#and other ants in the colony will take infected ones away to try and save the rest of the colony

[consultingzoologist]

heads up, seven up!

"Rules for those who want to participate: post 7 lines from a wip of yours and tag some other people!!!!" Thanks @sedum-lineare! I have many many Thoughts on ecology and fungi and humanity which I’m hoping will be a fic soon. Ish.

She reads about the fungi that live with humans.

The microbiome in her gut and on her skin that keeps her healthy.

The penicillium that saved Joel's life.

The microbiome which mimics that of the people you live with, and how mothers (parents, she corrects in her head) pass on some beneficial fungi and bacteria to their children during birth.

If only she could convince her Cordyceps to share and mix with Joel's microbiome in the same way, tell it he is family and a friend, and if she thinks of him as such Cordyceps should too, and protect him too.

It's a gentle fantasy, one she's angry to still think about, when she learns the truth.

Angry at Joel for taking the choice away and not treating her like an adult, angry that the doctors were going to separate her and him and the fungus from each other so violently, so completely.

@rustandruin @drumlincountry @doodleborg no pressure just if you have some writing Thots to share!

[sarcastic-nebula]

Humor Me

Today was one of those rare times when nothing needed to be done for the war. No shipping out, no briefings, not even a surprise Separatist attack had taken over the week’s schedule. Nevertheless, your job as a civilian mechanic for the 501st Legion raged on. While the men got some much deserved rest, you and the other civilian volunteers carried on as usual. Fixing faulty blasters, repairing damaged ships, and helping out where help was needed.

As much as you enjoyed working like an ant, doing her part for the colony, you really didn’t want to today. A headache pounded its way through your temples, making concentration for extended periods of time difficult. You weren’t even sure how it started; you were pretty sure you drank enough water and that you’d eaten that day, and that you got more than six hours of sleep. Since there was no reason for stress, that could not be the problem. Apparently, you would just have to deal with it. The bottle of simple painkillers taunted you from the refresher. You wanted to save those for when you truly needed them….but this headache was so bad, so you went ahead and swallowed two before heading to the mess hall to start the day.

Even after eating, and once the pain medicine kicked in, your headache remained there. How and why, you honestly didn’t know. What you did know was that you were nearly done repairing a blaster. Setting aside the finished product, you glanced at the still-too-many blasters to also take care of. Everyone else was busy at their own station with droids, and tech, and whatever, so you took a moment to close your eyes and relax, which helped with the head pain ever so slightly. Enough to notice the difference once you opened your eyes and groan internally at more work to do. You took a deep breath, and grabbed the next lucky blaster that needed fixing.

Now, could it be the wiring, the trigger, or something else? You ignored the now constant presence of the headache, which seemed to have slowly grown in intensity over the course of the day. You didn’t think to bring the pain pills with you, and you also thought lunch, time, and water would have helped. You were continuously proven wrong. A-ha! The ammunition junction! Immediately, you closed your eyes again and breathed. The realization of the problem with the blaster sent a strong strike of pain throughout your head. When it didn’t ease up right away, you set the blaster and the tool you held onto your worktable. It just wouldn’t stop for the love of kriff.

That’s it. Once you opened your eyes, you slowly got up and walked over to the officer overseeing the civvie volunteers, Miss Tari Mirius. Once you reached her desk, she looked up, and silently bade you to speak.

“Miss, is it alright if I turn in for the day? I have a headache that is making it difficult to concentrate, and I really don’t think-“

“(Y/N), you don’t need to worry about excuses. Things are so calm right now, I don’t blame you for wanting to get some rest. Do you need to see a medic, or need someone to stay with you?” Your boss’ quick understanding and thoughtful question made you do a double take, but then again, you rarely ask for things like this…or anything in general.

“No- no ma’am, I think I just need some sleep,” you replied carefully with a smile. Maker, you were going to have to work harder to get that pile of blasters finished. For now, you would force yourself to rest.

“Alright. Feel better soon, (Y/N),” the woman dismissed you with a smile, and then Miss Mirius returned to her paperwork.

You slowly left the civilian workspace, large enough for all of the volunteers, and made your way through the Resolute to your quarters. The bright lights throughout the ship burned your sensitive eye sockets, hurting your very brain even more. However, you pushed on to your crew’s women-only barracks, to your bunk, and collapsed face first into the pillow.

Time to try to sleep off this pain I didn't sign up for.

After what felt like minutes later, the door to the barracks slid open, causing you to blink rapidly and wake up. With a yawn and some shifting on your bunk, you sat up to see who dared bother your slumber.

"Hey. I heard you were having a headache?" The voice of the clones emanated from the newcomer. After adjusting to the light from the open door, and then the room's lights switching on, you noticed who had walked in. You smiled. Shaved and tattooed head, medic's emblem on his shoulder; Kix. He must have left his bucket in the medbay.

"Yeah, you heard correctly," and all of a sudden, the ache woke up and once again took root within your skull, causing you to wince. "Nothing serious, though. Can I help you?"

While you yawned again and faced his approaching form, he replied, "No, but I can help you. Don't you know how serious headaches can be?" He joked, and took a seat at the cot next to yours. You realized he was mostly serious when he set his med-pack next to himself.

"Oh yes, I can feel that the end is near. I see the light," you added sarcastically, and clutched at your chest, "papa, can you hear me?" You said as you pretended to reach for a ghost without laughing.

Kix laughed before you did, "Well, thank the Maker. I got here just in time!" With that, he pulled out his scanner, causing you to laugh.

"Really, it's nothing to worry about. You don't need to do all that." You told him once your giggles died down.

