julie completed Archives

Why 12 Dogs Keep Getting Adopted for the Wrong Reasons And What Happens Next

May 23, 2025 by Julie Majid

The dogs aren’t the problem—it’s the assumptions people keep making about them.

Some dogs get adopted on impulse, not because they’re the right fit, but because of how they look, what they represent, or who had one in a movie ten years ago. Shelters see it all the time. A breed gets popular on Instagram or a celebrity walks down the street with one, and suddenly everyone wants that dog—without understanding what life with that breed actually requires.

The consequences can be heartbreaking. These dogs aren’t flawed. They’re just misunderstood and mismatched. When a high-energy herder lands in a quiet apartment, or a guardian breed ends up in a chaotic home, everyone loses. Dogs get labeled as problems when the real issue is that they were never the right choice to begin with. Here’s a closer look at twelve breeds that keep getting adopted for all the wrong reasons—and the rough outcomes that usually follow.

In One of the World’s Oldest Rainforests, 10 Legends Surround the Beautiful Spirit Bear’s Existence

May 23, 2025 by Katy Stublen

In British Columbia’s Great Bear Rainforest, one rare white bear has inspired centuries of stories that blur the line between myth and biology.

Tucked into a stretch of temperate rainforest older than the Amazon, the Spirit Bear—also called the Kermode bear—is so rare, most people living nearby have never seen one. It isn’t albino, and it isn’t mythical. It’s a subspecies of black bear with a recessive gene that gives some individuals creamy white fur. But its appearance has stirred something deeper than science for the Indigenous communities who’ve lived alongside it for thousands of years. To them, this isn’t just a genetic variation. It’s a symbol of history, power, and balance. Every legend surrounding the Spirit Bear ties the animal to origin stories, natural forces, and choices made in ancient times. None of these stories are throwaway folklore—they’re rooted in place, in ancestry, and in the rhythms of the forest itself.

12 Dog Breeds That Were Meant for the Mountains And Are Now Stuck in Driveways

May 23, 2025 by Nicole Gehweiler

These dogs weren’t bred to wait around for you to finish your coffee.

There’s a particular type of dog that was built to scale cliffs, guard livestock on snowy ridgelines, or run ten miles without blinking. And somehow, they’ve ended up leashed to fences in suburban neighborhoods, watching the neighbor’s sprinklers instead of surviving avalanches. Mountain dogs weren’t made for stillness. But that’s where a lot of them are now—pacing behind backyard gates, under-exercised, misunderstood, and bored to the point of rebellion.

They aren’t bad dogs. They’re just in the wrong environment. You can’t take something wired for altitude, endurance, and instinct-driven work and expect it to thrive doing nothing. But that’s exactly what’s happening, over and over. These breeds were meant to live with purpose, not sit on porches. Here are twelve dogs who were bred for the peaks and are now losing their minds in cul-de-sacs, waiting for someone to remember what they were designed to do.

You’ve Likely Walked Past 14 Hidden Wild Animals This Year Without Ever Knowing It

May 22, 2025 by Katy Stublen

Most of them were probably staring straight at you the whole time.

If you’ve been on a trail, stepped through a park, or even pulled weeds in your backyard this year, chances are good you had company. Quiet, camouflaged, patient company. Some animals are so ridiculously good at hiding in plain sight that they don’t run, don’t flinch, and don’t even move when you’re right next to them. They simply wait you out.

This isn’t some rare, wilderness-only situation. These masters of invisibility are everywhere—urban, rural, coastal, desert. Most of them are small, some are shockingly close, and all of them are better at hide-and-seek than you’ll ever be. You probably snapped photos near one. Maybe even had lunch beside one. And unless you looked twice (or had a really curious dog), you’d never know they were there.

In The Time It Takes To Walk A Mile, 10 Species Will Have Already Migrated Past You

May 22, 2025 by Julie Majid

These animals are on the move constantly—and they’re not waiting for the world to catch up.

©Image license via Flickr/Epitácio Moura

While we’re busy checking step counts or looking for parking, entire species are quietly slipping past us. Migration isn’t always the dramatic, once-a-year spectacle we imagine. For some animals, movement is life—and it happens daily, hourly, even minute by minute. Some cross oceans. Others scale elevations so fast your knees would buckle just thinking about it. And while we’re crawling through errands or traffic, these animals are already miles ahead—no luggage, no rest stops, and no excuses. They’re not sightseeing. They’re surviving. And they do it with an efficiency that’s equal parts brutal and beautiful.