Looking to upgrade your macro photography kit? These great deals on dedicated macro lenses, ring flashes, tripods, focusing rails, and essential support gear will help you capture better close-up photos.
I noticed that I did a blunder with the existing manatee; manatees have beaver-like tails instead of fluked tails, while dugongs have the latter. I gave the manatee a dugong tail, so I will give the dugong a manatee tail, just to be fair. I hope you can understand.
Cole Sprouse is ready to live the suite life as an uncle.
After his twin brother Dylan Sprouse announced he was expecting his first baby with wife Barbara Palvin, the Riverdale star shared...
This is a natural white brain coral skeleton often used for nautical or coastal home decor. It is composed of a hard calcium carbonate skeleton secreted by marine polyps. These specimens are frequently found washed ashore on beaches or sourced from shallow tropical reefs. You might consider using it as a decorative element in a book case or display cabinet.
Thank you so much for taking the time to comment on this photo, it's very much appreciated!
More than 20 years after releasing Confessions on a Dance Floor, Madonna is taking over New York City to celebrate the sequel. During Friday’s Tribeca Film Festival premiere of the visualizer for her Confessions II album, debuting July 3, the 7x Grammy winner explained that the short is “really about connection,” which she hopes to […]
The crowd erupted in unified disapproval of Trump, the first sitting president to attend an NBA Finals game, as he appeared on the jumbotron at Madison Square Garden.
Today's brand new Dietz Dolls pinup artwork is another tribute in the style of Bill Randall and classic 1940s/1950s 'Greetings From' postcards with ‘Greetings from the Front’! What could be a souvenir from a soldier to back home during World War 2, showcasing somewhere in the Pacific Theater with the Sherman Tank and Willys Jeep.
New for 2026: As I rebuild the online store, I've opened a temporary one on Fine Art America with some pinups already on there. I'll be adding more in the coming months: fineartamerica.com/profiles/vintagepinups
High above Big Bear Lake in southern California, a pair of eaglets’ eyesight is coming into focus. Sandy and Luna, the 2026 chicks of internet-famous bald eagles Jackie and Shadow, now boast vision abilities nearly equal to that of adult birds.
According the Friends of Big Bear Valley (FOBBV), the non-profit organization responsible for the 24/7 live cam, the bald eagle chicks can now track objects like squirrels and airplanes in the distance. Viewers can spot Sandy and Luna bobbing their heads as they watch things move. “This ‘bobbing’ helps them calculate the exact distance and speed of moving objects,” FOBBV explains.
This vision maturation typically occurs around 35 days old. The physical changes to their eyes take a bit longer—about five years. You’ll notice that Sandy and Luna have black-looking eyes while their parents’ eyes appear as a lighter, creamy yellow. The eyes lighten as they age, evolving from extremely dark brown to a lighter brown to a creamy brown to yellow.
A lot will change for Sandy and Luna. Images: FOBBV
Maturing eyesight isn’t the only physical change the chicks have undergone. At around 35 days old, eaglets’ leg bones also harden. So while their feet remain comically large, their leg bones have reached their full length, allowing Sandy and Luna to walk around the nest with more confidence in their steps.
It’s been another roller coaster nesting season for Jackie and Shadow, a pair of internet-famous bald eagle parents living in San Bernardino National Forest in Southern California. After two of their eggs were destroyed by ravens in January, Jackie and Shadow laid two new eggs that have successfully hatched.
Chick 1 hatched on April 4 at 9:33 p.m. PDT, while Chick 2 followed on April 5 at 8:30 a.m. Their large nest in Big Bear Valley east of Los Angeles is livestreamed 24 hours a day by nonprofit Friends of Big Bear Valley (FOBBV) and has captivated millions.
On May 1, FOBBV announced the chicks’ names: Sandy and Luna.
Before leaving the nest, the chicks face threats from other birds of prey, including hawks, ravens, other eagles, and owls. Inclement weather can also present challenges for the chicks. In 2025, a March snowstorm resulted in the death of one of Jackie and Shadow’s three chicks.
