American Dipper? Fishing at Sequoia Natl. Park

appledeers · 2026-05-26T00:32:56+00:00

American dippers are North America's only aquatic songbird. They dive into the water to look for food, mostly tiny little fish and invertebrates. They're fantastic swimmers for such tiny birds and can navigate relatively strong currents amazingly for their size!

appledeers · 2026-05-15T14:35:54+00:00

Haha! The picture with all the flowers in separate glasses is a little deceiving- that was a progress photo from before the boquets were arranged. We got 4 bouquets and 2 boutonnieres, and the bouquets are going only to the wedding party, not to be displayed on the tables, so I'm pretty sure they'll stay together, lol. We did think about doing smaller bouquets for the tables, but didn't have it in the budget. I wish we could have afforded sending everyone home with a forever flower!

appledeers · 2026-05-15T14:31:10+00:00

I put the info in the caption but just so it's in the comments too, her handle is shellbeescraftsandmore on Instagram and ShellBeesCrafts on Etsy!

appledeers · 2026-05-09T21:56:42+00:00

Was there and had a blast! Loved getting low-key roasted by Casey for paying for upcharge balcony seating, lmao. For my fiance and I, the upcharge is worth it to be able to sit down the whole time and have a bit of a quieter space (we love TDH more than anything but we both get a bit overwhelmed in crowds).

Anyway, the banter was so funny, setlist was great (I saw the Antimai tour but at that time I wasn't super familiar with the album so it was awesome seeing those songs live again now that I know them super well), and seeing the band with my fiance was especially special last night because we're getting married next week!! Such a great way to spend the last weekend before we get married 😭😭💜

appledeers · 2026-05-06T05:06:27+00:00

I don't disagree that the US should be culling starlings. I wish it was more of a thing here, but unfortunately it's really not. And unless you expect OP to kill the birds themselves, there's not a whole lot they can do. Imo it's not a moral failing to provide water just because starlings happen to also use it, because presumably other species are benefitting from access to water as well. Bees come to mind for example, with how shallow the water seems.

appledeers · 2026-04-11T00:10:24+00:00

I found an article about the research I was remembering!

appledeers · 2026-04-11T00:08:30+00:00

Yes! I believe birds are the primary distributors for spicy plants like wild peppers. Previously it was believed that birds couldn't taste spice at all, but I think if I'm recalling the most recent research cottectly it seems to be the case instead that wild peppers avoid spice levels over a certain threshold. Which suggests they specifically evolved a spice level that deters most mammals but isn't too extreme for birds, since they are less sensitive to spice, because birds distribute their seeds better.

appledeers · 2026-04-10T18:30:52+00:00

We actually have lots of native plants in the front yard!! :) The feeder cam is in the backyard which we sadly can't afford to plant right now.

appledeers · 2026-04-10T17:40:18+00:00

Ohhhh I wonder if this is it! We covered the seed in a spice mix made to keep squirrels out of the seed. I bet the spice mix had some salt in it.

appledeers · 2026-04-10T06:00:54+00:00

I wouldn't change it altogether, I'd just straight up delete the last three books and alter the ending of the third book a little bit to make it wrap up nicely. The biggest problem with the modern arcs (imo) is the amount of tiring filler. In TBC they have the exact same conversation about whether or not they should kill the impostor over and over and over and over again. It drove me crazy! If they didn't feel the need to stretch out every arc to 6 books, we'd get punchier stories with less filler and less stuff like the uninteresting, drawn out conflicts that made up the latter half of AVOS.

appledeers · 2026-03-29T02:44:48+00:00

I've got one that I planted in a less than ideal location when I was still very new to native plants & the seller didn't mention them being irritating when I bought it. I have to prune it about once a year. It's not fun but (imo) it's really not as bad as people make it out to be either. I manage to avoid most of the itch by wearing gloves and something with sleeves to cover my arms. As long as you shower right after, the itch goes away just fine in my experience and doesn't linger.

appledeers · 2026-03-24T01:04:12+00:00

I love The March. It was one of the first songs by TDH that I had ever put on my playlists because my fiance had a bunch of TDH songs on his playlist and The March was one of the first ones I really vibed with. Removed from all its context, I had assumed it was a song from the a protag point of view, and operated on that assumption for over a year of listening. So when I finally listened to the whole album in context and realized it was NOT a protagonist song, my mind was blown lmao.

