San Antonio foundation pounces on bold program to return ocelots to the wild

FELINE GOOD

Recover Texas Ocelots/ Facebook

In Texas, wildlife conservation is far from a simple equation. According to Texas Parks and Wildlife, over 93 percent of the state is privately owned, including vital habitats for big cats. Balancing protection measures with the desires of landowners requires a deft hand.

Still, one San Antonio nonprofit is hoping it has found the right formula for ocelot recovery. The East Foundation, a local ranching operation and agricultural research organization, is proposing the Programmatic Safe Harbor Agreement with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, to support reintroducing species into the wild. A 30-day public comment period began September 15.

Following the proposal, the East Foundation will release ocelots onto a section of its San Antonio Viejo Ranch in Jim Hogg and Starr Counties — an area marked as unoccupied ocelot habitat. Landowners in neighboring counties can voluntarily sign up to allow the cats passage on their acres, exempting them from future conservation activities.

Working with the Recover Texas Ocelots project, East Foundation has assembled large amounts of data on ocelots, ranging from prey habits to behavior with other carnivores. This research informed the organization's conservation strategy.

The need for protection is dire. The distinctively spotted wild cats have been officially listed as endangered since 1982. The state's sole breeding populations live in far South Texas, where much land is devoted to ranching.

"The largest population of ocelots remaining in Texas (and, by extension, the United States) occupies East Foundation ranch land in Willacy County," explains Dr. Jason Sawyer, Chief Science Officer for the East Foundation, via a release. Several estimates place that population between 50 and 100.

"So, we have demonstrated that good land stewardship associated with normal ranching activities is not in conflict with ocelot recovery," he continued, "and we want to continue ranching operations while also providing an opportunity to expand these populations."

Plan details and other conservation efforts can be found online. Comments will be accepted through October 16, with full specifics available at the Federal Register.

"The assurances provided in the Agreement offer a path for lasting and effective partnerships that accomplish conservation goals while removing the barriers that have historically impeded these efforts," said Neal Wilkins, Chief Executive Officer for the East Foundation. "We are excited to lead an effort like this in South Texas, where we successfully operate, and where wildlife conservation and ranching have been vitally important for more than 100 years."

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www.philhardbergerpark.org/land-bridge

Wildlife advocacy tour treks to San Antonio's spectacular land bridge

BRIDGE TO THE FUTURE

Like many innovations promised by Midcentury America's rush to modernity, the highway system was proposed, plotted, and built with little thought to ecological impact. For wildlife, the shift to private transport was particularly deadly. By some estimates, car collisions kill over a million vertebrate animals daily.

The solution borrows from the transportation playbook, equipping roadways with overpasses and tunnels that connect habitats and allow animals access to resources on the other side of the road. One need not drive very far to witness their impact. Hundreds of deer, possums, and rabbits use San Antonio's Robert L.B. Tobin Land Bridge each day.

The Tobin Land Bridge opened as the United States' largest wildlife crossing in December 2020. In spring of 2021, a spectacular elevated walkway called the Skywalk debuted.

The Northwest San Antonio land bridge is now getting national attention through Wildlife Crossings Across America, a promotional road trip meant to highlight the structure's invaluable role in protecting local ecosystems. The advocacy tour lands in San Antonio on September 17.

The tour is a joint initiative by the National Wildlife Federation's #SaveLACougars Campaign, Big Cat Voices, ARC Solutions, and the Wildlife Crossing Fund. Environmental advocates, photojournalists, and authors will join local officials at each stop to document wildlife crossings at work.

The visits will be blogged on the Save LA Cougars website, and via the Instagram and Facebook accounts devoted to the now-deceased P-22 Mountain Lion. The big cat became the darling of Hollywood when it was first identified in 2012 and the poster puma for the pioneering Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing in Los Angeles.

The hope is to build pressure for more wildlife-friendly infrastructure — initiatives that prevent costly crashes and make cities more adaptable to the climate crisis.

"Saving wildlife amidst a growing biodiversity crisis and rapidly changing climate demands 21st-century solutions," said environmental journalist and author Sharon Guynup, one of the tour's fellows. "Connecting habitat bisected by roadways is key: animals need to move in order to survive."

