Wildlife Matters

@giveashitnature Love this!

If you're going to have a lawn, make it red creeping thyme. It barely needs water after the first year. It tops out around 2 to 3 inches and never needs mowing. It produces a carpet of magenta flowers in summer that bees and butterflies cover like a feeding station. It smells like thyme when you walk on it, because it is thyme. It's the same genus as the culinary kind, and edible. Deer won't eat it. Rabbits won't eat it. Grass is crowded out by it. It's hardy in most of the US (zones 4 through 9), tolerates poor soil, and handles moderate foot traffic. Honest caveat: creeping thyme isn't native to North America. But neither is your lawn. Kentucky bluegrass is European. Bermuda grass is African. Every square foot of creeping thyme replacing turfgrass is net positive for pollinators, soil, and water use. If you want a fully native ground cover, look into Pennsylvania sedge for shade, pussytoes or wild strawberry for sun, and moss phlox for rocky spots. But if you're going to have a lawn, make it one that does something.

.@FLOTUS @MELANIATRUMP announced the expansion of the @WhiteHouse honey program with the addition of a newly installed and fully functioning beehive on the South Lawn. Hand-crafted by a local artisan in the image of the White House, the beautiful, new hive will add two new bee colonies to the existing two colonies that already produce the signature White House honey. 🍯 🐝

In 2020, a small city in Wisconsin told its residents they could stop mowing for a month. 435 households joined in. The bees came back the same spring. Appleton was the first US city to adopt No Mow May. The city council suspended its weed ordinance for the month so residents wouldn't get cited for tall grass. Around 40 acres of lawn across the city went uncut. Researchers from Lawrence University sampled the unmowed lawns and nearby mowed city parks in the same week. The unmowed lawns had 5 times as many bees and 3 times as many bee species as the mowed parks. Wisconsin is home to nearly 500 native bee species. Most people have never seen them because they don't live in honeybee hives. They're solitary bees, ground nesters, small black or metallic green insects that fit on a fingernail. Appleton's unmowed yards gave them food and shelter in the hungry early-spring window when almost nothing else is blooming. The experiment cost the city nothing. It saved residents fuel and labor. It produced measurable ecological results within 30 days. Dozens of US cities have adopted the practice since. Has yours?

I am appalled to hear about the 31 sloths who died under the “care” of the not yet opened Sloth World in Orlando. These sloths — naturally solitary animals — were put in the worst conditions possible. They were taken from their natural habitats to a packed warehouse that wasn’t properly heated and allowed for the spread of deadly viruses, leading to a stress-induced death. My office is looking into this tragedy, and we will coordinate with local officials to determine how to best move forward. fox35orlando.com/news/31-sloths…

Updates on the SoCal wildlife crossing are here: bit.ly/41UN3Np

@Geniustechw Is she in the French Underground circa 1940s?

Actress Molly Ringwald warns Trump supporters that they'll be found guilty of treason once he leaves office “That is what’s going to happen. You should not support what is going on... You are going to be seen as a collaborationist.” Thoughts?

Please contact your elected officials in Congress and tell them to support the Luna–Costa–Garbarino Amendment — Protect Farm Animals and State Laws bit.ly/4dZB8oP #AnimalWelfare @AWAction_News

Nobody could figure out why the abandoned Hendricks apple orchard suddenly bloomed in April 2019. The trees hadn't produced fruit in eleven years. County agriculture office sent two inspectors. They found sixty thousand honeybees working the property - a massive colony that had escaped from Tomás Vega's apiary three miles south. Tomás had reported the swarm missing in March. He expected them dead. Instead they'd colonized the hollow barn on the Hendricks lot and cross-pollinated every surviving tree. That October, the orchard produced twenty-two tons of Cortland apples. The Hendricks family offered Tomás a permanent lease. He moved his entire operation there the following spring.

@MrPitbull07 What a great story!

@GigaBeers At 79, I think she's earned the right to dress how she wants! C'mon, man!

What’s happened to Susan Sarandon? Sarandon, once the sharp, no-nonsense Louise in Thelma & Louise—a defiant feminist icon who embodied strength, independence, and rebellion against societal norms—now presents a far more disheveled image at 79 that many observers describe as looking downright homeless. Her recent public appearances often feature mismatched layers, oversized or ill-fitting garments, casual sneakers …an overall rumpled vibe. Yuck!

@TaraBull Is this a paid-for "honor?"

Anne Hathaway has been named “The Most Beautiful Woman in the World” by People magazine

@Nero There is something really wrong with that creature, Looney Laura! 🤢🤮🤮

Lord, have mercy.

Last week, the U.S. Senate gave a Chilean billionaire the green light to mine next to the most visited wilderness in America- the Boundary Waters. The ore mined would be sold directly to China. The public was completely cut out of the process. This sets a dangerous precedent for public lands everywhere - including right here in Montana. Our hunting, fishing, and recreating belong to us, not foreign billionaires and DC dealmakers. I will fight for our public lands as your Senator. Stand with us. Follow @SethBodnar for more. #declareyourindependence #mtsen #montana

“We’re losing some of the most precious species on Earth. I can go back to places that have been monitored over a period of 20 years, and the change is significant,” says naturalist Martyn Stewart. cbsn.ws/4tXTfjJ

In 1987, 21% of Costa Rica was forest cover. Today, forest cover has swelled to 57%. They did it by paying landowners not to cut their trees. In the 1990s, Costa Rica passed a law funded by a tax on fossil fuels. Landowners receive direct payments for the ecosystem services their forests provide. Keeping the forest standing became worth more than clearing it. Nearly a million hectares of forest have been protected or restored through the program. Biodiversity is recovering. Species that we thought were lost forever are coming back. But it killed their economy, right? Nope. Costa Rica became the top per capita agricultural exporter in Latin America. The Costa Rican economy didn't collapse. It grew. It's not forests or the economy. The forests can be the economy.

@TaraBull 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

Rumors are swirling that Erika Kirk could be positioning herself for a 2028 presidential run.

@LangmanVince Because she can?

Why is 67-year-old Madonna acting like a 17-year-old?