davinciandwilde

[davinciandwilde]

i can’t stand “it’s not that deep” attitudes like even if it really really isn’t that deep just PLAY WITH ME. just fucking PLAY. have a meaningless but deep analytical conversation with me. just like think about shit for fun. does anyone else like to think about stuff for fun. it’s so lonely

[davinciandwilde]

[davinciandwilde]

“caught in the crossfire” is crazy work when it’s your own reporter and it’s a video where you can just watch the cop aim directly at her and shoot her completely 100% on purpose with your own two eyes

[davinciandwilde]

the greatest smiler of all time is louis armstrong

[davinciandwilde]

"In Northern California, a Native American tribe is celebrating the return of ancestral lands in one of the largest such transfers in the nation’s history.

Through a Dept. of the Interior initiative aiming to bring indigenous knowledge back into land management, 76 square miles east of the central stretch of the Klamath River has been returned to the Yurok tribe.

Sandwiched between the newly-freed Klamath and forested hillsides of evergreens, redwoods, and cottonwoods, Blue Creek is considered the crown jewel of these lands, though if it were a jewel it wouldn’t be blue, it would be a giant colorless diamond, such is the clarity of the water.

Pictured: Blue Creek

It’s the most important cold-water tributary of the Klamath River, and critical habitat for coho and Chinook salmon. Fished and hunted on since time immemorial by the Yurok and their ancestors, the land was taken from them during the gold rush before eventually being bought by timber companies.

Barry McCovey Jr., director of the Yurok Tribal Fisheries Department, remembers slipping past gates and dodging security along Blue Creek just to fish up a steelhead, one of three game fish that populate the river and need it to spawn.

Profiled along with the efforts of his tribe to secure the land for themselves and their posterity, he spoke to AP about the experience of seeing plans, made a decade ago, come to fruition, and returning to the creek on which he formerly trespassed as a land and fisheries manager.

“To go from when I was a kid and 20 years ago even, from being afraid to go out there to having it be back in tribal hands … is incredible,” he said.

Part of the agreement is that the Yurok Tribe would manage the land to a state of maximum health and resilience, and for that the tribe has big plans, including restoring native prairie, using fire to control understory growth, removing invasive species, restoring native fish habitat, and undoing decades of land-use changes from the logging industry in the form of culverts and logging roads.

“And maybe all that’s not going to be done in my lifetime,” said McCovey. “But that’s fine, because I’m not doing this for myself.”

The Yurok Tribe were recently at the center of the nation’s largest dam removal, a two decades-long campaign to remove a series of four hydroelectric dams along the Klamath River. Once the West Coast’s third-largest salmon run, the Klamath dams substantially reduced salmon activity.

Completed last September, the before and after photographs are stunning to witness. By late November, salmon had already returned far upriver to spawn, proving that instinctual information had remained intact even after a century of disconnect.

Pictured; Klamath River flows freely, after Copco-2 dam was removed in California

“Seeing salmon spawning above the former dams fills my heart,” said Joseph L. James, chairman of the Yurok Tribe, the leaders of the dam removal campaign along with the Karuk and Klamath tribes.

“Our salmon are coming home. Klamath Basin tribes fought for decades to make this day a reality because our future generations deserve to inherit a healthier river from the headwaters to the sea.”

Last March, GNN reported that the Yurok Tribe had also become the first of America’s tribal nations to co-manage land with the National Park Service under a historic memorandum of understanding involving Redwoods National Park.

The nonprofit Save the Redwoods bought a piece of land adjacent to the park, which receives 1 million visitors annually and is a UNESCO Natural Heritage Site, and handed it over to the Yurok for stewardship.

The piece of land, which contained giant redwoods, recovered to such an extent that the NPS has incorporated it into the Redwoods trail network, and the two agencies will cooperate in ensuring mutual flourishing between two properties and one ecosystem.

Back at Blue Creek, AP reports that work has already begun clearing non-native conifer trees planted for lumber. The trunks will be used to create log jams in the creek for wildlife habitat.

Costing $56 million, the land was bought from the loggers by Western Rivers Conservancy, using a mixture of fundraising efforts including private capital, low interest loans, tax credits, public grants and carbon credit sales.

