m3k4m0 - ;P
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BEHOLD!! I Made An Entry To Skunkape's 2023 Holiday Contest! :'Dc I Worked So Fuckin Hard On It Hhhrhrhrhgdhsjglshgjdjfh

The first page of a two page digitally painted comic of Sam and Max. In the first panel, Sam and Max stand in a small ice fishing hut with dozens of bottles of hot sauce stood behind them on the counters. Sam wears a heavy winter coat and hat, while Max wears a scarf. Sam says, "Hi folks! Welcome to Sam and Max's annual hot sauce tasting and ice fishing jamboree! We're Sam and Max, and today we're gonna be sampling some of these delightful hot sauces in order to further our ongoing piscatological pursuits!" Max replies, "Piss-catological...Sam, there's no way that's a real word." Sam simply responds, "Oh, hush, you. Now let's get started!" In the second panel, they both hold several different hot sauces, tasting them as they give commentary. Sam says, "Ooh, The Rambunctious Reaper. I'm getting some notes of citrus from this one." Max adds, "And this Bowel Wrangler has a light aroma of bleach!" Sam again, "Huh, Red forty?" Max, "Oh, I already tried that one. Tastes like what it says on the tin." In the third panel, Max sticks his tongue out thoughtfully, holding a bottle labeled 100 percent pure capsaicin. Sam says from offscreen, "What are you trying? Capsaicin? Sounds french." Max comments, "I'm getting light fruity and smoky notes as well as just a hint of lava." His tongue sizzles as he talks. In the fourth panel, Sam says, "Sounds like we've got a winner! Open up, little buddy!" as he opens up Max's head like a trash can lid and pours the capsaicin down his gaping maw. Max looks completely ok with this arrangement. In the next panel, Sam tosses the hot sauce away while Max slowly turns bright red, smoke pouring out of his mouth as he begins to emit a high pitched squeal. In the last panel, Sam grabs Max by the ankles and dunks him into the ice fishing hole, saying, "Yowch! Yep, that's effective, alright. Alrighty, in ya go! Get those fish, Max!" Max lets out a burbling yell as he hits the water, turning it to steam as he goes. To be continued on page two. END ID
The second page of the same comic. In the first panel, Max sinks slowly into the arctic waters, letting out a relieved sigh. Around him are three fish: a barreleye, a calm looking sleeper shark, and a small trout in the foreground who looks alarmed at Max's sudden appearance. In the second panel, Max suddenly lurches forward with a mad grin and gleaming eyes, reaching out toward the trout, who looks alarmed and tries to make a break for it. The barreleye looks on and quietly comments, "Oh, damn." In the third panel, Sam sits in a red folding chair holding on to Max's scarf like it's a fishing line. He says dreamily, "Oh, the things we'll make with these fish. Surströmming, fried boiled pickled herring on smørrebrød, fiskeboller..." Suddenly there's a tug on the scarf. Sam says, "Oop! That feels like a bite!" In the next panel, Sam pulls Max up and out of the water by his scarf. Max has the trout from the previous panel clutched in one hand and a long, bewildered-looking eel in the other, as well as a small goldfish stuck in the folds of his scarf. He grins triumphantly and crows, "Tada! I think I saw my great aunt Tilly down there!" Notably, Tilly is the sleeper shark. Sam grins brightly and says, "Wow! Nice going, little pal!" In the final panel, Sam now holds Max by the scruff of the neck. Max tosses the trout carelessly over his shoulder, where it probably lands in the ice fishing hole and mercifully escapes, never to be caught by these lunatics again. Good for him. Anyway, Sam says, "What a successful first outing! But don't forget, we've got around 20 more bottles to get through before the day is done." Max, holding a blobby bright red bottle, says, "I wanna try this one called Breath of Death next!" Sam responds, "Sure thing, little pal! Huh, sure is a good thing you don't usually obey the laws of thermodynamics. Otherwise, that cold water wouldn't have helped with the spiciness at all and you'd probably just be in a lot of pain." Max, completely nonchalantly and excited if anything, says, "Who says I'm not? Now set me back down and let's get to tasting!" END ID

BEHOLD!! I made an entry to Skunkape's 2023 Holiday Contest! :'Dc I worked so fuckin hard on it hhhrhrhrhgdhsjglshgjdjfh and let me tell you, I do not at all hope to win but I do hope it makes Steve snicker. Just the thought that he'll be seeing it is wild. Hope it makes y'all snicker too ehehehe!!

