I have a special hatred of animal hoarders because my Lily came from a hoarder and all 20-some cats and the other dogs in the trailer with her had to be put down, leaving just Lily (then Missy) alive. She had a two inch wide open sore from her neck to her tail, smelled like cat piss and could not be bathed, had cat scratches on her nose, and completely freaked out the first time she walked on grass and had no idea what to do when on a leash when I got her. She was so scared she spent basically the first two weeks in her crate in my bedroom before one night I woke up and she was in bed next to me. And that was still before I could bathe her and get rid of the cat piss smell.
So I hate fucking hoarders. As such, this video brought a big smile to my face:
Who in the hell hoards ducks? And why? And are they in jail (I hope)?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
Off-topic, but anyone here familiar with getting a visa for China? The program that hired me has said that the best way for me to make sure that I get my visa in time is to just apply for a tourist visa. They said that the university I’ll be teaching at “will file the necessary paperwork to make sure your teaching position with them is registered with the government.” This just seems like it’s potentially a bad idea but I really don’t know.
Just Some Fuckhead
Ducks aren’t completely blameless here. They are assholes.
schrodinger's cat
If Grumpy Cat can get a movie deal why don’t we make a documentary with Tunch? We can call it Tunch and his minions.
Violet
That’s an awesome video! And sweet, sweet Lily. I remember when you brought her home. Such a scared puppy. You did such a great thing for both of you when you gave her her forever home.
muddy
@Just Some Fuckhead: Not as bad as geese.
khead
If I may quote another philosopher…..
My problems are small.
Michael G
C’mon, admit it–you’ve got those hoarder instincts and only control them through constant self-policing.
jl
I didn’t know the details of where Lily came from. Sad, and glad she met Cole.
But, what about animals (UnchTay and OseyRay) who hoard their owners, and mercilessly bend them to their every whim?
Eh? What does Cole think about that?
Edit: and commenters are correct on the ducks (and geese). Cole gets one of those, he is dead meat. For reals.
schrodinger's cat
@jl: May be that was Tunch’s plan in bringing the bird. He is starting small.
cathyx
John, I’ll bet you have room for a duck or two in that bed. Time to add to the family.
Redshift
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): Well, I happen to know that you can come to the U.S. on a tourist visa and apply for a student visa while you are here, so perhaps it’s not completely unreasonable. I’d want definite information that it’s the case for China before proceeding, though.
John Cole
Geese are total assholes. As far as animals go, they are on the top of my shit list and the only use I have for them is basted in butter.
ShadeTail
The apartment where I live has a large artificial pond, and therefore we host a huge flock of ducks and a modest flock of canada geese. And they are filthy motherfuckers. They leave deposits of shit all over the place, making it almost impossible to take a walk and not step in some.
But I have to say this for the ducks: at least they’re well-mannered. If they’re foraging on the sidewalk and see you approaching, they’ll start quietly quacking to warn their fellows that something big is on its way. And then they’ll carefully get out of your way. The geese, by contrast, stand their ground, and they’ll get aggressive if they feel you’re too close. I’ve seen them actually charge dogs and small children.
I hate those damn geese. The lot of them deserve to be made into foie gras, I say.
JoyceH
Hoarding, whether of animals or clutter, is a mental illness. The Authorities have reacted like you just did, with anger and orders to straighten up, for decades – it doesn’t work. How about getting these people some treatment? Because otherwise, it’s just gonna keep happening.
muddy
@John Cole: I know! They hiss and snap and chase you. They are always welcome at xmas though.
Diana
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): no idea but while I was in china, the guesthouses in the more touristy parts of the country posted ads for native English speakers to apply to teach, promising among other perks (housing, travel allowance, etc.) that all visa paperwork would be taken care of. So maybe it is a thing, I don’t know.
wages in china are still pretty low in comparison with what a college grad can get in America, I don’t think they’re afraid of too many illegal immigrants hopping their visa and staying on indefinitely.
TaMara (BHF)
@Just Some Fuckhead: What is with all the duck hate? I had the smartest, sweetest duck ever and I still miss him. He ruled the backyard and truly thought he was a great dane.
muddy
I know a hoarder, she says she’s not, she’s just lazy. I was stupid enough to believe her, and when I offered to help do something about it I was verbally abused in a really vicious way. At least she can’t pull that lazy line any more after that showing.