During fledging, only 70 percent of eaglets survive. One of the greatest threats is from cars that can injure or kill the birds while they scavenge for food on roadkill.
Who are Jackie and Shadow?
The pair first got together in 2018 and successfully raised chicks in 2019 and 2022. However, their eggs failed to hatch in 2023 and 2024. Only 50 percent of eagle eggs successfully hatch, so this pair has already beaten the odds.
What happened to Jackie and Shadow’s 2025 eaglets?
In 2025, Jackie laid three eggs that all hatched in early March. On March 13, a strong snowstorm dumped up to two feet of snow and battered the nest with strong winds. Only two of the chicks were visible on the live cam when the storm passed by the next morning. FOBBV later confirmed the passing of one of the chicks. The two surviving chicks were later named Sunny and Gizmo after 54,000 names were submitted by fans.
What happens after chicks fledge?
Young eagles usually fledge–or leave the nest and fly–when they can flatten their wings and have feathers capable of flight. This typically occurs when the birds hit 10 to 14 weeks of age. Males also tend to take their first flight a little sooner than females.
According to FOBBV, fledglings from Southern California have been spotted as far south as Baja California, as far north as British Columbia, and as far east as Yellowstone National Park.
About 70 percent of bald eagles survive the fledgling stage. FOBBV does not tag their eagles, so it’s not possible to follow the chicks’ journeys after they flee the nest.
“Kinks are eroticized fears,” says author Dan Savage in the fascinating documentary Mineshaft: The Cruising Murders, which takes a brutal murder as its starting point and goes on to paint a portrait of pre-AIDS New York, with the filming of William Friedkin’s Cruising (1980) as its backdrop. Not all Friedkin’s films hit the zeitgeist in […]
Last month, the Office of the Ombudsman released its long-awaited investigation into the Hong Kong government’s work in combating animal cruelty.
Jack Chan, the Ombudsman, announces the report investigating the Hong Kong government’s work in combating animal cruelty on April 16, 2026. Photo: The Office of the Ombudsman.
The report was prompted by a series of horrifying abuse cases which, in the Ombudsman’s own words, “amount to a deliberate trampling on the dignity of life and run wholly contrary to the very conscience of a civilised society.”
The investigation focuses primarily on the failures of the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department (AFCD), which is responsible for animal management and welfare.
Among the key findings are the AFCD’s inefficient investigations and insufficient prosecutions. Out of 1,633 reports of suspected animal cruelty from 2020 to June 2025, only six prosecutions were brought – a striking, though not new, statistic.
The AFCD responded to the Ombudsman, saying that the majority of reports it received pertained to noise or nuisance complaints rather than cruelty. However, media reports on animal cruelty, including a recent shocking case of a 14-year-old student sharing online photos and videos of cat abuse, may suggest otherwise.
Other problems highlighted by the Ombudsman’s report include weak enforcement powers; inconsistent case handling; poor internal monitoring and staff training; delayed reform of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Ordinance (Cap. 169), first promised in 2019; and alarmingly low penalties for illegal animal traps, which currently carry a maximum fine of HK$50,000 with no provision for imprisonment.
Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department logo. File photo: Tom Grundy/HKFP.
These are important findings, and the Ombudsman deserves credit for highlighting institutional deficiencies that animal advocates have raised for years.
But while the report has identified some of the government’s major failures, it also reveals a deeper problem: Hong Kong’s approach to animal welfare remains fundamentally reactive rather than preventive, with most suggestions focusing on punishment, not prevention.
Worse still, the report overlooks many of the structural and everyday forms of animal plight that are normalised across the city. This article, then, intends to address these blind spots.
Duty of care
The most glaring limitation of the investigative report concerns its ambivalence over nudging the government to implement a “duty of care.”
While the Ombudsman acknowledges that the government has struggled to reach consensus on this proposal, it stops short of urging its adoption. This hesitation matters.
The Office of the Ombudsman. Photo: Peter Lee/HKFP.
A duty of care would fundamentally shift existing animal law from punishing cruelty after suffering occurs to preventing suffering in the first place. Without such a framework, Hong Kong continues to operate on an outdated logic: authorities intervene only after visible injury, starvation, or death.
