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This is Defector, a new sports blog and media company. We made this place together, we own it together, we run it together. Without access, without favor, without discretion, and without interference.

Defector

Animals

Creaturefector

Science


<p>charismatic megafauna (they/them)</p>


Sabrina Imbler

Green Pakistani Parrot on White Background

Birdfector

Let Birds Masturbate

Kathryn Xu

Clementine the tuxedo cat looking like a snake.

Life's Rich Pageant

How I Became An Itinerant Cat Tutor

The dead whale lies bloated off the Danish island of Anholt. It is the humpback whale known as Timmy, which first beached off Timmendorfer Strand at the end of March and was transported to the North Sea around a month later

The Long, Sad, And Totally Fucked-Up Tale Of Timmy The Whale’s Trip To Germany

a wall-e ass looking robot called the looming eyes buoy

Foolish Humans! Gulls Are Not So Gullible After All

What The Fuck Is Happening With This Fish

a photo of a remora fish with its head buried inside the cloaca of a manta ray

What Are You Doing In There, Fish?

A still from the trailer for Hoppers showing a beaver standing on a pile of machine rubble and proselytizing to a crowd of animals

Arts And Culture

Dam It All To Hell

the water scavenger beetle Regimbartia attenuata

Even After Being Eaten, This Beetle Has Two Ways Out Alive

a bright pink insect called a katydid against a dark background

This Pink Bug Is Not A “Rare Freak Mutant” After All

White-faced Plover Charadrius dealbatus, Great Kinmen Island, Taiwan.

Newly Poly Plover Dad Still Figuring Out His Time Management

Chimp Toti attentively observes the quartz crystal during Experiment 1.

Which Chimp Should Wield The Crystal?

Baby monkey named 'Punch' is seen with a stuffed animal at a zoo on February 20, 2026, in north of Tokyo, Chiba Prefecture, Japan. Abandoned by his mother at birth, the monkey found comfort with a stuffed animal.

The Mournful Ballad Of Punch The Monkey

the ancient fish Haikouichthys, which resembles a blue noodle with four eyes

Finally! An Ancient Fish That Understood Life’s Terrors

The President of the Lombardy Region, Attilio Fontana, is welcoming the mascots Tina and Milo of the XXV Winter Olympic Games Milano Cortina 2026 in Piazza Citta di Lombardia, in Milan, Italy, on February 27, 2024.

Olympics

Which Other Olympic Mascots Could Italian Stoats Tina And Milo Slaughter In Cold Blood?

fake berries called bulbils of the black-bulb yam

This Week In Delicious Scams; Or, I Yam Not What You Think I Yam

Artist impression of what Prototaxites would have look like in life

Who The Hell Was This?

Veronika the cow resting while using a stick.

Veronika The Cow’s Record Scratch

jon allen holds a worm up in front of a class

This Worm Is A Millennial

a laboratory mouse pokes out of a brown paper cup in a field of grass

What A Week Of Freedom Can Do For A Lab Mouse

American crocodile basking on jet ski, Broward County, Florida, USA December 2023. This crocodile was being tracked with a satellite transmitter as a component of ongoing research.

If You Give A Crocodile A Kawasaki Ultra 310LX

flat-headed cat, small wild cat, camera trap, southeast Asia, Thailand

What Would You Name This Cat?

<p>A. Frog is a freelance writer living in Japan.</p>


A. Frog

A screencap of a video showing the backside of a green frog and a hornet inside a plastic box

I Shall Never Mess Up Again

a mother leopard seal opens her mouth above the body of her dead pup

Why Won’t Nora The Leopard Seal Abandon Her Dead Pups?

Split image. The lefthand side is Olivia Nuzzi attends the 2023 White House Correspondents' Association Dinner at Washington Hilton on April 29, 2023 in Washington, DC. She's wearing a leopard longsleeve top and has long blonde hair and is smiling tightly at the camera. On the right side is an image of a purple blob of some sort.

Politics

Olivia Nuzzi Addresses The Worm

a female spider next to a funnel-shaped hole in a web