Omnes Omnibus
@John Cole: Speaking of geese and assholes…. I had an uncle who offered me five bucks if I could pet one of the geese in a pen at his friend’s farm. I was about nine. I stepped in to the pen and the fuckers came for me. I did not get the five bucks. Foie gras is another valid use for geese.
muddy
@JoyceH: They used to say it was a kind of OCD, but it’s not listed that way in the new DSM. They have found different areas of the brain light up for hoarding than for other OCD activities.
Capri
@JoyceH: Actually, lots of times they are seen as the owners of no-kill shelters, kooky crazy cat ladies, animal lovers, or other benign folks who are just a little outside the mainstream. To react to them with anger would be a step up in most cases.
Just One More Canuck
@Just Some Fuckhead: They’re dethpicable?
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
To be fair, geese were really friendly until we invented foie gras.
schrodinger's cat
@Redshift: Really? I guess it is possible if you can change to student status before your tourist status expires. Otherwise the friendly people at ICE will show you the door.
cbear
@Just Some Fuckhead:
@muddy: @John Cole:
Ducks and geese ain’t got nothing on fucking peacocks. Those bastards will take your nuts clean off, all the while screaming like a goddam banshee.
Fucking rookies.
jl
@muddy:
” I know! They hiss and snap and chase you. They are always welcome at xmas though.”
But if you are just the right age, and on a farm so the damn ducks and geese cannot destroy the whole thing, that is totally cool. And no guilt when you eat them later, since they were a constant battle. (as opposed to cute piggies and chickens, and the sullen hapless cows).
Anne Laurie
Oh, Cole, you know the answer in your head, even though your emotions get the better of your sense: Mentally ill individuals hoard ducks (or cats, or dogs, or ferrets, et al) because their aberrant brain chemistry has convinced them that they’re the only one who can provide “good enough” care for those poor critters. Most of them start out as ordinary pet owners, or breeders, or rescuers, who gradually lose the thread and start endangering the animals they truly intend to “help”. They shouldn’t be allowed to own pets — at least not without longterm supervision — but threatening animal hoarders with jail is counter-productive, because then borderline rescuers are afraid to ask for the help they need as their personal fiefdom moves from ‘kinda makeshit’ to ‘full-blown health hazard.’ Hell, in a decent society, most of these pepole would be entitled to better care themselves; by the time their pets are in danger, they’ve usually lost the ability to properly feed or groom themselves as well.
I’m not talking about deliberate “puppy mill” breeders or their ilk, people who treat companion animals as factory units for profit. Lock up those monsters, if you really think that’s gonna make a difference. But 90% of the animal hoarders who end up on the local news, or straining the resources of small-town animal services like Lily’s first owner, are as nuts as James Loughner or Adam Lanzer.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: I see it the other way. Foie gras is the only way to keep the vicious bastards in line. Just show up with butter and a French accent and watch them behave.
ChrisNYC
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): I’ve gotten a Chinese tourist visa. I did it through a service. I don’t know about the registering thing but I do remember that non-tourist visas are (or were, when I went in 2010) complicated and difficult to get. I feel like I read that on one of the sites for the visa services companies. Once you’re there, my sense from non-Chinese I met was that there is a surprising degree of laxness as to visa renewal, re-issuance, violations, etc. It’s a security state but mostly turned on the Chinese.
muddy
I remember when Lily was nervous about grass. Just the saddest thing! Here are some chimpanzees who were not experienced with it either. http://www.upworthy.com/chimpanzees-released-after-30-years-of-testing-brace-yourself-for-smiles?c=upw1
Al Swearengen
Lying causes cat piss smell.
WereBear
Hoarding is hoarding; they treat living things the same way they treat piles of magazines.
If you know of one, report it. You’ll be doing everyone involved a great favor.
Just Some Fuckhead
@cbear: Congratulations on your new capital C. We keep peacocks on the farm we own. They are useful.
raven
@WereBear: It’s illegal to hoard?
kdaug
@TaMara (BHF): Not ducks, geese. Ain’t nothing like a big honking goose coming after you to make you wish you had a samurai sword.
ant
so I found a nest of 7 baby rabbits in the back yard. They were so small their eyes were still closed.
There is one adult rabbit that lives in our fenced in back yard, musta had babies.
Anyways, the destruction that one rabbit caused over the winter with the chewing didn’t leave me very sympathetic to the plight of the babies. So I put them in a bucket, and promptly drown them.
Now, everyone is mad at me. I tell them there will be more next month.
Next time, they get a flee bath, and then given as toys to the cat.