"But it was enough to make you quit working for the day. What if it's a concussion, or meningitis, or some horrible infection? You could die!" He rattled off in a not-so-serious tone.

"Just some sleep should do the trick. Maybe some fruit or electrolytes or-"

"Look," he cut you off with a sigh, "for the first time in a very long time, my medbay is empty. It's quiet and unsettling, and it's killing me that I literally have nothing to do. So, could you just" he looked up at you from his seated position across from you, almost pleading, "humor me?"

The man was so bored, he wanted to play doctor over a simple headache. With an exaggerated eye roll, you nodded. "How do you want me?"

Almost like an excited loth pup, Kix sprung up and turned on his medscanner. "Just how you are is fine, just stay still," he said as he waved the scanner up and down your whole body. Once he stopped, with his eyes on the readings, he said you could relax. You simply stayed as you were.

"Give it to me straight, doc. Am I gonna die?"

After a few more moments, Kix sat down and sighed dramatically. Looking up at you, he said, "Luckily, I got here just in time. A second later, and we could have lost you. You, my dear, are suffering from a sinus headache and mild dehydration." His serious tone in this low-risk situation was the most ridiculous thing. Once you calmed down, a smile remained on his face. "Take some allergy meds and drink water, or some of that sports drink the men take after training. The sugars should help once you wake up from your prescribed nap, which you should continue after taking one of these" he handed you a little bottle of allergy pills, "and drinking this," and then gave you a blue colored electrolyte drink from his pack. He must have seen you sneezing on the last mission to that dusty planet....and he must have known earlier exactly what you needed.

"Thanks, Kix." You smiled, and stood up to give the man a hug. He could be really sweet, sometimes. All the troopers could, really. Kix had gotten up too, and stiffened at your hug. Dammit, I should have asked. You quickly released him upon realizing your error.

"Sorry, I should have asked first."

"No, no, it's alright. I just wasn't expecting it. I don't really get hugs from people who aren't brothers." He said frankly, with a hint of nervousness.

"I'm sorry, but that just makes me want to hug you more. I'll refrain though. I just want you to know that I am grateful for you as a... friend. So, thank you."

You made to sit back down on your bunk when he replied with his comforting hand on your shoulder, "I am thankful for you, too, cyar'ika." He began to exit the barracks with a smile on his face, when he remembered, "And take one of those pills every night 'til they run out!"

[aria-i-adagio]

Mudlark

aka. Chapter 46 of Where the Elfroot Grows (read on AO3)

---

Rhys Trevelyan - Fucking Herald of Andraste and newly appointed Lord Fucking Inquisitor - kneels on the warm ground of Skyhold’s garden, ripping out weeds with his bare hands, getting dirt all over his trousers, and trying his best to enjoy the autumn sun in peace. The walls of the garden are working as they should, collecting and trapping the heat of the day, even as the shadows cast by the trees begin to grow long. It’s brilliant engineering, even more brilliant than he thought at first. Even at lower elevations, the season for pears and applies should have passed, but the trees here are still producing. He suspects some sort of enchantment built into the walls to amplify the natural effects of the design, but he hasn’t been able to clear enough growth to uncover all the stonework. He’d have finished days ago. Except for Leliana and Cassandra interrupting his plans to declare him Inquisitor.

He’s as close to alone as he’s likely to manage anytime soon. Mother Giselle wandered into the chapel a half hour or so ago either to pray or to work on cleaning and repairing the ancient statue. She’d probably tell him that work and prayer are much the same if one has the right attitude of devotion to Andraste’s teachings and the Maker’s will. He heard the sound of other feet in the gallery a bit after Mother Giselle passed followed by the scraping of a chair being pulled into a desirable spot. Someone might be there still, but whoever it is, they aren’t bothering him, just trying to get a break of their own from the general cacophony of a hundred or so people trying to make Skyhold fully habitable.

It shouldn’t bother him so; it wasn’t as though he’d ever had space to himself in the Circle, but there’s something very different about being in charge of more than seedlings. And Inquisitor feels so much more permanent, so much heavier, than Herald.

Josie kidnapped him promptly after breakfast and trapped him in meetings all day. First with Leliana about the couriers she would be sending: to the Inquisition camps around Redcliffe, to the Chantry, to the College of Enchanters, to Queen Anora in Denerim, to Orzammar, maybe to the Queen of Antiva. Rhys had honestly lost count at a certain point, even though he did his best to read the ones she wanted him to sign. They were all variations on the same theme - an announcement that the Inquisition had survived the destruction of Haven, a reminder that they were responsible for closing the Breach, and requests for supports to oppose Corypheus.

Then, Rutherford and Cassandra wanted to discuss the soldier’s progress repairing an old road that ran through a pass between Ferelden and Orlais, just under the peak on which Skyhold sits. Rutherford says the road is in shockingly good condition and mostly only needs a bit of clearing a few holes filled to be usable by caravans. At the moment, the engineers can’t explain why it was abandoned, as once opened the route will save a significant amount of time transporting products between Orlais and the Lake Calenhad region. Further, they’d discovered auxiliary forts will secure Skyhold's control of what will be a valuable trade route. There’s some discussion of collecting tolls as a source of income for the Inquisition, but it all seems very abstract to him.

