Animal Speculation, Organizing + more

Hey Jammers! Here I am, back with another post. My summer break starts in about a month (earlier than usual), and I will have a lot of free time to post more frequently than my usual once-a-week-- I'm so excited :D

The past couple posts haven't directly involved AJ, so here I have some Animal Jam related content for ya. 

First up, some kinda-late update speculation:

So apparently, there will be a new animal announced soon. And apparently... Jamaa has deserts?

Well, I guess we have Appondale and Kimbara Outback. Those are pretty desert-y. Nevermind then XD

So... who might this new animal be?

One look at the pointy ears and my first thought was armadillo:

Armadillos live in grasslands, forests and semi-deserts, but we already have all the other pointy-eared desert creatures I can think of. 

Actually...

As much as I'm sure we don't need another fox to choose from, a likely possibility is that fennec foxes will be released soon. Unlike armadillos, these guys actually live in deserts. 

Still, those ears in the hint are too small to be that of a fennec fox!

*Google Image searches 'pointy eared desert animal' to get ideas*

WAIT A MINUTE

MAYBE...

AARDVARKS???

They live in sub-saharan Africa, but not the kind of sandy desert pictured in Liza's photograph. 

Maybe AJHQ has just given up with scientific accuracy :\

All I can hope is that the new animal is not a canine or a feline– we honestly have enough of those, and there are so many other possibilities!!! C'mon AJHQ, where them hippos at!? Zebras!?!?

Something really cool that could happen is the new animal being released as nonmember. I'm sure that would get people excited, regardless of what the new animal is!

Or maybe... Liza's photo doesn't mean there will be a new animal. Maybe kangaroos will become nonmember.

Ah well. That's enough new-animal speculation for one day.

Moving on...

Around a month ago there was a Lucky Day art contest on AJ's official Instagram and there was this really cute entry from IG user @kawaii_shark_21. Above is a part of it.

I screenshot it because I loved that hat and thought it would be a great idea for an AJ item!

Turns out it's an AJPW item:

Image credit to that same user.

If I actually played Play Wild I'd probably know that immediately lol. Still, I think the way this person drew it looks nicer than the real deal.

AJPW has some nice items– hey AJHQ! It would rock if you could release some AJPW items in AJPC if you ever run out of ideas, which I suspect happens frequently if it's expected that a new item comes out every day.

In other news...

I found a couple of nice items at a My Shop for only a few diamonds each! Arm Chairs, while a little boring, are a bit harder to trade for nowadays because they are an item with an older design that has been out of stores for long enough to make people call them 'beta' (which they're not, but it shows people value them).

I've had a membership for a few months now because I wanted to try out the My Shop feature– to buy from it, not to sell. Which brings me to my next segment...

On Animal Jam right now, I am organizing my things and getting rid of items I don't like. I could sell them in a My Shop... but because I'd prefer nonmember new players have them, I'm trading them away for 1 Necklace each, 1 item per person. It's really nice to make Jammers happy :)

I'm weird in the sense that I like to be very very organized on AJ-- ridiculously organized and minimal. I don't like having too many gems/diamonds, too many items, too many animals, and soon I'm going to start removing buddies I've never talked to (don't worry, I have a good memory)

It's funny because I'm pretty disorganized in real life. I haven't cleaned my room in months and I gave up on using a binder for my biology papers halfway through the year. I just cram stuff in my bag lol

I like being organized IRL, it's just a lot of effort :\

In other news, I found a lion cub in Jamaa Township. Wow.

Before I go, I wanted to give you an update on my request to Clark Stacey (AJ's CEO) to make Animal Jam educational again: I haven't checked for a response in a month, but I'll probably check sometime tonight. I guess I'm just nervous about what he'll say, but it's more than likely that he just hasn't seen it yet.

Alright. See you in Jamaa!

Happy Earth Day! Let's heal the world.

Hey Jammers, happy Earth Day! Here's a quick post before I leave for tutoring

You've heard all about recycling and turning off the lights, but in honor of Earth Day, here are the top 3 most effective ways to reduce our negative impact on our beautiful planet and replace it with kindness.

– Walk, bike, or take public transportation when you can. 

Even if your school is close by, it can be tempting to just drive/get driven and avoid walking. But you're not doing the environment or yourself any favors! I used to do that way too much, but during the past few years I've learned just how easy walking really is. (When you can, of course-- no one's asking you to walk 100 miles through the desert lol)

– Eat less animal products.

No one really likes to hear this one, but as more and more science comes out we now know it to be true that the meat/dairy/egg industry is a main polluter of water sources, waster of resources, reason for habitat destruction (most of the Amazon Rainforest is cleared for cattle grazing), and source of the toxic air pollution that causes climate change (as well as the health problems that come from breathing toxic air). Anytime you buy something with meat/dairy/eggs you indirectly give money to these practices.

You don't need to be 100% vegan, but just try to choose something plant-based over something meat-based when you can. 

Fun fact: It takes the water of 30 full showers to produce one hamburger. If you want to save an ocean of water, you could A. not shower for a month, or B. have a veggie burger instead. Wow.

