoelaces, and chasing off other horses who try to investigate, but those are behaviors that tie back into me being part of their herd. Grooming, play, and protection. And again, getting a bond like that isn't easy, but it is so worth it.
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