We updated the masthead to use “An Artful Web Comic of Delight and Wonder” a while back, but sometimes accidentally use the old one. Whoops. While this is sort of issue 14, issue 12ish had a few posts, so we’ve decided to count them as one since it’s just easier that way. We haven’t mentioned it before, but we always put the issue number in the upper left hedgehog.
This comic was dedicated to a running joke from March Mammal Madness where Stoats as a Measurement has been ongoing in describing various mammals stats for many years now. If you search for the #StoatsAsAMeasurement on Twitter you’ll find a treasure trove of wonderful things.
The updated Pricklepants Labs logo featuring a stoat nucleus really just pleases us somehow.
We made the art for this a good while ago in prep for this comic, and liked it so much we had to share back then. We still like it. The little paintings, the serious expressions of hedgehog and stoat, the careful drawing of the quills. It really comes together.
We initially were thinking we were going to draw a big pile of 1,200 stoats for this, but since we started working on this comic two days ago, we realized that wasn’t going to happen. The American black bear’s weight actually has a wide variation, from 90 lb/41 kg/297 stoats to 550 lb/250 kg/1815 stoats.
Tardigrades are fascinating, microscopic, nearly indestructible little water bears. When they go into their state of cryptobiosis, tardigrades can survive extremes of temperature, radiation, and even the vacuum of space. They’ve been around since the Cretaceous and survived multiple mass extinction events, probably thanks to this microscopic superpower.
You might have wondered why we included a picture of a 737 in our comic. We have been busy with a lot of things (and have been playing far too much Disney Emoji Blitz) and sort of lost track, so we started this Thurs. night in a panic. We happened to have done a drawing of a 737 in October that we liked. Problem solved.
Don’t forget Valentine’s Day is coming! We had made a Stoat Valentine a little while back, so this was another case of recycling to save time. While the original’s style is pretty, it wasn’t well suited to a comic.
Since Valentine’s Day is coming up, here’s a free, very affectionish Valentine for you. The bee, stoat, and chickadee aren’t to scale with each other, but to took some artistic liberties. It turns out we really like drawing bees and birds. That chickadee still really pleases us. Perhaps a Princess Pricklepants, Ornithologist will be coming up since we’ve discovered we really like drawing birds.
We hope you enjoyed this comic, even with a subject matter that wasn’t very hedgehog-centric, and with a rather abrupt ending.