– Don't buy what you don't really need– especially if it's plastic.

40% of food in America is wasted because people buy more than they can eat. The ocean is full of plastic because people buy toys and snacks that they don't need. Isn't it funny that snacks, the most temporary things, are packaged in plastic that lasts a billion years?


I hope you guys can help make Earth Day every day. Let's try our best!

~DoomyPanda

Cool Desert Animals

Hey guys! Sorry for another massive gap in posting without notice– I went away for a week and I thought I'd have enough internet and time to update you guys, but I was pretty busy and didn't have access to a computer. Whoops!

It's funny-- sometimes if I come back to Blogger after a long absence I get nervous that world war 3 or something went down on AJ XD glad it didn't this time.

I don't have much in the way of Animal Jam related content, and a big weekend of doing all the work I couldn't do while I was away the past week.

However, I do have some animal related content...

I saw so many different animals over my trip!

A few of the animals I saw I had never seen before-- like this beautiful roadrunner. 

I have some more pictures of the animals I saw, but they're on my dad's phone and he's away right now so I'll edit them back into this post when he returns. The photos are here now!

Here are all the awesome creatures I was lucky enough to see:

- A lot of tiny lizards. Most of them were understandably cautious around me (I'm a lot bigger than a tiny lizard), but on one of the last days of my trip I saw one sitting on a rock and they let me sit down nearby to admire them :3

- One larger lizard. I went on a hike and my brother spotted a black lizard with white spots/stripes and a rounded tail cooling off in the underbrush. I didn't get a picture, so I might not remember the patterns of their skin 100%.

- On that same hike, I saw another tiny lizard... but this one had two tails! Or, more accurately, the tip of a second tail coming out of their normal-sized one. Sorry for the low-quality photo, but you can see their two tail tips!

- Again on that hike, I saw two really big and cool caterpillars. One was eating a leaf and was so big they almost reminded me of a squirrel, holding the leaf in their hands and bringing it to their mouth. LOOK AT THEM

Fun fact: at least in America, any caterpillar you find is way more likely to be poisonous than any spider you find. You can tell that the caterpillar above is probably poisonous because of their bright colors and sharp barb at their tail. Another telltale sign is extreme fluffiness. 

Moral of the story: admire caterpillars at a respectful distance. ^-^

- Once again on that hike, I saw my first rattlesnake! They were just calmly and gracefully traveling over some rocks and into the brush, and we kept a respectful distance. I have a nice video, but I might need to edit out the sound because you don't need to hear my annoying voice lol

- For three or four days in a row, when my family came back to where we were staying we always saw the same slug in the same place at the same time of night. They weren't moving that slowly, they just had a schedule! In the photo it's hard to tell what part is the actual slug and what parts are just shadows lol

- I saw a bunny! Their ears were a little bigger than the ones where I live, so I took notice.

- I saw a baby finch and their parents

- EDIT: As I'm editing in the photos, I remembered another cool animal! My family visited a permaculture forest (fruit trees and veggies are grown alongside native plants and wildlife). The people there had built a shelter on a raft out of recycled materials that a mama mallard was using to take care of her eggs! They said the raft was anchored to the bottom of the pond to protect the mallard from coyotes because coyotes can't swim. We could see her shifting around inside, which they said was a sign that the eggs were soon to hatch!

- And last but definitely not least... a trio of coyotes strolling together at night! Nocturnal predators like them tend to stay far away from humans, so seeing them was special. Contrary to popular belief, coyotes want nothing to do with humans and will not attack you unless you are awful and attack them first, and even then they'll probably just try to get away from you. Among other keystone predators, coyotes are vital members of the ecosystem. They deserve respect. 

That being said, keep a respectful distance away from animals you encounter. They're probably afraid of you (you look like a giant to most of them) and the best way to show you care about them is to not cause them any unnecessary panic. In addition, be sure to contact a professional wildlife rehabilitator if you come across an animal who looks hurt. 


And you can probably get a general idea of where I traveled to from the animals I listed above. XD

Once I get all my homework done, I'll have more AJ-related things to post about later.

See you in Jamaa!

~DoomyPanda

BEEP BEEP New blog alert!

Hey Jammers! Wow, 2 posts in a row? And it isn't even school break??? UNHEARD OF!!! :O

This rare event is because a new Animal Jam blog has joined the playing field, and it looks really promising!

Just look at that crisp layout B)

Let us all give a warm welcome to the Animal Jam Timber Blog, courtesy of AJ user Difficult!

Click the link above to visit it (and follow it and leave comments on it!). It will also be viewable from Animal Jam Stream's blogroll page.

---

The next part of this post is unrelated...

You always here about the problems in the AJ community, right? Scamming, hacking... y'know, just Jammers generally being unkind.

WELL, we're all here because Animal Jam isn't just a hive mind of mean people. There are kind Jammers, too, but they can be hard to notice sometimes.

That is why I came up with a new idea for a post segment– nice people of AJ!

