A few nice animal cruelty images I found:
Photo sloth
Image by mojotrotters
You don't see it coming. A man bearing what looks like a plush toy just puts it in your arms. As if by instinct, the animal hugs you and rests there, long enough for a picture, until the man takes him away, demands some money, and move to the next tourist. It seems like animal cruelty, but the sloth doesn't seem to mind.
Portal of the day
Image by Hobo Matt
This was once the Brooklyn headquarters of the ASPCA, which was founded in New York City in 1866. (Here's a great history of the organization.) The ASPCA owes its existence to the tireless efforts of a single man, Henry Bergh, who "alone, in the face of indifference, opposition, and ridicule," worked to bring an end to the barbaric acts of animal cruelty once seen as acceptable. That's the organization's seal, featuring an angel preventing a man from beating a horse, perched atop the doorway; this is what it looks like up close.
Behold the Galapagos Mockingbird!
Image by A.Davey
The Galapagos Mockingbird (Nesomimius parvulus) had been flitting around in the background on other islands, but Santa Fé Island was where we had a real opportunity to know this delightful bird. It quickly became one of my favorite avian fauna in the Galapagos archipelago.
Let's see - how many "favorites" does that make so far? Well, better to keep a list of animals you love than a tally of creatures to avoid, to wit, the horrid Banana Spider of the Ecuadorian interior. Don't (or do!) worry; one will make an appearance in this photostream eventually, though not in the paradisiacal Galapagos.
I honestly don't know how thirsty the Galapagos Mockingbird is on an average day during the dry season.. Or, more importantly, how it went about slaking that thirst.
Now, however, Mockingbirds, never slow on the uptake, have come to associate tourists with - what else - water bottles, and water bottles with a potentially refreshing drink. What Mockingbird wouldn't rather hit up a tourist charmed by its charisma than pulp a cactus paddle or whatever it was they did before Homo sapiens began arriving in large numbers. Like many other animals in the Galapagos, the Mockingbird is not shy around humans, and will walk right up to you and look you straight in the eyes,
There's one catch to this excellent hydration scheme the Mockingbirds have come up with. Remember the saying "take only memories and leave only footprints"?
In the Galapagos this means sharing one's water supply with a Galapagos Mocking Bird is verboten, interdit, prohibido, no dice. This is true regardless how cleverly the bird behaves, putting you in mind of your own pet, be it (most likely) a cat or, perhaps the odd dog.
In fact, I was beaming with pride when our group's naturalist, normally a laid-back sort of fellow, became livid on observing that the group ahead of us, mostly scruffy 20-somethings, were having a de-lightful time luring Galapagos Mockingbirds to their water bottles and then stiffing them. Hyuck, hyuck! In case my meaning isn't clear, some members of the group were presenting their water bottles to the Mockingbirds, who in chipper good faith, promptly hopped over for the promised drink. Which was withheld. This is callous animal cruelty in anyone's book.
There then ensued a lively exchange between our naturalist and our guide, on the one side, and the other group's guide, on the other. Some of the scruffy 20-somethings sent reproachful WTF glances our way, as their kind will do when one of their self-centered, antisocial and/or harebrained schemes is thwarted. Ah, the joys of never having to be young again.
Having given you a highly personal and ideosyncratic account of the Galapagos Mocking Bird's natural history, I promise to make up for it by bombarding viewers with facts and figures with the very next image of a Galapagos Mocking Bird in my photostream.
