27 thoughts on “Mini Readers’ wildlife photos”

      1. They look suitably asymmetrical. Something organic that is extremely symmetrical, I’d be suspicious of.

        1. could very well be just the common N. American white-tailed deer, O. virginianus, I’m not good with deer ID, location would help.

          2. That clears things up a bit. It had what appeared to be a rather long face, but I guess that could have been due to the camera angle.
            as for being overrun, I’m sure they feel the same way about humans. I’d agree. If I had to choose between finding a deer in my back yard vs a person…

  3. Spectacular to apartment dwellers. Opinions may differ among people trying to grow anything outside. But, they do stimulate the economy – sales of wire fencing must surely be up as a result.

    1. “Me! Me! Me!” [jumping up and waving “Mini-me mask in the air.]
      (P> If I’ve got the film reference right. One of those Waynes World spin-offs?

  6. When I was in New Zealand I was surprised to learn that a large source of the revenue of deer farms came from selling the velvet to the China, where it’s thought (probably incorrectly) to be an aphrodisiac and to have other medicinal properties.

    1. everything is an aphrodisiac in China. and clearly they need help with erections, since the population is dwindling, with a paltry 1.4 billion people…

      If only they could be convinced to try real medicine instead of ground up wildlife parts. I think this is an interesting case to study, similar to religion, why people insist on traditional “medicine” that clearly doesn’t work instead of actual medicine that does. Grinding up rhino horns until they’re all extinct won’t give you a boner, but a little blue pill does the trick (or so i’ve been told).

      1. why people insist on traditional “medicine” that clearly doesn’t work instead of actual medicine that does.

        How do you know that it clearly doesn’t work? Or, to ask the same question differently, how do you know that it clearly doesn’t work?
        The answer in both cases is going to boil down to confidence in the importance of, procedure of, and interpretation of double-blinded clinical trials.
        You may have that confidence. But someone who has only had experience of medicine as the “barefoot doctor” saying “take this”, and when the “barefoot doctor” dies, or becomes a salesman for Mr Wong’s Herbal recipies … and who still hasn’t heard of double-blinded clinical trials. How is he (or she) going to be equipped to tell if ground rhino bollock is clearly a better solution to his (or her) problems than anally injected coloured water?
        Just because someone has the nous to become a billionaire in business (ripping off other business-people, almost by definition) doesn’t mean to say that they automatically learn in the process how to distinguish pseudo-medical science from medical science.

    2. I had earlier done an internet search of velvet antlers to see what varieties they take on. A Lot of links came back about it being an elixer for body builders to speed muscle recovery. That is one deeply misogynist niche in marketing, btw.

      1. body builders to speed muscle recovery. That is one deeply misogynist niche in marketing, btw.

        The one about the body builders, or the one about wanting “muscle” recovery?
        I’ve met and seen enough female body builders, and heard enough laughter about male body builders, to have some significant doubts about the “muscle” that they are concerned with recovery of. Or failure to recover, for the case of steroid users.

    3. It would be nice to see multiple studies that show unambiguously that such remedies are not only useless, but harmful to the user. It is obvious it is harmful to the deer, rhino, elephant, snake, shark…you name it. Uneducated Chinese think this stuff makes them stronger, faster, and sexier…now there is some need for some PSAs.

      1. It is obvious it is harmful to the deer,

        If the velvet is harvested on live horn, you could probably make that claim. If it is harvested from (say) “scratching posts” where the stag rubs it off to expose his newly minted “horns-d’l’annee”, then it actually approaches sustainable. Stupid, nonetheless, but “sustainable”, for some low values of sustainability.

    4. I just found this Nat. Geo. article on this. Deer antler velvet has been found to contain a growth hormone. Parts of the antler, not just the velvet ‘skin’ are thinly sliced and used for tea or soup.

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