The only part of the report that Rhys is internally motivated to be interested in is the repair work on an ingenious winch and cable system that would allow people and goods to be moved up and down the mountain in a matter of hours, versus days. Like the road, it is in remarkable condition - a little grease and a few solders to the heavy cables made it functional again. They’re already able to use it to send messages and lightweight supplies up and down the mountain. (And one adventurous member of Bull’s Chargers. Rhys is slightly envious.) To operate it with any significant amounts of weight, they'll need some strong draft animals to turn the winches at the base and the summit, but Rhys is told that the contact he had made with the farmers around Redcliffe and a few generous handfuls of gold should be able to make that happen.

Rhys had just thought assisting the farmers to secure watchtowers so that they could better defend themselves seemed like the right thing to do as he had no solution to the conflict in the area. Even without Templars and Maleficarii, there were still bears to worry about. Rhys has developed a strong dislike of bears. But they do all the allies they can manage. And Rhys wouldn’t say no to a bear fur or ten or a hundred. Skyhold is magnificent, but with the exception of the garden suntrap, the temperatures are rapidly dropping below anything he’s ever experienced.

An hour after lunch, when he thought the four of them were finished with him, Harritt showed up talking about the tunnels underneath the keep that he’d been exploring with a small team. They go deep, far deeper than Harritt is comfortable taking the men without reinforcements, but he just feels that they reach the Deep Roads. Skyhold is close to Orzammar after all. No signs of Darkspawn, thank Andraste! But they do need to be mindful of the possibility of an attack from below. (It balances the threat of an attacking dragon from above, Rhys supposes. Good to keep your equations balanced.) Cassandra suggested that Harritt take Blackwall along with a few soldiers to explore further, and around yawns, Rhys agreed with her. If the road between Ferelden and Orlais is somehow valuable, why not a road to Orzammar? Or Minrathous? All the roads!

Rhys continues ripping out vines and mentally curses all four of them for promoting him from Herald to Inquisitor. (Although, he’s fairly sure that Rutherford isn’t entirely happy about having a mage in charge for the longue durée.) Morning glories - another plant that would generally need a warmer clime to survive, even as stubborn as it is. Pretty flowers, but they take over everything. He’ll transplant some to a bed near an arbor he discovered two days ago when he swung a machete at a stand of ragweed and hit a metal post. The morning glories will be a desirable replacement - Josie will like the decorative element - if he can keep them contained.

Why couldn’t Andraste just need a gardener?

That question, of course, assumed that Andraste is in fact, the Bride of the Maker and thus, endowed with the power to toss Rhys back out of the Fade (however he ended up there in the first place), which, in turn, assumes the existence of the Maker and not just an empty throne in the middle of a Golden City. And as far as Rhys has ever been able to tell, the Maker’s existence can be neither proven nor disproven, and the people debating it - quietly, of course - were both wasting their breath and risking their necks.

A better question might be, why in the Void did he let Cassie talk him into agreeing to lead the Inquisition? It was a bit unfair of her and Leliana to ambush him with the question in public. And Josie and Rutherford’s little display of rallying acclamation from the survivors of Haven strongly suggested that the decision had already been made before Cassandra and Leliana asked him.

From the Fade and into the fire. Just my luck.

Rhys is too distracted by humoring his own grumbling to notice the loose, mounded soil hiding under the vines until his right hand is buried well past his wrist and stinging sharply from hundreds of tiny mandibles pinching the flesh and sinking venom under the surface of his skin.

Rhys springs up and back with a yelp, flinging his arm to the side in an attempt to shake the ants free, then immediately back in front of him to cast a cage of lightning around the anthill, hoping that it circles deep enough underground to cut off the entire colony before any more of the ants can swarm out to attack him.

“Andraste’s flaming weasel -” Some of the ants have already gotten under his sleeve, and it doesn’t take many of this species to produce abject misery. He swats futilely at his arm, then gives up and tears off his jacket. “Knickerbocker tits!”

“Rhys, has some demon of dance possessed you?”

“Ants.” Rhys tosses the jacket aside and tries to crush the insects between the fabric of his sleeve and his arm for a second before ripping the buttons on his shirt open and stripping it off as well. A couple of the damned terrors have made it to his neck and chest. “Blighted fire ants.” Ugh. That’s a horrible notion - fire ants infected with the Blight. The Maker really will have abandoned us.

“So dramatic. Here -” Dorian attempts to brush a few of the blighters off before Rhys can stop him. “Fasta vass! That thing bit me.”

“Yes.” Rhys flicks one off his neck and sweeps his left hand over his right arm. Be damned nice if this Anchor were effective against fire ants. “Get me a bucket of water, will you?”

The static cage spell will wear off shortly, releasing any of the ants that hadn’t been shocked to death already. And those ants will be an infuriated horde with murder on their hive mind. Rhys ignores the stinging long enough to cast as controlled and intense of a fire spell as he can manage over the mound and watches with satisfaction as it erupts through the weeds and rolls over the anthill in a destructive wave. Invasive little fuckers. Kill them. Kill them with fire.

Rhys grabs the full bucket from Dorian and splashes the water over his right side, knocking most of the remaining ants loose and hopping away from that bit of ground before they can recover and decide to crawl up his leg.

“The hell are those things?”

“Fire ants.” Rhys glares at the scorched earth, watching for movements that might single a second assault. Dorian really must have spent the majority of his time in cities and libraries if he didn’t know about fire ants. The things are native to Tevinter and had been slowly invading the south for decades. He goes back to the well in the center of the garden and draws another bucket of water to dump over his head. “Also known as the most vicious little blighters known to Thedas.”

“Certainly they can’t be that bad. They’re just insects.”