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San Antonio sparkles and shines as No. 5 most festive city in the U.S. for 2023

on the nice list

San Antonio homes, businesses, and special events that go all out to deck their halls for the holidays have not gone unnoticed. San Antonio has been named No. 5 most festive city in the United States.

A new study by home services provider Thumbtack puts San Antonio at the top of the nice list this year. The report compiled data from millions of Christmas-related home projects across all 50 states between October 2022 to November 2023 to reveal their list of the most festive cities in the nation.

San Antonio is on the rise, after the city previously ranked No. 10 in the 2022 report. And while Thumbtack specifically focuses on home holiday projects, San Antonio residents certainly can glean inspiration from the city's many festive displays, and several surrounding Hill Country winter wonderlands.

Texas cities dominated the top 10, with Austin (No. 1), Dallas-Fort Worth (No. 2), and Houston (No. 3) ranking just ahead of San Antonio to claim the top three most festive U.S. cities. Rounding out the top five is Seattle, Washington in the No. 4 spot.

The average cost to hire a holiday lighting specialist, Thumbtack says, is between $168-$300, with other requests like wrapping outdoor trees tacking on an additional cost. If San Antonians are looking to outsource their exterior home decorating to a specialist, they're already past the peak time to hire one, Thumbtack says. Americans most frequently hang their holiday lights and Christmas decorations during the Thanksgiving weekend, according to the report.

"Whether you’re looking to make your home a brightly lit winter wonderland or simply looking to add a few festive touches to your home’s exterior — sprucing up your home’s exterior with lights is an exciting part of getting into the holiday spirit," said Thumbtack design expert Morgan Olsen in the report. "Hiring a holiday lighting specialist can help you avoid stress (and unwanted injuries) so you can focus on enjoying the season."

Thumbtack's top 10 most festive cities in the U.S. for 2023 are:

No. 1 – Austin, Texas
No. 2 – Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas
No. 3 – Houston, Texas
No. 4 – Seattle, Washington
No. 5 – San Antonio, Texas
No. 6 – Atlanta, Georgia
No. 7 – Phoenix, Arizona
No. 8 – Tampa, Florida
No. 9 – Denver, Colorado
No. 10 – Orlando, Florida

Director Todd Haynes tackles inappropriate relationships in May December

Movie Review

Director Todd Haynes has pushed buttons throughout his career, starting with his acclaimed short film, Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story, which used Barbie dolls to illustrate the late singer’s anorexia battle. He’s at it again with his latest, May December, which tackles the idea of highly inappropriate relationships through a lens that itself has the potential to be upsetting.

Elizabeth (Natalie Portman), an acclaimed actress, has traveled to Savannah, Georgia to shadow Gracie (Julianne Moore) in preparation for a movie in which Elizabeth will play Gracie. That movie tackles the beginnings of Gracie’s relationship with Joe (Charles Melton), when he was a 13-year-old seventh grader and she was a 36-year-old pet shop worker. The shocking tryst resulted in much controversy, a child, and a jail stint for Gracie, but the couple professed their love for each other through it all.

Twenty years later, they’re still together, having added two more kids to their family, children who happen to be the same age as Gracie’s grandkids from her previous relationship. Elizabeth wants to experience it all, bouncing from person to person to try to understand exactly who Gracie is and was. Striving for authenticity in her performance, however, soon takes her down a Method acting rabbit hole.

Directed by Haynes from a script by Samy Burch, and loosely based on the story of teacher Mary Kay Letourneau and her 12-year-old student, Vili Fualaau, the film treats Gracie and Joe’s relationship in a relatively straightforward manner. It details a benign life in which they have the love of their kids and some neighbors, even if they occasionally get a box full of poop on their doorstep.

It’s the arrival of Elizabeth that sends things spiraling, as her various conversations trigger responses from both Gracie and Joe that they seem not to expect. Haynes alternates between being serious and being campy, with not enough of each for either for them to seem to be the goal. The score gives off a less-than-serious vibe, and an early scene in which a mundane thing is treated as if it were happening in a soap opera points in the campy direction, but those type of moments are few and far between.

