Marianna's Blog
Dumbstruck
Lessons & Reflections from the National Butterfly Center
About two weeks ago, tragedy struck. I’m not talking about the lightning that hit our transformer, but a much more nefarious strike, around 30 miles from us.
Tuesday night, August 19, after the gates of the Valley Nature Center closed in Weslaco, three teenaged boys jumped the fence and chose to torture, mutilate, kill and take five of the center’s Texas Tortoises. These docile, protected animals never stood a chance against these cowardly thugs, who gutted and decapitated two of the animals, while another was stomped outside of the park, according to surveillance video that captured these horrific acts.
Cuckoo over Cecil
Lessons & Reflections from the National Butterfly Center
I know it’s crazy, but I can’t stay silent about Cecil the Lion and all the current hype…I hope my comments are not considered cuckoo, but well crafted and cogent.
My father was a big game hunter and a Life Member of Safari Club International, an organization that is currently being vilified. When he killed the record-breaking Nile crocodile in 1991, the villagers ate the beast and celebrated my father as a hero. He was a "savior" to their clan, which had lost many people and livestock to this “devil.”
Just one of his trophy permits, for which he paid after being selected in a lottery, was $50,000. He was well into his 80’s when his number came up, and it didn’t matter that he’d just had another coronary catheterization, he hopped a plane and took off like Jeff Glassberg in hot pursuit of some incredibly rare butterfly.
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