First up...

I actually saw this person in Jamaa today. Naturally, I was curious and clicked their Jammer Wall to find...

...a bunch of happy quotes and messages! Aww :')

This is what I like to see on AJ-- Jammers doing kind things without thinking about rares or diamonds or whatever. 

AJHQ, give this person a Positive Player Plaque!

I have some more screenshots of other positive Jammers but I'll save them for other posts.

---

I haven't done an animal-focused post segment since I talked about the fat-tailed dwarf lemur, so it's high time I made another. 

When I'm bored during school, sometimes I go through Google Images looking for interesting animal photos, and I tend to discover a lot of new animals in the process.

I stumbled upon this cool animal in that way. I present to you...

The beautiful, precious, amazing green heron!

Mira, one of the two guardian spirits of Jamaa, is a great blue heron, but did you know that herons come in all colors, shapes, and sizes?

The green heron is an example of this-- they tend to be rather short and stout, when compared to the great blue heron's tall and slender physique. 

However, the two herons share the same kinds of swampy wetland habitats, enjoy similar kinds of food (earthworms, small fish, small rodents, etc.) and may even be seen together. 

While I have seen great blue herons before in wetlands near me, I have never seen a green heron before. However, the Florida Everglades are a beloved home for them– the place that the Jamaa land Balloosh was based on!

Fish are an important staple food for the green heron, so they have many ways to catch them. One technique that the green heron uses is floating a feather or a twig on the surface of the water to pique the curiosity of a nearby fish.

However, green herons are most commonly known for something that I have yet to mention.

THEIR UNBELIEVABLE NECK

One day, I really hope to see a green heron for myself. Even though we know so little about them, one thing is certain: green herons are amazing.

I hope you enjoyed this post! :)

See you in Jamaa~

Coming Soon: AJ for older kids?!

Hey Jammers! Remember that post I made last weekend where I was wondering what the heck is going on at AJHQ? Well, it turns out that on the same exact day I published that post, another post was made on Animal Jam Archives that may just answer this question... among many others that we have had over the years!

So apparently in January, the podcast Kidtech interviewed Clark Stacey where he revealed some potentially big info about things that are soon to come on AJ.

I have no idea how anyone at AJ Archives could find this podcast– I'm always going deep to find news about Animal Jam and I've never once seen this.

There's already a summary of some parts of the interview in the link above, but as I write this I'm listening to the podcast to summarize the interesting stuff for you guys, and at 9 minutes in here's the first new thing:

- The partnership with Nat Geo was to help AJ compete for attention with bigger kids games like Club Penguin. 

This makes sense! It's hard to gain publicity as a small kids game when you're overshadowed by giants like Disney. 

It's common sense, but it's good that this was mentioned because it implies that the break-off between Nat Geo and AJ may have just been because AJ didn't need them for publicity anymore.

Additionally:

- The partnership with Nat Geo was expensive, and even though they have a huge library of animal video and photography, licensing issues made it hard to use. Much of the educational material on AJ was collected by AJ itself!

It's starting to make more sense why AJ split with Nat Geo.

Also,

- Animal Jam was close to having partnered with Animal Planet, but eventually ended up with Nat Geo instead. 

Just thought that was interesting. 

And another fun fact:

- 20,000 pieces of artwork are sent in every day through the Masterpiece system and each is checked by a real person twice. Wow

The main idea, however, comes around the end of this 45-minute podcast:

Wildworks has been working on... Animal Jam for younger kids, and Animal Jam for older kids.

(Ok, for the record, neither of the above screenshots are "leaks" of the potential new games– the one above is an example of early AJ animal designs from the Animal Jam Archives, and the one below is a screenshot from the game Lif. They were just the first things that popped into my head when I heard about this lol)

According to Clark Stacey, there has been a lot of feedback from Jammers saying "I'm a junior or senior in high school. I've been playing AJ for 5 or 6 years but it feels weird to still be playing at this age. You guys should do something like Animal Jam but for older kids with less restrictions."

I can relate to the quote above except that I don't feel weird about playing AJ anymore lol– it's something that makes me happy, so I don't really care if I'm not exactly the target demographic.

But anyway, Clark Stacey goes onto confirm that Wildworks is in the process of developing these two new games and that they should be announced soon publicly. 

He described the one for younger kids as a "bridge into Animal Jam" and the one for older kids as "what happens after Animal Jam". They probably won't be exactly like Animal Jam, but I wonder if the one for older kids might use graphics similar to beta testing given how older Jammers might be nostalgic for that. 

Personally, I think the 'Animal Jam for older kids' is a nice idea (I'd probably play both that and normal AJ), but the 'Animal Jam for kids below 8' seems a bit much. If kids grow up fixed to a computer screen while they are very young... it's just not good, no matter how cool the game is. 

I really hope that the kind of uneventful updates AJ has been having don't continue even after these upcoming games are announced, but regardless, it seems from the interview that Animal Jam is a labor of love, for the most part.

Thanks for reading, and see you in Jamaa! :)