In casting Portman as the obsessive actor, Haynes may have been trying to offer up echoes of her Oscar-winning role in Black Swan. It’s no small irony that the person who comes off as the most craven in such a sordid story is the actor who everybody wants to be around, not the woman who became a pariah because she is a sex offender. In that and other ways, Haynes upends expectations, keeping the film interesting even through its slower moments.

Portman and Moore are ideal for their respective roles, Portman because she has a knack for portraying confidence and guile, and Moore due to her ability to manipulate at will. Melton, best known for playing Reggie on Riverdale, pales in comparison due to his less showy role, but he complements the story well. Special notice goes to Elizabeth Yu as Gracie and Joe’s daughter Mary, who shines in her limited scenes.

The story of May December contains elements that will creep certain viewers out, whether it’s the subject matter itself or the performances of the two great lead actors. Haynes has a way of getting under the skin with his storytelling, and this film is yet another great example.

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May December is now available on Netflix.

Photo by François Duhamel / Courtesy of Netflix

Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore in May December.

Tesla's electric Cybertrucks go home with first customers in Texas livestream event

delayed future

"This is really going to change the look of the roads," said "Technoking of Tesla" and co-founder Elon Musk on a live stream for the "Cybertruck delivery event" — the official rollout of the first futuristic electric Tesla trucks.

Announced in 2019, the all-electric truck with a very unique visual design made waves in the news, then was delayed for years as fulfilling the initial claims of vehicular superiority were tougher challenges than they seemed.

A few Texans and Californians may already be used to seeing the occasional Cybertruck out and about, but these were likely pre-production vehicles, and some sources speculate they were driven by employees and engineers in California. (The factory is here, in Central Texas.) They're not hard to spot — looking more like a Humvee from Mars than any earthly pickup truck, they certainly do make an impression.

"What we're aiming for here, is something that's more truck than truck," Musk stated, while standing in the covert bed of the truck, which is nearly invisible thanks to the sloped profile of the vehicle. But it is equally meant to outperform sports cars at their jobs. Musk listed toughness, towing capacity, and speed as its main three triumphs.

Demos included a sort-of-awkward, but technically successful redo of a notorious former experiment in which a baseball was, in fact, able to break two windows; a video of the vehicle being pelted with bullets and receiving dents, but seemingly no puncture wounds; a video of a towing test in which it out-performed a diesel-powered Ford F-350; and flashiest of all, a quarter-mile race against a 2023 Porsche 911, while towing a Porsche 911.

Musk claims that this truck is "smooth as silk" to drive, which this reporter can believe after taking a (much better-looking) Tesla Model Y — an SUV type — on a road trip from Austin to Houston and back. The vehicle, by Musk's description, also resists rollover with a low center of gravity, can tow more than 11,000 pounds, and dynamically adjusts steering intensity based on speed, among other off-roading perks.

After the video and stage demos, the first batch of Cybertrucks literally rolled out. Musk opened the handle-less door for some of the owners, and there was some confusion on how to operate the latch: The Tesla leader leaned in to instruct some of the drivers to put the vehicle in park before the door could be open, and guided some customers on how to find the latch to open the door themselves.

The short live stream (only about 35 minutes after 25 of semi-abstract animations) ended as Musk drove one of the vehicles off the line — either a real impromptu decision, or feigning a shrugging agreement to the invitation.

Anyone on the Internet at this point knows that Musk is as famous for his controversial opinions as for his company's accomplishments; but the livestreamed portion of this event was relatively free of bravado outside of this vehicle's capabilities.

"Even if I liked Elon that would still be one of the ugliest vehicles ever created," wrote one Reddit user, in what seems to be a recurring theme in the discourse.

"I like it and I’m tired of pretending I do not," wrote another, more vulnerable Redditor.

"It's an announcement of an announcement from 5 years ago," wrote an Instagram commenter.

The Cybertruck is available (starting at $49,890) at tesla.com. The website lists 2025 as the estimated delivery date.

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