A young female Pine Marten has taken to settling in an Owl Box setup with a live streaming camera (24x7). Details on channel https://www.youtube.com/@ScottishWildlifeGarden. Male has been bringing some food, she recently brought back her own kills too.

The old main coin (at about 7 Euro) was a Kuna, which means marten, so... https://www.reddit.com/r/EuroCoins/comments/uj6ebl/final_design_of_croatian_1_euro_coin_unveiled_do/

Going through ttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustelidae and I realised I had missed quite a major update in my previous Updates to the Mustelid species post. I have added these to that post, however as I am sure most of you are unlikely to re-visit that post I have created a part II !

I have also deleted the Mustelid Family Tree, phylogenetic tree and re-uploaded in a new post with these extra updates!

New World Weasels

Members in this genus were formerly classified into the genera Mustela and Neovison, but many studies had previously recovered several American species of Mustela, as well as both species within Neovison, to comprise a monophyletic clade distinct from all other members of Mustelinae. A 2021 study found this clade to have diverged from Mustela during the Late Miocene, between 11.8 - 13.4 million years ago, with all members within the clade being more closely related to one another than to any of the other species in Mustela, and gave it the name Neogale, originally coined by John Edward Gray.The American Society of Mammalogists later accepted this change.

• Neogale africana - Amazon weasel

• Neogale felipei - Colombian weasel

• Neogale frenata - long-tailed weasel

• Neogale vison - American mink

I was looking at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustelidae and noticed there have been some updates to the naming of mustelids species against my own personal database. Also, because of this my top stickied post - Mustelids by Region is somewhat out of date. (I will update it over the next couple of days and add some pictures where I can)

Deletions:

• Egyptian weasel - Mustela nivalis subpalmata has been reconsidered as a subspecies of least weasel

Additions:

• American ermine - Mustela richardsonii - long considered to conspecific with the stoat (or short-tailed weasel) a 2021 study found it to be a distinct species.

• Haida ermine - Mustela haidarum is thought to be a hybrid species that originated from ancient hybridization between the stoat and the American Ermine (above) was also re-evaluated during that 2021 study.

• Formosan ferret-badger - Melogale subaurantiaca was thought to be conspecific with the Chinese ferret-badger but a 2019 genetic study found it to represent a distinct species.

• Pacific marten - Martes caurina was formerly considered conspecific with the American marten however several studies now have had it redefined as a separate species.

• Caucasion badger - Meles canescens was long thought to be a subspecies of the European badger however, a 2013 study found significant genetic divergence between both species.

• Northern hog badger - Arctonyx albogularis was formerly considered a subspecies of the greater hog badger until a 2008 study proposed splitting the hog badgers into three different species.

• Sumatran hog badger - Arctonyx hoevenii was formerly consider a subspecies of the greater hog badger but together with the Northern hog badger it was placed as its own species.

• Congo clawless otter - Onyx congicus was formerly recognized as a subspecies of the African clawless otter but has been recently be recategorized as its own species.

Massive Ommision!

New World Weasels

Members in this genus were formerly classified into the genera Mustela and Neovison, but many studies had previously recovered several American species of Mustela, as well as both species within Neovison, to comprise a monophyletic clade distinct from all other members of Mustelinae. A 2021 study found this clade to have diverged from Mustela during the Late Miocene, between 11.8 - 13.4 million years ago, with all members within the clade being more closely related to one another than to any of the other species in Mustela, and gave it the name Neogale, originally coined by John Edward Gray.The American Society of Mammalogists later accepted this change.

• Neogale africana - Amazon weasel

• Neogale felipei - Colombian weasel

• Neogale frenata - long-tailed weasel

• Neogale vison - American mink

As the ferret is our only domesticated mustelid, I am sure many subscribers here are familiar with them and keep them as pets. They are often bought by unwary owners only to be abandoned when the owners cannot cope. If these are passed onto rescues they still have a chance, but in many cases they are literally abandoned outside, often dying a cruel death by starvation amongst other things.

Unfortunately some of the ferrets that end up in rescues have ended up there because of ignorance of their proper care, have had unintentional (sometimes intentional) neglect and have major issues because of this. They often are not properly socialised with people and it takes dogged patience to get them to act well enough to be kept as pets. In all this their bitey nature is well known. In my opinion (note my opinion here) some however really never reach this stage and are just never ever going to be suitable to be kept as pets. As with rogue dogs, my opinion is these animals are just too dangerous and the owner should take responsibility for putting them down at least in extreme cases.

To the point, a post on /r/ferrets showed someone's arm bandaged and soaked in blood. This was far worse than I have seen on /r/ferrets and I was not the only person alarmed by this abnormal ferret behaviour. I suggested that euthanasia should unfortunately be at least be considered in this case. After a reply along the lines of "omg you're suggesting euthanising a baby ferret" followed by a "omg how could someone who is the moderator at /r/mustelids even think that?" it was obvious my comments were not going down well and I deleted them.

I had no intention of doubling-down on what I was saying, I backed off and I thought that was the end of it.

The out-spoken poster above however felt that was not enough and got the mods to get me a permanent ban to /r/ferrets - a community I have been a member of for 10 years or so, even being a moderator at one point.

Then.... after getting me banned the same poster started a smear campaign in a new post on /r/ferrets particularly emphasizing my being a moderator of /r/mustelids. I had no way to respond because of course I have been banned from the group. So... 3 day ban from Reddit for using a temporary account.

A message to moderators asking "why" for the permanent ban was met with a simple "you don't align with the views of our sub", then muted for sending a second message asking for clarification.

I never insulted anyone, I never trolled anyone, what I was saying was not in itself that outlandish IMHO.

That said, I can understand why someone might not have liked what I said, and would have even understood a temporary ban given the subject matter, but a permanent ban was not called-for, I deleted my posts myself and had retreated from the subject.

Letting someone post a follow-up which was badmouthing me after banning me seems like pure vindictiveness on the part of both /r/ferrets and the poster.

• The Original Post

• The Character smear - To me, it is extremely odd that one of their major arguments is you cannot compare dangerous dogs to dangerous ferrets, but never says why... then goes on about my being a moderator at /r/mustelids as if it was pretty much the worst thing about my comments.

I would never advocate euthanising wild animals biting people, it is sort of expected. I don't advocate people keeping wild animals as pets at all, even cross-breeding because of this.

Ferrets can be dangerous, and I am not the only one who thinks that responsible owners should at least think about euthanasia as a worst case scenario..

I have no intention of hiding anything here. Your posts here don't necessarily need to be in my favour, but I would ask that you keep posts polite and insult-free. I do have mod status here at least.

/r/mustelids needs some new faces. Let us know if you are interested in moderating.

Ideas on how to add content especially welcome.