Weird Animals - Och Aye The Roo!

The week saw the publication of the 2010 Eden Wildlife Report, which tracks the numbers of foreign species introduced to the UK over the past century. Compiled by Dr. Toni Bunnell and a team from the University of Hull, the report mentions wallabies thriving in Scotland, scorpions setting up home in Kent and aardvarks that have somehow emigrated from Brazil to Cumbria (Telegraph).

Of course, this won’t be news to one member of Britain’s thriving rod-fishing community, who this week caught a piranha in his local pond (Guardian).

Another place you might not expect to see exotic creatures is on your lunch menu, but that didn’t stop one restaurant owner in Mesa, AZ from putting “lion burgers” on the menu to celebrate soccer’s World Cup. Cameron Selogie of the Il Vinaio makes his “mane course” with genuine lion meat imported from South Africa, earning him the ire of local animal rights groups and several death threats, but not a reprimand from health officials. According to an FDA spokesman serving lion meat is perfectly legal, as long as it’s not roar (Scotsman).

Slightly luckier than the lions, one cat who has fallen on his feet is Oscar, a housecat from the Isle of Jersey in the UK, widely billed as the “bionic cat” after successfully receiving two artificial hind legs to replace the ones he lost in an altercation with a combine harvester (BBC News).

You might think pitting a rodent like mammal against a 12 tonne Triceratops makes for an equally one-sided match up, but evidence emerged recently that our primitive ancestors occasionally feasted upon dinosaurs. Seventy-five million year old “gnaw marks” of a kind characteristic of early mammals, and belonging to a creature not much bigger than a squirrel, have been found on the fossil bones both of Tricerotops and the crocodile-like predator Champsosaurus (LiveScience).

Sadly today the nearest we get to dinosaur flesh is turkey or chicken, but not all birds were prized solely for their meat. The huia bird of New Zealand for example, was once used to make the feathered head-dresses of Maori chiefs, until predation from accidentally introduced species drove it to extinction around 1907. But if the bird has gone its feathers have not, and one recently became the most expensive feather ever when it sold at auction for NZ$8000, i.e. $4000 American (Telegraph).



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Posted By: Dumbfounded - Mon Jun 28, 2010 - Comments (4)
Category: Aliens, Animals, Dinosaurs and Other Extinct Creatures, Cryptozoology, Food, Overpriced Merchandise, Pets, Cats, Rants, Warnings, Jeremiads, Prophecies and Cassandra-like Figures, Science, Violence, 1980s

Cornify

Is the news getting you down? Then why not visit the Cornify page, where you can brighten up any gloomy photo? See how I've made the BP Oil Spill contamination look more cheerful?

Posted By: Paul - Wed May 26, 2010 - Comments (4)
Category: Cryptozoology, Kitsch and Collectibles, Internet

The Jackalope

This Austin, TX, bar sounds like my kind of place. Any WU reader ever been there?

Posted By: Paul - Wed Nov 25, 2009 - Comments (3)
Category: Cryptozoology, Fictional Monsters, Recreation, Regionalism, Alcohol, Eating

A Little Light Weirdness - 5

They say news travels fast, but in the speed stakes it can’t hold a candle to dumb. Circling the blogosphere like an angry Superman is news that security guard Jason Cooke has managed to sight the Loch Ness monster on Google Earth. The object, which Cooke claims exactly matches the descriptions of Nessie, is clearly visible as a quadrupedal, long-necked plesiosaur-like creature, and in no way could be the wake behind a boat or anything mundane like that. This latest find comes as a relief to many cryptozoologists, who had expressed concerns that the dearth of recent sightings might mean Nessie had fallen victim to Global Warming (Telegraph).

Or perhaps this is simply proof that Scottish universities have got the jump on their transatlantic counterparts? In a move nearly, but not quite, totally unlike Jurassic Park, Professor Hans Larsson of McGill University in Montreal has announced that he hopes to de-evolve chickens back into their dinosaur ancestors. Larsson stressed that he is not aiming to recreate whole dinosaurs at this time, but by switching on or off certain genes in chick embryos he hopes to induce atavistic dinosaur anatomy in the full grown animals (AFP).



More in extended >>

Posted By: Dumbfounded - Wed Aug 26, 2009 - Comments (12)
Category: Animals, Ceremonies, Weddings, Contests, Races and Other Competitions, Cryptozoology, Fictional Monsters, Fairs, Amusement Parks, and Resorts, Geography and Maps, Inebriation and Intoxicants, Nature, Science, Experiments, Surrealism

The Shaggs

Here's an oldie-but-goodie from the catalog of weird music: MY PAL FOOT-FOOT, by the Shaggs.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Jul 05, 2009 - Comments (4)
Category: Cryptozoology, Fictional Monsters, Family, Music, 1960s

Bigfoot Prefers Garlic Cloves, Not Powdered

I could expect this on certain channels, or in tabloids. But not The National Geographic Channel! The interesting part starts at about 0:43 and goes to 6:00.

Posted By: qualityleashdog - Fri May 15, 2009 - Comments (4)
Category: Cryptozoology, Hoaxes and Imposters and Imitators, Anthropology

Florida Skunk Ape

Who knew that Chuck's state boasted its own Bigfoot, in the form of the Florida Skunk Ape?

Posted By: Paul - Thu Apr 16, 2009 - Comments (5)
Category: Cryptozoology, Regionalism

Porky in Wackyland

As you're eating your Easter Ham, what better cartoon icon to think of than Porky Pig!

Posted By: Paul - Sun Apr 12, 2009 - Comments (2)
Category: Cryptozoology, Pop Art, Surrealism, Cartoons

American Monsters

I enjoyed visiting the American Monsters site, a resource for cryptozoologists.

But I regret that when I visited Crater Lake in Oregon, its scaly inhabitant was not showing himself.

Posted By: Paul - Sun Nov 16, 2008 - Comments (2)
Category: Cryptozoology, Fictional Monsters, Movies, 1970s

The Elves of Iceland

Maybe the Icelandic banking meltdown can be remedied with pots of elvish gold.

Posted By: Paul - Mon Nov 10, 2008 - Comments (6)
Category: Cryptozoology, Fictional Monsters, Eccentrics, New Age, Paranormal, Regionalism, Religion, Foreign Customs, Europe