“I fell into a mound once when I was still an apprentice... I’ll take a small horde of Darkspawn over these things.” Rhys rubs his hands over his neck and face. He doesn’t think he’s allergic; the bites should just be an irritant - just one more irritant for an irritating day - but people do develop allergies to insect bites following initial exposure. He can’t feel any swelling around his throat, but there is an itch along his jaw. He swats at his cheek - unsure if there’s an ant, or if he’s just imagining it - and inadvertently smears water and dirt together into mud.

“Ah, thus the warpaint.” Dorian smirks at him.

Rhys touches his face. The tacky mud over his cheek and nose sticks to his fingertips. Fortunately, it seems like Dorian is the only other person about to bear witness. Rhys laughs. Ah yes, he should definitely be in charge of a quasi-religious movement with a military. “Yes. The warpaint.” He slaps his thigh as he feels another series of stingings pricks. Excellent. One or two had made it to his legs, but at least it’s not a swarm. “And the two or three more fireballs I’m about to hit that mound with.”

“Such a vengeful little mudlark. Ready to defend his territory. Want help?”

“Oh yes. Fire. Kill them with fire.” Rhys casts another fire spell over the mound as the first burns out, silently apologizing to any innocent soil dwellers caught in it... But... Fire ants.

“Then quick healing spell, a bath, and clean clothes, I suppose?”

“Volunteering to help with that too?”

“I could be.” Dorian paces a tight circle around Rhys and flicks one of the insects off his back with a single manicured nail. “You seem rather distraught to be left alone.” A wave of magic - Dorian’s spells always feel warm - flows over him, easing the stinging, although the sensation - real or imagined or a combination - of insect feet has Rhys ready to crawl out of his skin - along with the rest of his clothes.

“Inquisitor?” Cassandra shouts down from a window in the tower she’s claimed for herself. “What are you doing? Why are there flames?”

“Fire ants!” Rhys yells back. That should be self-explanatory. He thinks the known range of the damned bugs includes Nevarra, but then Cassandra hasn’t spent that much time in Nevarra, and probably not that much time stomping through weeds anywhere. Andraste! Fire ants under armor. He shivers at the thought.

“What?” Cassandra sounds confused.

“Don’t worry about it, Seeker. The Herald and I have everything under control.”

Rhys can imagine her grumpy huff even if he can’t hear it over the sound of the shutters of the window slamming shut.

Dorian’s eyebrows arch high with amusement. “Be careful, Rhys, or there’ll be a rumor started that you’ve gone quite mad.”

“If I get many more bites -” He smacks a different spot on his thigh. “I just might.”

“Well then, we’d better go make sure you get them all drowned then. Is it safe to touch your shirt?”

“Leave it. Damn things will get confused now that their colony is gone and wander off in a bit.” He can retrieve the shirt and jacket to be cleaned later - once the ants are well gone. The morning glory vines around the ant mound are too green for the fire to spread easily, but Rhys throws another bucket of water over them to be safe. Josie would probably tell him it’s bad form to burn down one’s new base of operations. And then yet another bucket over his head.

If Varric has questions when Rhys, shirtless and still dripping water stalks past the table he’s writing at with an amused Dorian following behind, he keeps them to himself.

“Why so grumpy today?” Dorian asks. He’d volunteered to go find some dry, ant-free clothes for Rhys, and after returning to the kitchen storeroom - the most rational place to locate a tub for bathing until further repairs are made - had remained, leaning against the closed door and toying with the rings he wears, switching them from finger to finger. “You're normally as chipper as a little bird.”

“A mudlark?”

“Does that bother you? I won't call you that if it does.”

“No, no. I kind of like it.” Rhys scrubs a bit of soapy flannel between his toes - just in case an ant had found its way there. At least Josie won’t be able to complain about dirt under his fingernails for a few hours. “Much better than Herald.”

“Or Inquisitor?”

“Definitely better than Inquisitor.” Rhys slides down in the tub, dunking his head under the water again. His next oldest brother and little sister calling him snaggletooth when he was eight would be better than Inquisitor. Besides, he likes the way that Dorian says ‘mudlark’ when talking to him. Rhys resurfaces and pushes wet hair out of his face. “I really don't want to be called Inquisitor. And yet, here I am.”

“You know, the fact that you don't want to be Inquisitor might be precisely the reason why you should be.”

“I spent all morning trying to keep up with discussions on topics that I know nothing about. Politics, economics - roads! I’m not the right person for this.”

“You’ll learn. Quickly, I’m sure.”

“You’re more confident than I am.” Rhys flicks idly at the surface of the water. “But for what it’s worth, thanks.”

“Rhys, the kind of person who would be prepared for something like this is also the kind of person who is likely to abuse any power they are given. And you will have power once the rest of Thedas realizes the threat Corypheus poses. Wouldn’t you rather be the leader and not just the tool?”

Rhys lifts his left hand from the water and studies the Anchor carefully. Yes, a tool. An instrument that controls the Veil in terrifying ways that he doesn’t understand. Something that he’s not supposed to have and that an ancient monster desperately wants. The faint green glow is more apparent in the dim light of this basement room than it was in the sunlight of the garden - one more reason to cherish the place. “It feels so foreign. Wrong. Like some disease that should be pruned away.” He touches the first three fingers of his right hand to his palm and draws them slowly down to the fold of his elbow, following the path that the magic flows along before Solas pushes it back again.

Dorian’s brow creases and moves fluidly, kneeling on one knee beside the tub and catching Rhys’s hand in his. “You’ve managed well this far.” He weaves their fingers together, and almost - almost - touches his lips to Rhys’s knuckles. “You can always come rant to me, you know. If any given day is too much.”

Rhys remains still for the space of one, two, three heartbeats, then he runs his thumb over Dorian’s fingers, soft skin, metal rings warm with heat from his body.

