Here are four of my more notable observations from my weekly biodiversity run about Ōtautahi-Christchurch city, NZ, yesterday.

The steel blue ladybirds are back. These are Australians that have been spreading through the city over the past 6 years.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/407394546

The poroporo-feeding Australian beetles *Psylliodes brettinghami* are about again. These beetles first showed up in the city in 2024 and now many of our poroporo plants are pock marked with feeding holes.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/407394556

Two kererū were in Ernle Clark Reserve by the Opawaho-Heathcote River. This has been the site of lots of native tree planting and weeding by the local community, so I hope the kererū stick around and nest.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/407394555

A young wild native mistletoe that I've been watching on the grounds of Cashmere Primary School looks like it's about to fruit for the first time. Mistletoes are rare in the city so hopefully the birds help it to get some baby plants established in the area.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/407394557

#nature #biodiversity #nz #wildcounts #Ōtautahi #Christchurch #nz

#NewsIWantToRead

Internet quickly recovers and deshittifies as last AI data center is shut down

#UtopianMicrofiction

Just cancelled my 1Password account.

It’s sad and disheartening to see a Canadian company taking decisions like the one in September.

That and the massive price increase earlier this year made me sway to a self-hosted solution, with the Spanish VaultWarden.

I will still miss it, because it flowed really well for me.
- - -
Je vians d’annuler mon compte 1Password.

C’est profondément triste de voir une compagnie canadienne prendre des décisions comme celle de septembre.

#1Password #Bye

This is cute.

https://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/2292221/librairie-hintonburg-demenagement-spaniels-tale

Has anyone seen Mr. Pierce McKoy near downtown Durham lately? He's the shoe shine guy who used to set up near Beyu Caffé downtown. Now he's usually near W. Main & Market St., or was last time I saw him. https://maps.app.goo.gl/Lst76qiHhQbMFD1N8 #local #Durham #DurhamNC #shoeShine #PierceMcKoy #DowntownDurham

I'm going to need adults to admit that they are seriously not going to ever lose a power struggle with a kid and they know it and you know it.

You are in charge.

Be in charge.

Stop setting up little battles for you two to fight when you already know the outcome.

Think about strategies for cooperation more.

Use your energy to teach children how to navigate the world.

Create opportunities for learning and growth, not fake skirmishes that just damage your relationship.

#Photoctobre2026 #Photoctober2026 #Toronto

Jour 10 / Day 10 : contre-plongée / low-angle

La Tour du CN Tower

“If you’re really that sick you should be in the hospital”

Please stop saying this to chronically ill people.

If we went to the hospital every time we suffered, we would live there.

Hospitals can’t help us and they often make us worse.

We are on our own, and being subtly gaslit doesn’t help.

Instead of suggesting we aren’t “that sick” or that there’s care we’re choosing not to get … ask how you can help.

Show genuine concern and a desire to learn about life with chronic illness.

Understand that more often than not an ER trip means setbacks, trauma and no help at all.

#disability #ableism #chronicillness

Random Mastodon admin question (or maybe someone else has done this)... anyone here who has set up a Postgresql hot standby/read replica who might answer a few questions or lend some prior experience?

(looking to create a replica of an existing Mastodon database, on another server -- already all set up -- and just looking for some gray hair/experience on what to avoid and what does/does not work. Trying to start replicating an existing server from the cloud to a local ISP, with plans to eventually fail over to a new install... need to scale my server here up and NOT on a certain cloud provider that charges egress).

#MastoAdmin #postgresql

Mark my words: by the end of 2028, the dollar will no longer be the world's reserve currency; U.S. big tech will have lost billions of dollars in revenue from other countries switching to other tech; and the U.S. stranglehold over world banking (i.e., that which gives the U.S. the ability to impose arduous financial sanctions on anyone in the world they want) will be at least 50% gone.
Trump couldn't do more damage the U.S.'s financial supremacy if he were trying.
Because he is.
#politics #USPol

Two papers I came across today:

People are just copy-pasting agents.md all over the place instead of using links or versioned copies or anything: https://arxiv.org/abs/2610.11169

Does using agent files actually work? No. https://arxiv.org/pdf/2602.11988

This is not a serious field.

My wife is sending me Benny updates while I’m out of town 🥺 #CatsOfMastodon

🇨🇦 can protect people without sacrificing #privacy! Let's build safer online spaces that protect users, privacy, and free expression.

💥 Tell your MP: Fix online platforms, don't ban or surveil users. Amend Bill C-34 today:

https://openmedia.org/BillC34-mtd

Must be serious if Yale is emailing us to update the firmware on their lpcks. I just did it. Took about 5 mins but was very easy. Might as well get it done.

#SmartHome #HomeAutomation

First we warn them. They don’t listen. Then we illustrate. They don’t listen. Then the breach happens. They come to us in a panic, asking what they could have done to prevent this and what they can do now that it has happened. This is the sighbersecurity cycle. #InfoSec

While the brilliant Lise Meitner (1878-1968) was nominated for the #NobelPrize 49 times for her work – 30 x for Physics & 19 x for Chemistry – she was famously snubbed & only her long-time collaborator Otto Hahn received the award. Yet her legacy lies not in a medal: in solving the puzzle of #nuclearFission, she fundamentally changed our understanding of matter & energy forever.

Pepper and Riley looking rather alarmed at having their photo taken. You'd think they would be used to it by now 😺 I have more than 70 photos of these two curled up together. They have a very strong bond.

#CatsofMastodon #Mastocats #Cats #CatsofFediverse #Friday

@CStamp @pixelunion

Side note:

It is imperative that every country in the world wean itself from American owned, and American hosted tech.

RE: https://mastodon.social/@pixelunion/117412000263558162

@pixelunion I'd go so far as to add: if you are not American, do not put anything on the cloud you don't want their gov to have access to. Bush passed a law after 9/11 that makes it easy and legal for their gov to just request these from the cloud provider and that provider will hand it over.

Americans can fight this, it's their gov and it's not supposed to spy on them; non Americans, not so much.

The US just sanctioned the entire International Criminal Court. Banks froze accounts, US tech vendors cut off licenses and updates, and YouTube pulled 700+ videos of possible war crime evidence. ⚖️

If one executive order can switch off a court, your family photos aren't safe on American clouds either. 🇪🇺

🐘 https://pixelunion.eu/blog/2026/10/icc-sanctions-digital-sovereignty/

#DigitalSovereignty #ICC #BuyFromEU #Privacy #OpenSource