The sale was part of a movement called Land Back, which involves returning ownership of once-native lands of great importance to tribes for the sake of effective stewardship. [Note: This is a weirdly limited definition of Land Back. Land Back means RETURN STOLEN LAND, PERIOD.] Studies have shown around the tropics that indigenous-owned lands in protected areas have higher forest integrity and biodiversity than those owned by national governments.

Land Back has seen 4,700 square miles—equivalent to one and a half-times the size of Yellowstone National Park—returned to tribes through land buy-back agreements in 15 states." [Note: Since land buyback agreements aren't the only form of Land Back, the total is probably (hopefully) more than that.]

-via Good News Network, June 10, 2025

[davinciandwilde]

Driving home I saw a male cardinal standing in the middle of the street. Every time a car approached, he fluttered out of the way and immediately returned as it passed. I pulled over and moved his mate's limp, warm body to the base of a tree so he wouldn't get run over while grieving her.

When she gets to bird heaven, I hope she says hello to my friends there.

[davinciandwilde]

"Following the tragic drownings of 15 schoolchildren in his home town, an Indian man has started a swimming club that has seen more than 10,000 learn how to handle themselves in the water.

He’s narrowed down the introductory course, which focuses entirely on swimming for safety rather than for sport, to just 16 lessons that begins by removing the fear of the water and the river’s current.

It’s called the Valasseril River Swimming Club, and it now boasts thousands of members among the communities living along the Periyar river in the southwestern Indian state of Kerala.

It was created by Saji Valasseril, a humble furniture shop owner who, according to the Better India, was overwhelmed with grief following the overturning of a boat carrying a school class and its teacher in 2009. He started by teaching his children to swim, then his friend, then his friend’s children, then some from the neighborhood.

Soon the news spread that free swimming classes were available and the trickle of interest turned into a torrent.

“Most drowning cases reported here are of people boating close to the banks and not in the middle of the river,” says Saji. “You only need 16 days to learn how to remove your fear of water and save yourself from drowning.”

[Note: In India, drowning kills an estimated 38,000 people each year. Source]

“All kinds of people come together, young and old, men and women, from diverse professions, backgrounds and belief systems. We don’t see any of those differences. No one is looked down or looked up, there’s only teaching.”

In the water of the Periyar, swimming lanes are formed by strings of floaties or tires which are separated based on difficulty level. Deeper lanes with a stronger current are playfully called the “doctorate lanes” while those under which the student can place their feet on the riverbed are called “Kindergarten.”

All children have to be accompanied by a guardian who will be able to reach them from the riverbank in case something should happen. This, the Better India reports, has led to many of the guardians becoming club members themselves. Older folks, disabled, and the neurologically disordered have all learned to swim at the Valasseril club, which even attracts athletes.

Recently, one of its teenage students set a record in the Asian Book of Records for the longest open-sea swim by a minor. Another is preparing to swim the English Channel.

Those who ‘graduate’ not uncommonly pull on a branded aquatic shirt as a volunteer teacher or lifeguard, reflecting how at 5:30 a.m. before the heat of the day sets in, and with the chorus emanating from the Thattekkad Bird Sanctuary nearby, there’s no place most would rather be."

-via Good News Network, June 5, 2025

[davinciandwilde]

gonna take a hot shower and put on a big t shirt and my undies and i’m gonna sit on the floor and color at my coffee table like im 6 years old again and then i’ll feel better

[davinciandwilde]

Shout out to all the Black ppl that can no longer participate directly in the fandom they love because of the stresses of racism 👍🏾 you contain multitudes of value and I'm sorry that the color of your skin and the power of your voice makes people not want to acknowledge that.

[davinciandwilde]

🌊

[davinciandwilde]

"i don't care if they make their whole way though uni with chatgpt" i think you guys are so internetpilled that you have forgotten there are actual jobs out there that require people to know what they are doing in any way possible or else people die

[davinciandwilde]

Source

“Rent prices have exceeded income gains by 325 percent”

[davinciandwilde]

people who are just finding out about internet tracking and data mining in the year 2025 and that your special robot friend does not respect your privacy lol

[davinciandwilde]

[davinciandwilde]

PLAGUE! PLAGUE! PLAGUE! PLAGUE!

[davinciandwilde]

Rings

[davinciandwilde]

How it started:

How it’s going:

Just a lil reminder that even if it doesn’t feel like it, even if it feels so fucking slow and you can’t see it at all, you do improve when you keep doing the thing. I love you. Hang in there.