Dorian’s eyes drop. His cheeks might be colored a touch, but Rhys can’t quite be sure in the dim light. He rises to his feet and turns away in a single elegant motion. “You should take a break. Soak for a while. Relax a bit.” He pushes the door open, just a crack, hesitating for the barest second. “I guess I’ll -”

“Dorian?”

His back straightens as he turns back around. “Yes.”

“Keep calling me mudlark.”

Dorian glances down, breaking eye contact between them, but the corners of his eyes crinkle as he smiles. “You know where to find me, Mudlark, trying to salvage books. I could try to do something about the mess you’ve made of your hands playing in the dirt again.”

[rahimaldemir]

Let’s thing biology wise- 1000 years in the future and the virus has gone through several mutations... where do you think the strain would end up? How would it evolve? We’ve seen that it strives to be the ultimate predator...

Okay, ahaha, so I used to be an anthropology major, and did some of studies on biological anthropology and the evolution of humans and shit like that, so I’m gonna draw on that a lot for this.

I’m just gonna talk about volatiles, because that’s easier than trying to address all of them. I’m going to take two major things into account when thinking about this: getting access to resources (in this case, food, i.e. people) and reproduction.Which is also one of the reasons I’m only focusing on volatiles/night hunters, because they’re the only zombie type that has developed a way to reproduce at the time of the game.

I’m also going to go into this with a few assumptions. First, that human beings and infected are kind of cohabitating on Earth, and that humans haven’t been run to the brink of extinction. Two, that in DL, infected function mainly off of vision and sound, this is based off the fact that human (and most other primates) have shorter snouts/weaker olfactory senses, so it doesn’t make sense for for smell to suddenly become their strongest trait. I think there’s two really big branches the evolution could go down:

1.) Volatiles, or whatever the infected are at that point, would evolve to be able to withstand UV light, allowing them to hunt during the day. Although they are a nocturnal species, being physically incapable of being out during the day AND being away when majority of their primary food source is sleeping or hiding away would eventually have an impact. Being active at the same time as your prey is a major part of any predator species.

Or 2.) Volatiles fully commit to the night life. We’re talking enhanced night vision, so bigger eyes. We see volatiles tumble off of roof tops enough that it makes me think their perception of their surroundings is still underdeveloped.

If they do stay nocturnal, I think they’d need some efficient enough way to hunt humans even when they’re hiding in their homes or something so proficient that the second humans step out at night, there’s risk of a volatile scooping them up. This second option is under the assumption that in a functioning world, it’s not realistic for human beings to NEVER leave their safe houses at night.

If volatiles were to stay bipedal, I think their legs would need to develop to withstand long falls and make large jumps. Even with their still very human bodies, volatiles rely of jumping a lot. If their sight doesn’t get any better, then this would also help save them for when they fall of buildings. There’s a possibility their feet and hands may also elongate to better grip climbing.

Tbh, it all really depends on whether they put their evolutionary points into running or climbing. I would THINK climbing would server them better, letting them climb tall buildings, break into windows, traverse cityscapes. I know I mentioned the chance of them remaining bipedal, but honestly it’d probably make more sense if they became at least partially quadrupedal. Maybe kind of like lemurs.

Their joints and bones’ resistance to trauma would also need to get better fast. Human feet, knees, and backs are what we would call the peak of evolution.

If they retain human brain size, they’d probably have a strong level of problem solving and would be able to trick prey or use tools much more proficiently than any other non-human animal.

Going into reproduction, there’s also a chance that volatiles would start to diversify biologically based on role, much like an ant colony or bee hive. We already see this in the night hunter, who I think of as like a nest keeper/responsible for guarding new, budding volatiles. Their maneuverability is much, much more advanced than the the run off the mill volatile. They also seem much more deadly. So tbh? Maybe that’s what volatiles will evolve to be more like in general.

I’m really sorry anon, I got super burnt out half way through this and I have a lot more to talk about, but no energy to do it.

[convivialcamera]

Medical Doctor Attempts to Make Penicillin | Outlander Makes

CLAIRE: Hey everyone, I’m Claire, we’re on Fraser’s Ridge and today we’re making .... penicillin!

PART ONE: WHAT IS PENICILLIN?

CLAIRE: Penicillin has been on my list for Outlander Makes for a very long time, almost since the beginning. It’s one of my favorite medicines. I just love that it can kill bacteria and save lives. It has that unique property of being made from mold, and I think it will be a cool learning opportunity for me because I just love penicillin.

Penicillin is effective against staphylococci and streptococci bacteria, some of the most common bacterial infections seen on the Ridge. It was the first modern antibiotic, which I suppose is relative. But penicillin itself comes from a secretion of molds in the genus Penicillium.

I can’t believe how much Outlander Makes makes me think about my university science classes.

It’s time for my favorite part: reading the ingredients. And wow, this is a short list: benzylpenicillin.

Time to go do some research. All of which is stored in my brain because it’s 1771 and penicillin won’t be officially discovered for 157 years.

Anyways, molds have been used to fight infections since ancient times. There’s evidence ancient peoples in Egypt, Greece and India used certain fungi and molds in their medicine, according to my Uncle Lamb’s research. But penicillin as I know it, in the future, was first discovered in a bread mold in 1928 by a Scot named Andrew Flemming, but then it wouldn’t be used in human medicine until 1942.

So, I think I’m going to start with bread. But the mold spores are just in the air, and there’s no reason another food couldn’t be a growing medium. So we’ll just have to see what works best. I’m excited. I think this is going to work.