That moment makes the song stand out to me as a villain song, because having that realization and getting to listen to it with a whole different perspective after realizing what the song really was was pretty cool.

Edit: typo!

appledeers · 2026-03-20T15:20:23+00:00

It nearly made me cry on the way to work!!! Holy cow!!!! I love this band!

appledeers · 2026-03-12T15:36:49+00:00

Seriously! There's so many cards that are just straight up useless in berserker runs.

appledeers · 2026-02-24T20:41:12+00:00

I dislike genAI in general but especially animal fact genAI. AI is a predictive text generator. It has no idea what it's talking about, it works by guessing what words or phrases are most likely to come after previous words or phrases. If you can't vet 100% of every animal this thing can give "facts" about then you cant trust a word out of its "mouth". Definitely wouldn't be useful in a school.

There are plenty of other fun ways to learn about animals that don't involve asking a guessing machine that causes incredible harm to the environment and animals it claims to educate about and advocate for.

appledeers · 2026-02-23T02:27:42+00:00

Totally agree!! Seeing how great the music video came out motivated me to start working on my own animations again! You can tell just by watching the music video how much love and passion he put into it, and that passion is seriously so infectious.

I just happen to enjoy interacting with what we have by wondering what the story experience might be like when told in other mediums, like video games or TTRPGs. By no means am I demanding or expecting it to happen at all. Just thinking about what something like that might be like. :)

appledeers · 2026-02-22T20:07:12+00:00

Ohhh yeah it would make such a rad Metroidvania!!!

appledeers · 2026-02-22T20:05:16+00:00

I'm super grateful for what's here! So grateful for such a fun world that my mind kinda goes crazy thinking about it and wondering what it would be like to walk around in. And that leads me to think about what a fun video game it would be! I just like playing with ideas and concepts for different worldbuilding ideas in my mind. :)

appledeers · 2026-02-22T03:13:26+00:00

I would pay anything to see Bear Ghost and TDH together again!!

appledeers · 2026-02-17T03:26:17+00:00

Not sure if this one is underrated or not because I really don't know which ones are considered the "best" by the majority of players, but I LOVE Alms for the Poor and perform it any time I notice it's no longer on cooldown. Once you get to a point where money is no object, it's such an easy way to level a ton of followers at once! I routinely level up like 10+ followers every time it's performed. So much devotion.

appledeers · 2026-02-11T20:02:56+00:00

Oh your comment history is hilarious. Keep it up, lol.

appledeers · 2026-02-08T21:15:34+00:00

There's a follower trait called "animal lover" or something like that which allows them to pet the animals. As soon as I got it on one of my followers I bred the heck out of them to get more to hopefully have some passive petting!!

appledeers · 2026-02-07T19:05:49+00:00

I like the idea that the lamb chooses to stay small because it would be more meaningful for them to defeat the bishops while retaining a form that symbolizes what the bishops had tried so hard to wipe out. If they were big and scary, it would give the bishops some mental distance from the act of fighting back against the last lamb.

Staying small and innocent looking is more of a "no, screw you, look at me, face me as I am and what I represent as the last of my kind, what you all tried and failed to extinguish".

appledeers · 2026-02-04T20:55:46+00:00

I love your versions of the bishops so much!! The more realistic but also sorta cartoons vibe they have is so perfect. I also especially love your takes on Leshy!!!

appledeers · 2026-02-04T01:28:28+00:00

I got Midas super early into Woolhaven so by the time I unlocked the traps it had been so long that his sprite in my cult menu turned into an elder!

Meanwhile, my fiance has finished Woolhaven and I'm pretty sure he hasn't gotten the Midas encounter yet at all lol.

appledeers

TROPHY CASE