Growing up, there are certain animals you're more familiar with than others. Kids love dogs and cats, they love dinosaurs. Some kids are into predators like lions, tigers, and bears, while others prefer animals one might find on a farm, like horses, cows or pigs. As a child, my tastes were a bit more… unique. I flitted between wanting to be an entomologist to wanting to be a marine biologist on the regular. I'd rather pick up rocks and look for bugs, or scout for frogs, toads, newts, and salama…

Do you like puns? If so, congratulations, you're in the right place. When left to my own devices, I am not a woman of the punny experience. My brain just doesn't really work that way. The puns I come up with on my own are borderline nonsensical. I usually have to explain them, which gets a lukewarm chuckle at best. Although not my wheelhouse, animals are a great subject for puns. You might say animal puns are hiss-tarical or a-moose-ing. See how punny that was! Since I have no skill for this ar…

No touching

Today is World Anteater Day , and what better way to celebrate than honor the greatest anteater of modern times, Arthur, from the hit PBS show Arthur. Arthur is not only an aardvark but also an anteater. This is a 3rd grader who contains multitudes! In his cartoon form, he resembles a mouse more than any real anteater in the wild. However, every real Arthur stan will know that he resembled an authentic anteater perfectly in his first book incarnation, Arthur's Nose. Unfortunately, the creative…

Gatekeeping is sometimes necessary. I find it unquestionably necessary to gatekeep cat and dog memes from the rest of the animal memes. There is no shortage of lists displaying hundreds of thousands of dog and cat memes. If I were a betting man, I would say there are more cat memes than any other type of meme on God's green earth. I've got nothing against dogs or cats, but I have to ask, where are the worm memes? Where are the buffalo memes? When will the non-domesticated animal of the world ge…

A tweet from @NYCParks went viral last week after the account reassured concerned citizens that the sight of squirrels “splooting” around public parks shouldn't be cause for alarm. @NYCParks explained, “On hot days, squirrels keep cool by splooting (stretching out) on cool surfaces to reduce body heat.” Included with the important public service announcement was a picture of a little squirrel sprawled out under the shade of a tree. It turns out squirrels aren't the only splooters in the animal…

We can't really tell you what it means when an animal goes “ goblin mode .” You kind of just know. It can be anything from a subtle devious look, to a full-on explosion of ravenous chaos. Often, watching animals lose their sh-t can feel pretty relatable—sometimes you just need to let loose without giving a single heck. There's a Twitter account, @mischiefanimals , that does a wonderful job chronicling all the wild instances of animals going bonkers, and we've collected some of our favorite rece…

Unlike humans, animals don't necessarily have to perform in order to entertain others. A goofy-looking cat who transitions awkwardly between sleeping positions can potentially inspire more delight in a person than a professional comic with years of experience and practice. No one bats an eye when I wash my hair, but a shampooed cow? Standing ovation. Even the most painfully low-effort memes can fully recover if they feature a funny or adorable animal. That said, we've rounded up a glorious coll…

I'm sure we all wished we were born into the legendary Irwin Dynasty at some point. Imagine being the heiress to the Australia Zoo throne, spending your days wearing fantastic two-piece khaki outfits with your awesome and perfectly wholesome family. I, for one, want nothing more than to star in my wildlife documentary programming and continue on the legacy of Steve Irwin , aka The Crocodile Hunter. I would trade my boring non-regional American accent for that authentic Aussie twang in a heartbe…

Bark Bark. Meow Meow. These are the classic sounds of the dog and the cat we all know and love. They are the most common pets for a reason, and that reason is that they are so rad. A dog will bark when they hear you coming out of the bathroom. A cat can stretch out to over three feet. These are iconic animals that I can't help but love with all of my heart. I understand why certain people do not want dogs or cats as pets. They is much more responsibility required for a feline or a canine than a…

For as long as I can remember, being a trash animal has been considered the adorable raccoon's game. The masked critters would creep around in the night, destroying giganting garbage bags of food, rifling through compost, and even waltzing into my Brooklyn apartment to hydrate from my poor cat's fountain. Once they just straight up started gobbling up her food. Until relatively recent years, raccoons left our other favorite trash critter, possums, in the proverbial dust. Possums are complicated…

Claws out

Halloween is just around the corner, and you know what that means! For fans of the animal kingdom, it means it's time to find an animal costume that carefully treads the line between being a furry and being Regina from Mean Girls . When you're a kid, it's easy to dress up as a cat or a wolf without getting any slack for it. Animal costumes are available, possibly a little basic, but most of all, cute. As an adult, you have to choose between whatever hogwash Spirit Halloween has to offer or the…

You've gotta hand it to frogs and toads. It's well known that it is not easy being green. So why is it so damn easy to scroll through a bunch of dumb and wholesome frog memes ? It's true that the meme world tends to favor cats and dogs, and though we do love a good cheems meme, our amphibious friends kind of get the shaft where meme attention is concerned. And we're not okay with that. So it's time to show some love to our favorite froggy critters. These memes and posts are just a taste of the…

Cosy

It's been years since I had a dog of my own. Taking care of the energetic beasts isn't an easy feat, and it doesn't exactly suit the urban lifestyle - especially in New York City where we pay exorbitant rents for shoebox-sized apartments. While I happily accept my new cat-person identity, I enthusiastically enjoy dogs vicariously. This means cooing over photos of my friends' dogs, or spending time cuddling with my parents' adorable (and huge) canine companions. No disrespect to my cats, but the…