PART TWO: HOW DO YOU MAKE PENICILLIN?

CLAIRE: I’ve got a whole bunch of extra bread, so I’m going to tear it up and leave it out and see what it grows. Marsali is also out collecting food scraps from the other settlers, things destined for the pig trough, that we’ll test as well.

I’m tempted to put my samples under glass cloches to keep mice and bugs and other pests out, but I’m concerned that they will prevent mold spores in the air from getting to the bread, so we’re going to try both.

MRS. BUG: She’s gone mad, she has. Up all night baking more bread than the Lord when he fed the multitudes with the loaves and fishes.

BRIANA: Woah. You’re not planning to eat all that, are you?

CLAIRE: No, I’m going to let it go moldy.

MRS. BUG: What a terrible waste.

BRIANA: Please tell me you’re being sarcastic.

CLAIRE: What, me? Never. I’m making penicillin.

BRIANA: Then Mrs. Bug is right, you have lost your mind. You can’t do that.

CLAIRE: Yes, I can. And not just with bread, we’re going to test other food scraps too. Then, we’ll find the right strain.

BRIANA: This is dangerous. What if it messes with some cosmic balance? Or breaks some rule of space and time? Isn’t this playing God?

CLAIRE: I change the future every time I save a life here. And now I’m going to do it even better. So, time, space, history be damned.

See, now all the bread is set up. Marsali will be back soon, and we’ll set up her scraps the same way, and then we wait.

THREE DAYS LATER

CLAIRE: It’s a little dark in here because I wanted to keep the samples out of the sun. The bread and other samples have been left to mold for three days, and now we’re going to check and see how it went. I’m in that delusionally optimistic headspace where I think this might work on the first try.

I’m looking for a blue-green mold, maybe with a white outer ring. I’ve got my microscope and candles ready, so I can examine the mold more closely. What I don’t want is Aspergillus, another type of mold that grows under similar conditions but is very toxic and instead of curing infections would actually … kill my patients faster. So, if we see any fuzzier molds that are green, gray or black, that would be bad.

So, on a few of these samples I very clearly lost the battle against ants and some mice. The ones under the cloches fared better, but there’s not yet anything that looks like mold yet. This is going to take longer than I thought.

In the meantime, I’m going to work on the incubation medium that I’ll use to make even more penicillin once we grow the mold — which, we absolutely will. And for that I need Jamie.

JAMIE: Yes, Sassenach?

CLAIRE: Could you go kill me something I can make into broth?

JAMIE: You canna slaughter a chicken yourself?

CLAIRE: I can, but could you just help out for the common good? And if you don’t want to kill a chicken you could go hunt something else, right?

JAMIE: Claire, what if you waste all this food and you don’t get your medicine?

CLAIRE: I want you to know I can accept zero criticism right now.

JAMIE: Then I’ll be back with some meat for your broth.

FOUR DAYS LATER

CLAIRE: It’s day three! Well, it’s been a week but it’s day three of work. No, there’s no curse. Stop trying to make a day three curse happen.

Jamie shot a goose, and Bree plucked it for me, and Mrs. Bug made it into this broth. I’ve got to check out our bread and food samples and see if any Penicillium molds have grown. And … there are a lot of molds here! Turns out more than one mold can grow on bread. I’m looking for the classic blue-green color, and there is more than just blue-green here. This pie crust did a little better — see the white outer ring, and there’s no black, like on this bread sample. This is promising.

If I remember my textbooks correctly, Penicillium will look like a stalk of wheat with a branched end under the microscope. If the end is more like a fuzzy ball, it’s the killer Aspergillus mold that I talked about earlier. I’m going to make slides and see if I can positively identify any of these as penicillin.

TWO HOURS LATER

CLAIRE: OK, I’m down to the last two slides, and so far it’s a big fat nothing.

ROGER: What is going well right now?

CLAIRE: Nothing. This whole thing is a disaster. If these don’t have the right mold, I’ve wasted this whole week and all this food and will have to start over.

ROGER: Oh.

CLAIRE: Say a prayer, Roger. And…. got them. I was right about the pie crust — that’s definitely a Penicillium colony growing. I love it when I’m good at stuff.

ROGER: We all knew you could do it.

CLAIRE: Bree thinks I’m breaking the time-space continuum, but there it is! That’s penicillin!

So, my next step is to prepare the incubation mediums. I’ve got the broth Mrs. Bug kindly prepared, and I’m going to strain it and then boil it. I also need to sterilize the bowls, so I’m boiling some water for that. And then I have these muslin cloths that I’ve also boiled and air dried as best as I could, which will keep things like insects, bugs, mice and other critters out. It’s nearly impossible to achieve true sterility in these conditions, but it’s important to try.

And then I’m going to use these confirmed Penicillium samples and use a sterilized knife to put them into the broth to incubate. The thing about penicillin is that the mold itself isn’t antibiotic, but the mold’s secretions, so that’s what I’m trying to produce and capture.

So, I’ll leave this to do its thing. We’ll check back in a few more days.

ONE DAY LATER

CLAIRE: WHAT DO YOU MEAN ONE OF THE CHILDREN GOT IN HERE AND KNOCKED OVER ONE OF THE BOWLS?

THREE DAYS LATER

CLAIRE: ADSO! GET AWAY FROM THERE! NO, STOP DRINKING IT!

JAMIE: Are you done with your experiment, Sassenach?

CLAIRE: Noooo. I can’t believe that you can’t sense right now that I am not in a good place.

JAMIE: Oh.