If a cat falls from an unprotected high-rise window, or a dog is chronically confined in a tiny flat with little exercise or social contact, the current legal framework can hardly intervene until obvious harm has already occurred.
With a duty of care, caregivers would be legally required to provide appropriate food, shelter, veterinary care, and living conditions that meet animals’ physical and behavioural needs safely. In other common law jurisdictions, including the UK and Australia, duty of care provisions have already become a cornerstone of animal protection.
Undoubtedly, one of the report’s recommendations is to “further strengthen outreach and education in schools, helping students and young people build an awareness of animal protection from childhood.”
This is a fantastic recommendation for preventing animal cruelty, but it remains frustratingly vague. What kind of education are we talking about?
Dogs in Hong Kong. File photo: GovHK.
If Hong Kong genuinely wants to cultivate respect for animals, it must first confront contradictions in the current education system.
Attending a local secondary school, I still remember many science classes where animal dissection was presented as a normal part of learning, from dissecting ox eyes to hearing classmates describe experiments on mice.
These activities are still recommended by the Education Bureau’s Biology Curriculum and Assessment Guide, although the government also expects secondary school students to “learn about how humans can live in harmony with animals and show respect for all living things” in the very same subject.
Humane education
Not only do such laboratory practices risk reinforcing a worldview in which animals exist primarily as instruments for human use, but the pedagogical value of animal dissection has been convincingly challenged by a large corpus of research.
Yet, the issue is perhaps just one of the many voids in our education system that should help enhance animal well-being and stop the everyday exploitation of animals. Learning about veganism, the intersection between animal exploitation and other social problems, conservation, and other elements of animal education are equally important.
Humane education should equip citizens with the ability to locate the many practices of cruelty against animals in Hong Kong, many of which the Ombudsman’s report says nothing about.
Of course, the development projects and human activities that disrupt animals’ habitats should not be ignored. Just think of how Chinese white dolphins have lost their habitat because of reclamation or been injured because of high-speed ferries’ propeller blades, to name just one example.
Whether one supports these institutions and projects or not, it is difficult to argue that they fall outside the conversation on animal welfare.
A Chinese white dolphin spotted in the southern part of Lantau on September 10, 2021. Photo: Kelly Ho/HKFP.
The government’s poor animal management policies in urban areas are another major omission in the Ombudsman’s investigation. The report rightly condemns illegal animal traps but ignores government-led practices that also cause suffering, including the wild boar culling operations.
If Hong Kong truly wants to become a “civilised” city that respects life, then animal welfare cannot be confined to criminal prosecutions of isolated abuse cases. It must also confront the legal, educational, economic, and cultural systems that normalise animal suffering in everyday life and prevent it from happening in the first place.
Another step that must be taken to safeguard animals’ well-being is to ask a harder question: What kinds of relationships do we, as a city, continue to build with the animals who live among us?
As philosopher Martha Nussbaum reminds us, animal justice should not be measured simply by the absence of cruelty, but by whether animals can actualise the capabilities essential to their flourishing.
For dogs, that includes play, movement, and social bonding. For dolphins, it means the ability to hunt, communicate, and live within their natural habitat. Survival alone is not welfare; a decent life is.
The Ombudsman’s report is an important step. But it should not be mistaken for an ultimate solution. Rather, it should remind us that there is always more that we – as policymakers, educators, and citizens – must do.
HKFP is an impartial platform & does not necessarily share the views of opinion writers or advertisers. HKFP presents a diversity of views & regularly invites figures across the political spectrum to write for us. Press freedom is guaranteed under the Basic Law, security law, Bill of Rights and Chinese constitution. Opinion pieces aim to constructively point out errors or defects in the government, law or policies, or aim to suggest ideas or alterations via legal means without an intention of hatred, discontent or hostility against the authorities or other communities.
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Cole Sprouse is ready to live the suite life as an uncle.
After his twin brother Dylan Sprouse announced he was expecting his first baby with wife Barbara Palvin, the Riverdale star shared...
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