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More Posts from M3k4m0

1 year ago

i must ask you reblog this so said beast, you know. actually has attributes

1 year ago
Something Healing About This

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1 year ago

Alligator Body Language and You, or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media is Being Stressed for Views

Alligators are wild animals. Despite the idiotic claims of animal abusers like Jay Brewer, they cannot be domesticated, which means they are always going to react on the same natural instincts they've had for millions of years. Habituated, yes. Tamed, yes. Trained, definitely. Crocodilians can form bonds with people- they're social and quite intelligent. They can solve problems, use tools, and they're actually quite playful. Alligators are also really good at communicating how they're feeling, but to somebody who doesn't spend much time around them, their body language can be a bit mystifying. And it doesn't help when social media influencers are saying shit like this:

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

That is not what a happy gator looks like.

That's a terrified, furious gator who isn't attacking because the ogre handling her has her in a chokehold. She's doing everything she can to express her displeasure, and he's lying about it because he knows his audience doesn't even know how to think critically about what he's doing. He knows that because his audience doesn't know anything about these animals, he can get away with it. This I think is why I hate him so much- he deliberately miseducates his audience. He knows what he's doing is factually inaccurate, he just doesn't care because attention means more to him than anything else in the world.

Let's change that! Here are two really important lessons for understanding alligator body language on social media.

Lesson 1: Alligators Don't Smile (in fact, most animals don't)

So what's going on in this video? Jay Brewer is aggressively choking his white alligator Coconut while scrubbing algae off of her with a toothbrush. And make no mistake, he is digging into the creature's throat while she is visibly distressed. He claims she's happy- but she's not. He is willfully misrepresenting what this animal is feeling. That's a problem, because people... well, we actually kind of suck at reading other species' body language. The reason for this is that we tend to overlay our own responses on their physical cues, and that's a problem. For example, let's look at an animal with a really similar face to ours, the chimpanzee. Check out Ama's toothy grin!

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

Wait, no. That's not a happy smile. That's a threat display. When a chimpanzee "smiles," it's either terrified and doing a fear grimace, or it's showing you its teeth because it intends on using them in your face.

How about a dog? Look at my smiling, happy puppy!

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

Oh wait no, this is a picture of Ryder when he was super overwhelmed by noise and people during a holiday party. He'd hopped up in my sister's lap to get away from stuff that was happening on the floor and was panting quite heavily. See the tension in the corners of his mouth and his eyes? A lot of the time when a dog "smiles," the smile isn't happy. It's stress! Why Animals Do The Thing has a nice writeup about that, but the point is, our body language is not the same as other species. And for reptiles, body language is wildly different.

For instance, look at these two alligators. Pretty cute, right? Look at 'em, they're posing for a Christmas card or something! How do you think they're feeling?

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

Well, I'll tell you how the normal one is feeling. He's annoyed! Why is he annoyed? Because the albino just rolled up, pushed another gator off the platform, and is trying to push this guy, too. I know this because I actually saw it happen. It was pretty funny, not gonna lie. He's not gaping all the way, but he was hissing- you can actually see him getting annoyed in the sequence I took right before this shot. Look at him in this first shot here- he's just relaxing, and you can see he isn't gaping even a little bit.

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed
Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed
Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

By the end, he's expressing displeasure, but not enough to actually do anything about it. He's annoyed, but he's comfy and that's where one of the best basking areas is, so he'll put up with it.

Reptiles open their mouths wide for a lot of reasons, but never because they are actively enjoying a sensation. Unless they're eating. No reptile smiles- they can't. They don't even have moveable lips. If a reptile is gaping, it's doing so because:

It is doing a threat display.

It is making certain vocalizations, all of which are threats. Alligators are one of the rare reptiles that do regularly vocalize, but most of their calls aren't made with a wide open mouth.

It is about to bite something delicious or somebody stupid. Check out this video- virtually all of the gaping here is anticipatory because these trained gators know darn well that the bowl is full of delicious snacks. (I have some issues with Florida's Wildest, but the man knows how to train a gator AND he is honest about explaining what they're doing and why, and all of his animals are healthy and well-cared for, and he doesn't put the public or his staff at risk- just himself.)

It's too hot and it has opened its mouth to vent some of that heat and thermoregulate. This is the main reason why alligators will often have their mouths part of the way open, but sometimes they'll open all the way for thermoregulation. This is what a thermoregulatory gape looks like- usually it's not all the way open, kinda more like < rather than V, but you can't say that 100% of the time. Additionally, a thermoregulatory gape... typically happens when it's hot out. If they're inside, maybe they've been under their basking light for too long. Heat's the dominant factor, is what I'm getting at.

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

There is another reason that a captive crocodilian might be gaping, and that's because it's doing so on command. Some places have their gators trained to gape on cue, like St. Augustine Alligator Farm and other good zoos. They have the animals do this in presentations that are genuinely educational. They ask the animals to open their mouths so that they can show off their teeth and demonstrate how their tongues seal off the back of their mouth. They'll also do it as part of routine healthcare, because looking at their teeth is important.