CLAIRE: I guess it’s time to check the remaining bowls and see how incubation went. Like with the bread and food samples, I’m looking for Penicillium’s distinctive blue-green coloring with a white ring around the outside. So, the first bowl: nope, that’s not it. See those hairy, green clumps that look like submerged sea beasts? It could be another mold, bacterium, or maybe a colonial alga, but it’s not at all what I’m looking for.

But this second one, yes, this looks promising. See the colony in there? Looks like Penicillium to me. And, it’s worked in two more of these bowls. Three out of six isn’t a terrible average, even if two of my bowls got canned.

I’m going to have to check under the microscope again to be sure, but I’m, like 98 percent sure that’s it. I’ll strain the broth once more, to get the solid mold parts out. It’s the mold’s secretions you want, not the mold itself.

JAMIE: So what you’ve got there is broth that the mold has pissed in, is that right?

CLAIRE: Well, if you insist on putting it that way, yes. This was so much work, and it’s so unsure. This is a huge advancement in medicine for this time. It was way easier to mix up gentian ointment, or to set up the beehives, but maybe it was less satisfying. Is it better to not work that hard and not be that satisfied or to work really hard and be exhausted and somewhat more satisfied? I don’t know. Basically, there’s no way to win.

PART THREE: HOW TO MAKE PENICILLIN

CLAIRE: Here’s how you make penicillin.

Tear up pie crust and other food scraps, including bread, and leave them out to mold under glass cloches for five to seven days, keeping the cultures out of direct sunlight and away from pests. When the food starts to mold, identify Penicillium by its coloring and then under a microscope, looking for the mold’s distinctive branching pattern. Use a sterilized knife to distribute samples of your Penicillium into sterilized bowls of strained and boiled broth that has been cooled. Cover with sterilized muslin cloths and leave to incubate for several days. To use, check that broth has grown more Penicillium mold, by both the mold’s coloring and by shape under magnification. Strain the mold out of the broth, and use it to treat infection.

[thesafepesticide]

How Do I Know If My Home Has Drywood Termites? How Do I Know If My Home Has Drywood Termites? Here in Florida, summer means hot weather, lots of rain, and, unfortunately for homeowners, lots of drywood termites. While you may not be able to see them causing damage with your own actual eyes, that doesn't mean they aren't there. Drywood termites eat your home from the inside out, making them hard to identify and dangerous, costly pests. As experts in termite control, we're happy to share our expertise on dry wood termites and reduce the drywood termite damage. First things first, let's talk about the most common signs of dry wood termites in your home.

The Most Common Drywood Termites Signs

While all termites are dangerous, dry wood termites pose the biggest threat to homes in Florida. Unlike other breeds, dry wood termites build a colony and live inside the wood they're feeding on. This means that they're even harder to spot and can cause sizeable damage to the foundation of your home before you even notice their presence. Find more about termites! This is why proactive termite control is so important for homeowners in Florida--you know what they say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure--and this is especially true when it comes to termites! Here are the most common signs to keep an eye out for:

Sound of Clicking Noises

While it takes a bit of a trained ear to identify, termites make quite a racket. From noisy eating to banging against the wood to alert the colony of danger, termite infestations can be detected by listening for clicking sounds in the wall.

Flying Termites and Wings

Another common identifier is the presence of their wings. Since the colony requires swarmers to reproduce and grow the colony, flying termites or evidence of their wings is a tell-tale sign of a dry wood termite infestation.

Sighting of "White Ants"

Most people don’t realize it, but termites actually look quite similar to ants. The biggest differences? Termites have cream colored bodies, straight antennae, and much thicker midsections.

Hollow-Sounding Wood

While the goal is to catch termites before they get this far, a critical indicator that you have a severe termite infestation is the sound of hollow wood. Because dry wood termites eat from the inside-out, they leave a skinny layer of wood or even just the paint. If an area of your home sounds thin or papery when you knock on it, it could be the work of a dry wood termite colony.

Frass: Termite Droppings

Beyond seeing the damage or the termites themselves, one of the most apparent signs of an infestation is the presence of frass. Unlike subterranean termites, dry wood termites don't use their droppings to build. Instead, as they work their way through your home, they excrete frass, kicking it out of the tunnel and onto your window sills, floors, and other areas of your home. This results in a dark powdery substance with minor black marks built up around the infected area. If you notice any of these signs in your home, contact us immediately! The sooner you can get a termite infestation under control, the less money you'll spend on home repairs.

How to Prevent Drywall Termites?

If you don’t think you have an infestation but want to prevent termites altogether, here are the top ways to prevent an infestation in your home:

Build with termite resistant materials. Spanish Cedar and Bald Cypress are naturally termite resistant and can save you lots of trouble down the line.

Keep firewood & mulch away from your home. Store these items at least 20 ft away from the perimeter of your home.

Remove old tree stumps and rotting fences. This also includes old sheds or wooden structures that may be on your property.

Pre-treat the wood using termite specific insecticide to prevent termites from ever entering.

Schedule yearly termite inspections. Your best bet when taking a proactive approach is to make sure you have your home inspected every year!

How to Treat Drywood Termites?

Because termites cause such serious damage, they should be dealt with as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Some common treatment options for drywood termites include:

Fumigation

Heat Treatments

Cold Treatment

Wood Injection

Borate Treatment

Micro Electrocution Method

While there are DIY options for termite treatment, it takes a trained expert to identify the type of infestation you have and choose the appropriate treatment method. We do NOT recommend trying to handle a termite problem on your own. While you could be initially saving money with store-bought items, you do run the significant risk of not eliminating the infestation and spending more money on repairs in the long run. Keep sharing How Do I Know If My Home Has Drywood Termites? with your friends and family members. Read More: https://thesafepesticide.com/how-do-i-know-if-my-home-has-drywood-termites/?feed_id=108&_unique_id=611372447da2e

[tineyearthling]

Human  Arrogance  to  Save  the  Planet...

