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You guys, I have promised cute photos of bird bands and I HAVE DELIVERED. Or rather, you have delivered, and I’m just putting them up.

First up is a pic from faithful reader Joe, the Upper Evergreen Guy. His tropical bird had no legs to band, so he was forced to drastic measures.

Faithful reader Beth K. has no bird to band, but does have a remarkably mellow cat to crown.

Renee J’s dog is similarly more tolerant of random objects than most domestic beasts:

“There actually is a population of geese that lives on the pond behind my house,” says faithful reader Esther Blodgett, “but they’re mean SOBs if you aren’t armed with bread crusts and likely would have resisted my efforts to band them. Fortunately, I found this critter in my back yard. He put up a good fight, but I was able to tag him.”

A bird of a different sort was banded up in Alaska:

Faithful reader Baka Gaijin had his own favorite bird in mind for this band:

And faithful reader Jerrod Kingery found his band too hot to handle — literally! Or maybe metaphorically? I dunno. There’s an oven mitt involved, anyway.

Finally, faithful reader Red Greenback banded a Mark Trail action figure (note: not officially licensed) and created his own Unnaturally Large Animal Shot.

Most everyone who’s donated: your band should be winging its way to you right about now, if you haven’t gotten it yet! The last batch is going in the mail tomorrow. One sad note though: some people have found that the devilish machines at the post office have difficulty dealing with the awesomeness of bible bird bands, and are getting envelopes like this:

If this monumental tragedy happens to you, please let me know and send me your address — I have extras and will resend. (If you’ve already told me, your band is going out tomorrow.) Similarly, if your band doesn’t show up by, say, the middle of next week, let me know and I’ll send again.

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Mark Trail, 10/22/11

WELL I GUESS WE ALL FEEL KIND OF SILLY NOW, don’t we? Yes, Mountie and Mother McQueen aren’t just living in paranoid fear that someone will stumble upon their bible banding operation; they’re living in paranoid fear that someone will stumble upon their Eden-like valley, where they’ve convinced all the animals to live in harmony with one another (if by “all the animals” we mean ducks, moose, and beaver), using some combination of divine favor, perverted science, and devil magic. Obviously the bible bands are some key part of the mysterious process by which this miraculous scene was created, with the possibility that the geese would bring visitors to see the Canadian Neo-Eden being only a harmful side effect, not the actual purpose of the banding. Anyway, with this shockingly insane revelation, this storyline has just gone from “enh” to “wow,” and will shoot all the way up to “holy moly” if Mark ends up punching someone in the face.

The bright green water in this scene indicates that algae may also be among the organisms forced into pan-biological harmony by the McQueens’ eerie witchery.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 10/22/11

I’m glad to see that Hootin’ Holler’s grinding poverty will now be the source of this strip’s humor, rather than just its unsettling background. Today, we learn that the Smifs are too poor to afford cheese, ha ha!

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So ends the Fall 2011 Comics Curmudgeon Fundraiser — thank you one and all for your generosity and/or patience. GOOSETRAX will remain up into November for all your extended goose-tracking requirements, and you can check for fundraising banners you might have missed here.

Dick Tracy, 10/15/11

Dick Tracy is running a retrospective — a perfect excuse to revisit classic villains and antique themes like this “woman in peril” sequence featuring Tracy’s wife-to-be, Tess Trueheart. Why can’t we see stuff like this in other “new-old” throwback strips? I’m lookin’ at you, For Better or For Worse.

Apartment 3-G, 10/15/11

OK, Lu Ann here has parents and a torch-carrying childhood sweetheart (Cody Stiles, indistinguishable down to the neckerchief from cousin Blaze) back in South Dakota. We haven’t seen the mother lately; her relationship with her father is “complex”, but — like Lu Ann herself — only in the sense that it’s incoherent. Meanwhile, her Texas cousin Ruby seems to have forgotten that Lu Ann is no novice at this wedding business — Powers is her name from a marriage to a Vietnam-era fighter pilot who died in combat. Maybe Ruby doesn’t pay any more attention to Lu Ann than anybody else does?

Mark Trail, 10/15/11

Andy, unheard, is saying, “When Kelly Welly is the brains of your outfit, it’s time to find a new outfit.”

Rex Morgan, M.D., 10/15/11

Her improbably-coiffed swain may have kept Kelly waiting, but like a gentleman took the time and trouble to steal a car suitable for a lady. And now: POOL PARTY!!!

Mark Trail’s Greatest Hits – a Fall Fundraiser special, part 6

Mark Trail — 3/24, 3/25, and 10/22/10

This concludes Mark Trail’s Greatest Hits — until next time. Lordy, that duck’s the size of a Cessna.

— Uncle Lumpy