In this case, the animals aren't gaping because they're stressed, they're gaping because they know they're gonna get a piece of chicken or fish if they do it. And what's more, they're doing it on cue. They have a specific command or signal that tells them to open wide. It's not an instinctive response to a situation. It's trained. If the animal provides the behavior after a cue, the situation is much less likely to be negatively impactful.

It's also important to remember that there's a difference between a partially open mouth and a gape! As discussed above, alligators will often have their mouths a little bit open just to maintain temperature homeostasis. It helps them stay comfy, temperature-wise. These guys are all doing thermoregulatory open-mouthed behavior- that slight open and relaxed body posture is a dead giveaway. (That and it's the hottest spot in the enclosure.)

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

Lesson 2: A Happy Gator Is A Chill Gator

So if alligators don't smile or have facial expressions other than the :V that typically signifies distress, how else can you tell how they're feeling? One way is stillness. See, alligators subscribe to the philosophy of if it sucks... hit da bricks.

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

Basically, if they hate it, they'll leave. Unless, y'know, somebody has their meaty claws digging into their throat or is otherwise restraining them. (Restraint isn't always bad, btw. Sometimes the animal is going through a medical thing or needs to be restrained for their safety- which a responsible educator will explain.)

Let's look at a very similar scenario, in which a captive alligator is getting his back scrubbed.

As you can see, it's quite different. First, he's not being restrained at all. Second, look at how relaxed he is! He's just chilling there vibing! He could simply get up and leave if he wanted to, because he's not being held. Towards the end of the video, as he lifts his head, you can see that his respiratory rate is very even as his throat flutters a bit. I'm not sure what this facility is, so I can't comment on care/general ethics, but like. In this specific case, this is an alligator enjoying being scrubbed! And you can tell because he's not doing anything. A happy gator is content to be doing what they're doing.

Why Should I Listen To You?

Now, you should ask yourself, why should you listen to me? Why should you trust me, who does not own an alligator, versus Jay Brewer, who owns several?

Well, first off, there's no profit for me in telling you that what you're seeing on social media is in fact not what you're being told you're seeing. I'm not getting paid to do this. That's the thing with people who make social media content. The big names aren't doing it just for fun. They're doing it for money. Whether that's profit through partnerships or sponsorships, or getting more people to visit their facilities, or ad revenue, you can't ignore the factor of money. And this is NOT a bad thing, because it allows educators to do what they're passionate about! People deserve to be paid for the work that they do!

But the problem starts when you chase the algorithm instead of actually educating. A "smiling" alligator gets the views, and if people don't know enough to know better, it keeps getting the views. People love unconventional animal stories and they want those animals to be happy- but the inability to even know where to start with critically evaluating these posts really hinders the ability to spread real information. Like, this post will probably get a couple hundred notes, but that video of Coconut being scrubbed had almost 400,000 likes when I took that screenshot. Think about how many eyeballs that's reached by now. What I'm saying here is that it's just... really important to think critically about who you're getting your information from. What do dissenters say in the comments? What do other professionals say? You won't find a single herpetologist that has anything good to say about Prehistoric Pets, I can tell you that right now.

Another reason you can trust me is that my sources are not "just trust me bro," or "years of experience pretending my pet shop where animals come to die is a real zoo." Instead, here are my primary sources for my information on alligator behavior:

Dragon Songs: Love and Adventure among Crocodiles, Alligators, and Other Dinosaur Relations- Vladimir Dinets

The Secret Social Lives of Reptiles- J. Sean Doody, Vladimir Dinets, Gordon M. Burghardt

Social Behavior Deficiencies in Captive American Alligators (Alligator mississippiensis)- Z Walsh, H Olson, M Clendening, A Rycyk

Social Displays of the American Alligator (Alligator mississippiensis)- Kent Vliet

Social Signals and Behaviors of Adult Alligators and Crocodiles- Leslie Garrick, Jeffery Lang

Never smile at a crocodile: Gaping behaviour in the Nile crocodile at Ndumo Game Reserve, South Africa- Cormac Price, Mohamed Ezat, Céline Hanzen, Colleen Downs (this one's Nile crocs, not American alligators, but it's really useful for modeling an understanding of gape behaviors and proximity)

Thermoregulatory Behavior of Captive American Alligators (Alligator mississippiensis)- Cheryl S. Asa, Gary D. London, Ronald R. Goellner, Norman Haskell, Glenn Roberts, Crispen Wilson

Unprovoked Mouth Gaping Behavior in Extant Crocodylia- Noah J. Carl, Heather A. Stewart, Jenny S. Paul

Thank you for reading! Here's a very happy wild alligator from Sanibel for your trouble.

Alligator Body Language And You, Or: How To Know When An Alligator On Social Media Is Being Stressed

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