You got people like this around you? Country’s full of ’em now. People walking’ around all day long every minute of the day, worried about everything. Worried about the air, worried about the water, worried about the soil. Worried about insecticides, pesticides, food additives, carcinogens, worried about radon gas, worried about asbestos, worried about saving endangered species. Lemme tell ya bout endangered species, awright? Saving endangered species is just one more arrogant attempt by humans to control Nature. It’s arrogant meddling. It’s what got us in trouble in the first place. Doesn’t anybody understand that? Interfering with Nature. Over 90 percent, over, way over 90 percent, of the species that have ever lived on this planet, ever lived, are gone. Wooosh! They’re extinct. We didn’t kill them all. They just disappeared. That’s what nature does. They disappear these days at the rate of 25 a day—and I mean regardless of our behavior. Irrespective of how we act on this planet, 25 species that were here today will be gone tomorrow. Let them go gracefully. Leave Nature alone. Haven’t we done enough? We’re so self-important, so self-important. Everybody’s gonna save something now. Save the trees, save the bees, save the whales, save those snails. And the greatest arrogance of all, save the planet. What? Are these fucking people kidding me? Save the planet? We don’t even know how to take care of ourselves yet. We haven’t learned to care for one another—we’re gonna save the fuckin’ planet? I’m gettin’ tired of that shit. Tired of that shit. Tired. I’m tired of fuckin’ Earth Day, I’m tired of these self-righteous environmentalists, these white bourgeois liberals who think the only thing wrong with this country is there aren’t enough bicycle paths. People trying to make the world safe for their Volvos. Besides, environmentalist don’t give a shit about the planet, they don’t care about the planet, not in the abstract they don’t, not in the abstract they don’t. You know what they’re interested in? A clean place to live. Their own habitat. They’re worried that someday in the future they might be personally inconvenienced. Narrow, unenlightened self-interest doesn’t impress me. Besides, there is nothing wrong with the planet, nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine. The people are fucked. Difference. Difference. The planet is fine. Compared to the people, the planet is doing’ great! It’s been here four and a half billion years. Did you ever think about the arithmetic? The planet has been here four and a half billion years. We’ve been here, what? A hundred thousand? Maybe two hundred thousand and we’ve only been engaged in heavy industry for a little over two hundred years. Two hundred years versus four and a half billion. And we have the conceit to think that somehow we’re a threat? That somehow we’re gonna put in jeopardy this beautiful little blue-green ball that’s just a floating’ around the sun? The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through all kinds of things worse than us. Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sunspots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles, hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids, and meteors, world-wide floods, tidal waves, world-wide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages, and we think some plastic bags and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference? The planet isn’t going anywhere. We are! We’re goin’ away. Pack your shit, Folks, we’re goin’ away. We won’t leave much of a trace either, thank god for that. Maybe a little styrofoam, maybe, little styrofoam. Planet Will be here and we’ll be long gone. Just another failed mutation. Just another closed-end biological mistake, an evolutionary cul de sac. The planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas, a surface nuisance. You wanna know how the planet’s doin’? Ask those people at Pompeii, who were frozen into position from volcanic ash. How the planet’s doin’. Wanna know if the planet’s alright, ask those people in Mexico City or Armenia, or a hundred other places buried under thousands of tons of earthquake rubble if they feel like a threat to the planet this week. How about those people in Kilauea, Hawaii who built their homes right next to an active volcano and then wonder why they have lava in the living room. The planet will be here for a long, long, long time after we’re gone and it will heal itself, it will cleanse itself ’cuz that’s what it does. It’s a self-correcting system. The air and the water will recover, the earth will be renewed, and if it’s true that plastic is not degradable well, the planet will simply incorporate plastic into a new paradigm: the earth plus plastic. The earth doesn’t share our prejudice towards plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. The earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the earth allows us to be spawned from it in the first place: it wanted plastic for itself. Didn’t know how to make it, needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old philosophical question, “Why are we here?” “Plastic, assholes.” So, so, the plastic is here, our job is done, we can be phased out now. And I think that’s really started already, don’t you? I mean, to be fair, the planet probably sees us as a mild threat, something to be dealt with, but I’m sure the planet will defend itself in the manner of a large organism like a bee hive or an ant colony can muster a defense. I’m sure the planet will think of something. What would you do, if you were the planet trying to defend against this pesky, troublesome species? Let’s see, what might, viruses, viruses might be good, they seem vulnerable to viruses. And, viruses are tricky, always mutating and forming new strains whenever a vaccine is developed. Perhaps this first virus could be one that compromises the immune system in these creatures. Perhaps a human immunodeficiency virus making them vulnerable to all sorts of other diseases and infections that might come along, and maybe it could be spread sexually, making them a little reluctant to engage in the act of reproduction. Well, that’s a poetic note. And it’s a start. But I can dream, can’t I? I don’t worry about the little things, bees, trees, whales, snails. I think we’re part of a greater wisdom than we’ll ever understand, a higher order, call it what you want. You know what I call it? The Big Electron. The Big Electron. Oooohhhh, Woooohhhh, Woooohhhh. It doesn’t punish, it doesn’t reward, it doesn’t judge at all. It just is, and so are we, for a little while. Thanks for being here with me for a little while tonight.