See how everyone likes them apples.
Redshift
@schrodinger’s cat: Yeah, you have to be in the valid visa period. But there’s explicit provision for converting a tourist visa to a student visa; it’s on the State Department website. You have to have paperwork from the school before you can start the application for a student visa, so it makes some sense that it might be easier to arrange once you’re already here.
LT
Cole, WTF?
Animal hoarding is commonly a symptom of mental illness.
Just Some Fuckhead
@ant: LOL!
muddy
@WereBear: This hoarder I mentioned had a cat, and it had diabetes I guess, it was like a skeleton with eyes. She said he was fine because he had a great appetite. He did too, but he was just burning right through it. I freaked out when I saw it.
I got my nerve up to say that I was going to take the cat to the vet (probably to be euthanized) but just then it died in her bed. I went ahead and told her what I had planned, not sure if it was kind but it needed to be said. I don’t know how long it was like that before I came over. Horrifying.
Steeplejack
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
This sounds a little casual, if not sketchy. You already got some advice from Mnemosyne in a previous thread, which apparently you didn’t see.
Nicole
I worked as an interpretive character at a zoo back in the 1990s- there were two Cape Barren Geese in the walk-through exhibit, Ethel and Lucy. Lucy was incredibly social and would stand next to the you as you talked to the visitors about the wallabies and the other animals in the exhibit. I remember she had a particular taste for bottled water and would do some pretty theatrical coughing to encourage the me to share my water with her (she had her own bowl of water easily reachable; she just liked Poland Spring better).
Some years after I left the gig, I learned Lucy was kicked to death by some visitors on a day when the exhibit was unattended for a few minutes. Sounds like some of the posters tonight would approve of this.
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
Hope your uncle died a horrible death, e.g., pecked to death by geese.
LT
@Nicole:
What the fuck is that about?
Redshift
@Anne Laurie:
True, if they actually get that supervision and treatment. All too often, if it hasn’t gotten to ‘full-blown health hazard’ (for humans, not for the animals), they can convince authorities that it’s a property matter. We had a local “rescue” for rabbits that consisted of one person with an increasingly overcrowded barn and a few volunteers who helped out a bit. She finally got busted by animal control and got a bunch taken away, but when it went to court, the state official didn’t have testimony from the rescuers and vets who had seen the horrific shape many of them were in, and she got a lot of them back.
jl
@Nicole:
” Sounds like some of the posters tonight would approve of this.”
I would not approve.
The Other Bob
We used to own a couple ducks. They were a little dumb, but cute and harmless. They were a lot like the happy ducks in the video.
That video is great. My wife and I just said yaaaaaaay.
WereBear
@raven: When the animals are not cared for, certainly.
But even inanimate objects can reach a hygiene emergency state; or even threaten the integrity of the building.
LT
@Anne Laurie: Didn’t notice your post. Surprised Cole does not know this. Like you said, just angry, probably.
ShadeTail
@LT: I think the fact that many of us have (very well-deserved) contempt toward wild geese is giving Nicole flashbacks about a tame goose she used to know.
Mo
I’ve done Chinese business visas. You need a letter from your US employer who is sponsoring you, the institution in China that is inviting you, and the hotel you will be staying in when you arrive in China. The papers need to be delivered in person to your nearest Chinese consulate, so almost everyone goes through a visa service. It sounds like the place that is hiring you isn’t getting the business letter from the Chinese institution. There does seem to be a fair amount of wiggle room in the visa situation, especially on the academic end of things. We have an office in China, so the business letters can be generated internally if need be.
How soon do you need the visa? I usually count on a week for the turnaround, including the Fed Exing back and forth to New York. We usually get multi-entry visas, in case there is a need to leave China and then come back, however I think that you can’t get one of those as your first Chinese visa.
My advice would be to ask the people who are hiring you if they can put you in touch with someone whose had the job before you so that you can ask them questions about handling the move to China. They may very well tell you that this is all handed informally in China. The visa services also have packets of information about the visa applications. You can request the info and then use it to request needed documents from your employer.
Sorry if this is rushed. It’s past my bedtime.
pegleghippie
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
I work in China currently and I came here on a tourist visa, got the residence visa after about a month. My employer needed extra photos and info and things to make it happen. It’s standard practice here among all the jobs I’ve seen. You should be fine.
