Animals Guardians

Fat Bear Week voting runs today from noon to 9 p.m. ET. 🐻

The bracket is open, and every matchup asks the same deceptively simple question: which Katmai brown bear best represents a summer spent preparing for winter?

Cast your vote, then tell us which bear earned your pick.


Check comments for the full story ⬇️

Beautiful young female Belted Kingfisher started her Tuesday with a bang 🥺. She hit the window of an office building in Andover, and was found with another Kingfisher, already expired. Kind finder drove her all the way to us. ❤️

Belted Kingfisher are fiercely territorial birds, and live solitary outside of mating season. They attack each other in impressive aerial displays and will make direct contact, defending their turf. This time of year, parents are kicking young birds out of their territory too. I have a feeling that was the cause of their crash.

She's otherwise healthy, we are getting oxygen and anti-inflammatory meds were given. Send some healing vibes to this beautiful young bird!!! We will be visiting the bait shop for minnows tomorrow.

Say YES If you like this Picture💐🐺

Chunk can still eat—but repairing his jaw would require far more than one operation. 🐻

A veterinary team would first need to capture and anesthetize a massive wild brown bear, examine the injury and determine whether reconstruction was even feasible. Recovery could mean controlled feeding, pain management, repeated monitoring and weeks in captivity—while trying not to condition a powerful wild animal to people.

That trade-off matters because Katmai says Chunk’s break is now fully healed and permanent. His jaw remains attached to the rest of the mandible but hangs off the right side of his muzzle. Even so, he can eat and gain enough weight to survive hibernation.

National parks generally preserve natural processes rather than treating every injured individual. Intervention becomes more likely when human activity caused the harm, public safety is involved or a threatened population requires protection.

If a wild animal is coping, when does treatment help—and when does it cost the wildness we’re trying to protect?



Check comments for the full story ⬇️

A group of stray cats wandered into the woods one day and came across something that should have sent them running.

A wild puma was resting beneath a large tree. 🐆

But instead of fleeing, the cats slowly began moving closer.

And what happened next left everyone who witnessed it amazed.

# # # The puma in the forest

The unusual encounters took place near an old farming property on the edge of a forest in northern Argentina.

Several stray cats had been roaming around the area for months. They spent their days hiding beneath sheds, slipping between fences, and searching for food wherever they could.

The puma occasionally appeared near the property, too.

He would move quietly through the trees, sometimes stopping to rest before disappearing back into the forest.

Whenever the cats spotted him, they usually ran.

That was until one afternoon, when a small tabby decided to do something different.

Instead of disappearing into the bushes, the cat stayed exactly where it was.

It sat a few feet away from the puma and watched him.

The puma lifted his head.

The little cat froze.

Neither animal moved for several seconds.

Then the puma calmly lowered his head and went back to resting.

And somehow, the tabby didn't run away.

# # # The cats kept coming back

Over the next few days, something unusual began to happen.

Whenever the puma appeared, the cats seemed less frightened. They would remain nearby, carefully watching him from a distance instead of immediately scattering.

At first, they kept their space.

Then one cat decided to get a little closer.

Another followed.

Before long, several stray cats were lying around the puma as he rested in the shade.

It was an incredible sight.

These tiny cats were sharing the same patch of ground with a powerful wild predator, and the puma didn't seem particularly bothered by their presence.

Then one of the cats took things even further.

It walked right up beside him and curled against his side.

The size difference was almost comical. 😂

A small stray cat was snuggled next to an enormous puma, as though they were simply two animals enjoying a quiet afternoon together.

The puma remained still.

He didn't chase the cat away. He didn't appear to growl or react aggressively.

He simply allowed the little animal to stay close.

But as beautiful as the moment looked, there was an important detail that couldn't be ignored.

# # # A wild puma is still a wild puma

A local wildlife volunteer named Elena witnessed the scene one afternoon.

She kept her distance while watching several cats resting near the massive animal. It was the kind of encounter that seemed almost too unusual to be real.

The cats appeared relaxed.

The puma seemed calm.

But Elena understood that this didn't mean the puma had suddenly become a friendly house cat.

Wild pumas are powerful predators, and their behavior can change without warning. People should never approach them, try to touch them, or encourage interactions with stray animals.

Even when an encounter looks peaceful, safety has to come first.

So why did the puma allow the cats to remain so close?

Nobody could say for sure.

Maybe he simply wasn't interested in them.

Perhaps the cats had grown familiar with his presence and no longer considered him an immediate threat.

Some may have been looking for a warm place to rest. Others might have felt comfortable enough to stay nearby because he wasn't showing signs of aggression.

There are plenty of possibilities, but we can't know exactly what the animals were thinking.

# # # An unlikely moment of peace

What makes this encounter so fascinating is the contrast between their lives.

The stray cats were used to surviving around farms, buildings, roads, and people.

The puma belonged to the forest.

One was a small animal searching for safety and shelter. The other was a wild predator built to survive on its own.

Yet, for a short time, their worlds overlapped.

No chasing.

No fighting.

No sudden rush into the bushes.

Just a group of tiny cats resting near a massive wild animal that seemed content to leave them alone.

Of course, this doesn't mean predators and smaller animals naturally become friends. It doesn't mean the cats were completely safe, either.

But it does remind us that animal behavior can sometimes surprise us.

We expect a puma to chase cats. We expect stray cats to run from a puma.

And most of the time, those instincts would be a good reason to keep their distance.

Still, not every encounter unfolds the way we imagine.

Sometimes, two completely different animals end up sharing the same space without a fight.

And on that quiet afternoon, a group of stray cats found themselves resting beside one of the forest's most powerful animals.

Whether the puma saw them as harmless, ignored them completely, or simply didn't feel the need to react, one thing is certain:

It was a remarkable sight that nobody who witnessed it would forget. ❤️🐾

It weighs less than an AA battery. It is so shy that photographers struggle to find it. And it just beat the world's most famous parrot.

New Zealand has crowned its 2026 Bird of the Year, and the winner is a small, jet-black bird that nearly vanished from the planet. The karure, also known as the black robin, received 25,610 votes to take the title. It beat the kakapo, the flightless nocturnal parrot that finished second with 19,445 votes, and the karearea, or New Zealand falcon, which came third with 17,423 votes.

This was a record-breaking year for the competition. More than 105,000 people voted, the highest turnout in the contest's history, with about 88 percent of votes cast from within New Zealand. To put that in perspective, roughly one in every fifty New Zealanders participated.

The karure lives only on the Chatham Islands, an archipelago about 800 kilometers east of mainland New Zealand. It is a tiny bird, weighing less than an AA battery, with black plumage, black eyes, and a small pointed black beak. Bird enthusiasts have affectionately nicknamed it the goth of New Zealand's bird world.

But what makes this win remarkable is the story behind it. By 1980, the entire population had dropped to just five birds. Habitat loss and introduced predators had pushed the species to the brink of extinction. Among those five was a single breeding female, named Old Blue, and her mate, Old Yellow.

Conservationists led by Don Merton pioneered an unusual technique. They took eggs from the robins' nests and placed them with another bird species, the tomtit, to foster. This tricked the robins into laying more eggs, allowing the population to slowly rebuild. Every single karure alive today is descended from Old Blue and Old Yellow.

The population now stands at around 350 adult birds. While that is a dramatic recovery, the species is still classified as threatened. The birds live only on two predator-free islands, and that habitat is nearly at capacity. Conservationists are working to remove feral cats from a third island, Pitt Island, to give the karure a new place to expand.

The campaign for the bird was run by the Chatham Islands Landscape Restoration Trust. Despite coming close in previous years, this is the first time the karure has won Bird of the Year.