I'm always looking for old photos featuring coati in them.
Recently a VR experience featuring the man was on display in London.
An article talking about Attenborough shared several photos...
One of which made me and, if you're as much of a fan of the coati as I am, will probably make you smile as well.
A photo of the actor with his son...
And a baby coatimundi.
A mansion is Tucson (that asked not to be named in the original article because they didn't want the publicity...but I'm here to tell you it was probably the Franklin House) became the chosen residence for a wayward coati in November.
Something had been ripping up the lawn (coati can smell grubs up to 2ft into the ground) and causing some havoc to the gardens surrounding the mansion.
After learning that the culprit, who was doing a not-so-great job as a horticulturist on the mansion's grounds, was a coati, the animal control folks set up trail cams to see whether or not the animal was alone or part of a group. Once it was determined that it was a solo male, traps were set.
Almost immediately the coati went for the bait, found itself in a trap and eventually being released back into the wild at Catalina State Park nearby.
You can find the entire article here at Tuscon.com
Something that has always fascinated me are animal stories.
Animals have been players in some of the biggest moments of human history.
And sometimes?
They play a part in some of the smaller moments...
Like a lttle coati named Cody in Tennessee.
Around 2009, Cody wound up at a pet store in Murfreesboro, Tennessee called Animal City.
Cody was yet another victim of the illegal animal trade. Animal City received him after coming from the Mississippi from an exotic animal breeder (whether legal or illegal I do not know...but I'm absolutely against the breeding of coatimundi for this purpose).
For 11 years Cody was something of a local celebrity with people coming to the pet store specifically to see the little coati.
Described as a lightning-fast pickpocket, Cody's life at Animal City came to a quiet end during a dental surgery he was undergoing.
I have not reached out to understand why Cody passed during his surgery but as someone with several years of animal experience, anesthesia can become risky with older exotics.
I think it's fantastic that a local paper picked up on the story of Cody and posted it for others to read.
His small part in the story of a big world is important to document.
To let anyone who might read this or the original article about Cody know he was here.
After all, as an animal trainer I respect once told me...
"They're just little people in different costumes."
One of the earliest posts on this blog was an entry about the "Peel Street Monster" that I'd read about in the magazine, Fortean Times.
At the time that it had been published, the internet was still in its infancy-ish stage. Information continues from humankind's collective history; things like old newspapers, newsletters and various periodicals are making their way online more and more quickly adding more information to stories we're already aware of.
One such story is that of the "Peel Street Monster" that I wrote about in one of the first posts on this blog back in 2009.
Since that time, the "Peel Street Monster" has also become known as the "Wolverhampton Monster". More information about the incidents surrounding the story have shown up in additional sources and a clearer picture of what actually took place from the moment the "monster" first attacked to its death at the hands of a teenager with a brick to the misunderstanding that it was allegedly attacking a baby (it wasn't) to being dumped in a gutter to discovering it was a female to discovering there was another coati as well that was never caught (which makes me wonder if that coati had anything to do with reports not long later of a troupe of coati a few miles from this story's location). Author Thomas Fair has written a fantastic short article about this little moment in history...
A moment when one of the most interesting animals in the world became a monster...
And, like a lot of alleged monsters and misunderstood characters throughout human history?
Repeated a lesson that continues to haunt us...
Our primitive fear of what we don't understand.
A fear that, more often than not, has time and time again brought about violence against the innocent.
Like an innocent litle coatimund a long time ago whose only crime was being curious and unusual.
It's June in Cambridge, Massachusetts and someone is hearing noises coming from the inside of a U-Haul.
Upon closer examination?
They could hear birds sqwaking and chirping, but also something else.
Not long after making the call about the U-Haul, members of the environmental division of the local police as well as the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (MSPCA) arrived on the scene to force open the trailer.
What they found was typical of these types of heartbreaking animal rescue stories, particulary exotic animal rescues...
Locked inside the U-Haul were several birds, rats, chinchillas...
And four brown-nosed coatimundi.
All of the animal were housed in dirty cages.
The MSPCA put up all the other animals for hopeful adoption while the group tries to find an animal sanctuary or zoo that can take in the coatis.
I'll be calling the MSPCA to find out the situation with the coatis and update this story as soon as I can.
Link to the original story here.
Here's a video of one of the rescued coati.
Just a quick post to let those who, like myself LOVE the coati, know that this blog will begin posting all new material and coati news very soon as well as coati art and more.
My last post was in 2015...
This was at the same time that Cody, a coati who entered my life and was a massive part of it for 17 years, passed away at the ripe old coati age of 17.
He was incredibly well cared for and was my entire world for 17 years.
No vacations. No traveling.
Just making sure he was taken care of.
I learned a LOT about the coati in order to properly care for this amazing animal.
It's time to get back to sharing that love for this incredibly unique and amazing animal.
There is so much still unknown about the coati...
From vocalizations to birthing to their privage lifestyles.
I hope you'll follow along as I jump back into cataloguing all things coatimundi in one place...
The Collected Coatimundi!