Nicole
@ShadeTail: Look, I know Canada Geese are a pain in the ass- I live in NYC, they crap over everything in the parks and they now live here year round. But a lot of the problem is that people feed them and people leave food around they can get to. Canada Geese should be hitting sexual maturity at age 7 or 8, but in a lot of places they’re reproducing at 3 now, and they’re not migrating. They may be aggressive monsters, but they are aggressive monsters of our own making. We need to change our behavior first.
LeftCoastTom
@Nicole: Interesting…sounds like human-food-conditioned bears.
Roger Moore
@Nicole:
I’ve heard that some of the problem is that hunting seasons are arranged so the migrating population is hunted on both ends of the route, while non-migrating birds are only hunted once. Some places are changing their season so it happens after migrating birds have left, so only the permanent residents are in danger.
ShadeTail
@Nicole:
Just because a lot of people are foolish enough to feed the geese doesn’t change their basic natures. They are loud, filthy, and outright mean, and I see no reason to tolerate that. I’m nearly to the point of buying a hunting knife and using it to start occasionally beheading one of those nasty things for my family’s dinner. I imagine we could thin the flock quite a bit all by ourselves.
LeftCoastTom
@ShadeTail: Huh? You don’t want to tolerate wild animals that humans food-condition? Why isn’t the answer “stop food-conditioning them”? Should we also kill all the bears, or can a few of them live?
Bill D.
We had a bad case of cat hoarding (200+ cats) here in the San Francisco area some years ago from a serial offender. Looks like mental illness which is what the court found in her case.
pseudonymous in nc
The French have a colour named caca d’oie for a reason.
patrick II
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
My son taught english with a tourist visa for a program at Chinese grade schools, not a university. Anyhow, after teaching for about two weeks the local police showed up and kicked him out of the school. It turned out alright — he then toured China for real. China has regulations for everything, but they are arbitrarily enforced. 99% of the time you might get away with it, but not always.
Hillary Rettig
As others have noted: hoarding is a mental illness.
The fate of your average factory farmed (or even “cage free”) duck, chicken, cow, pig is far worse than that of your average hoarded animal. (For one thing, most FF animals are slaughtered when they are still veritable babies.) People who care about animal welfare should work on going vegan, and encourage others to do the same. I recommend Erik Marcus’s short book Ultimate Vegan Guide, which is short and fun and helpful: http://www.amazon.com/Ultimate-Vegan-Guide-Compassionate-Sacrifice/dp/1461088011/
And I wrote an article on nonperfectionist veganism: http://www.vegsource.com/news/2012/06/the-rise-of-nonperfectionist-veganism.html
Stella B.
@cbear: Peacocks? Nah, swans! Get to close to a swan’s nest while momma is sitting on eggs and poppa will be coming for you…and he weighs about 40 lbs, too. An elderly and deaf dog of mine once did that by accident and was shocked to discover a giant bird about to beat her into a grease spot. Her solution was to hide behind me. Yikes!
David Parsons
@Hillary Rettig:
I’m vegan, but I don’t see anything but the most tenuous connection between hoarding and veganism (omnivores can, and do, object to factory farms, and can, and do, shop carefully to avoid buying things that come from those farms; it works the same way with pets in that people can have pets without becoming hoarders.)
Fort Geek
@Baud: We invented foie gras in self-defense.
A Humble Lurker
@Stella B.:
There’s a lake not far from my house with assorted turtles, ducks, and geese. In the middle is a little island where a momma and daddy swan have set up shop. Like many here I am not fond of geese myself, so it’s always fun to watch daddy terrorize the shit out of the geese whenever they get too close to the nest.
Tk
Hoarding is a mental issue. It’s compulsive. I don’t think any of those people are bad but quite the opposite. They want to protect all of the lost and abandoned animals and can’t stop collecting them. If they had stopped at 4 or 5 animals everything might have been fine.
Tk
Hoarding is a mental issue. It’s compulsive. I don’t think any of those people
Parrotlover77
Good god. As the resident bird lover and Lurker, I am appauled at all the bird hate around here lately. Fuck you all. Tunch needs to be an indoor cat if he attacks birds while out (outdoor/feral cats can be an ecological disaster to local bird populations) and geese are fucking awesome. One pair made a home in our company’s parking lot one year. We all loved them, they were polite (but the male did chase you if you got close — hell, you would too if a giant predator got close to you), and the fuzzy babies were the cutest damn things ever.
So again, fuck you all.
Also, too, hoarding is a mental illness, I agree there and all the rest. Fuck is it beer o’clock yet?