From Veterinaria [FB].

This photo of a weasel (looks like Mustela nivalis) riding on a Green Woodpecker (Picus viridus) is going viral.

Buzzfeed:

East London resident Martin Le-May captured this incredible photo of a baby weasel on the back of a green woodpecker in Essex, England, on Monday

As much as we’d all like to believe this is a wondrous tale of friendship wherein two mates go on an epic adventure featuring a baby weasel and his magnificent flying steed, sadly it’s NOT.

It’s a photo of a weasel trying to kill a woodpecker. …

Le-May, a hobby photographer, was taking a walk with his wife through the Hornchurch Country Park in east London in the hopes of her seeing a green woodpecker for the first time. …

“As we walked we heard a distressed squawking and I saw that flash of green. So hurriedly I pointed out to Ann the bird and it settled into the grass behind a couple of small silver birch trees. Both of us trained our binoculars and it occurred that the woodpecker was unnaturally hopping about like it was treading on a hot surface.

Lots of wing flapping showing that gloriously yellow/white colour interspersed with the flash of red head feathers. Just after I switched from my binoculars to my camera the bird flew across us and slightly in our direction; suddenly it was obvious it had a small mammal on its back and this was a struggle for life.

The woodpecker landed in front of us and I feared the worst. I guess though our presence, maybe 25 meters away, momentarily distracted the weasel. The woodpecker seized the opportunity and flew up and away into some bushes away to our left. Quickly the bird gathered its self respect and flew up into the trees and away from our sight.

The woodpecker left with its life. The weasel just disappeared into the long grass, hungry.”

Hat tip to Ratak Monodosico.

photo: Josh Rainey

Josh Rainey:

A couple of weeks ago I had the incredible opportunity to photograph Stevie and Brady’s engagement photos on a family property along the Siletz River. They had a great idea for a photo so we set it up and got the shot we were all thinking. Long story short, the image was shared on the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation page and gained a ton of exposure! 100,000 likes and 9,000 shares in the first 24 hours!

Here

William T. Beidler

Kuriositas looks at Young Faces of the American Civil War. Apparently, some people collect Civil War photographs and devote considerable research into trying to identify the individual soldier who is the subject of the photograph.

Somehow we expect their faces to be different, not so staggeringly modern looking. Place them in contemporary clothing and all of these young men would not look out of place in a mall or a high school yearbook. Yet these extraordinary ambrotype and tintype photographs were taken during the American Civil War (1861-1865). Almost 150 years separates their lives from our own yet their youthful faces retain a powerful resonance and an immediacy which brings that dreadful conflict in to our imagination.

Who were these young men? What sort of lives did they live during and (one hopes) after the Civil War? The names of many of the young men pictured here are unknown, their fates a mystery. Yet despite the century and a half gap between their careful posing for the camera, some can still be identified. Astonishingly, names can still be discovered, as well as insight in to their character and personality.

Above is William T. Beidler, photographed with an already-archaic flintlock musket. Young Beidler, along with two of his brothers, served in Mosby’s 43rd Virginia Cavalry Battalion. He was born 9 December 1845 and enlisted from Fauquier County 10 February 1864. He served as a 4th Sergeant (not a Captain) in Captain William H. Chapman’s Company C.

He is recorded as having participated in actions: 12 March 1865 at the “Hague” near Kinsale, Westmoreland County, 21 March 1865 at Hamilton, and 4 May 1865 at Charles Town. West Virginia.

After the war, he worked in the wholesale drygoods business in Baltimore, where he died 7 August 1897 (aet. 53).

These fluffy wuffy baby owls are one of those completely unidentified Tumblr images. They are not familiar to me, so they must be European or Eurasian. They are small, eared, and have a grey and a brown phase, so they could be Scops Owls (Otus scops).

Linonia & Brothers-In-Unity Reading Room in Sterling Library. A small library, inside Sterling, stocked with non-course-related reading material and very comfortable leather chairs. Its name comes from two early Literary & Debating Societies.

The Daily Prep (in multiple postings, just scroll down) tours Yale’s Beinecke Library, the surrounding Hewitt Quadrangle and Wolseley Hall, then goes over to Sterling Memorial Library. A friend of mine used to observe that life after Yale is one constant struggle to live as well as you did when you were a Yale undergraduate, in which nearly all of us fail.

Via Bird Dog.

Photos by Grzegorz Leśniewski

Via Ratak Monodosico.

German cemetery at Tetes des Faux.

Telegraph slideshow

Hat tip to Karen L. Myers.