KARL SHUKER: THE BLACK LION VERSUS TARZAN!

In earlier ShukerNature posts of mine (click here and here), I have revealed that although a number of unconfirmed reports can be found in the archives of cryptozoology, as yet there is no conclusive evidence for the reality of black lions (i.e. lions exhibiting melanism), and that four much-circulated online photographs purporting to be of genuine black lions are nothing more than Photoshopped fakes.

Nevertheless, the very concept of a black lion is so captivating and compelling that it has been utilised very effectively in fiction. Perhaps the most stunning example of this was recently brought to my attention by Facebook friend Sefton Disney, and features a mighty confrontation between a magnificent black lion and a very formidable rival for the crown of African jungle king - Tarzan!

Read on...

KARL SHUKER: THE PANTHER OF GIFFARD'S CROSS – AS SIMPLE AS ABC?...

Excerpted from my impending book, Cats of Magic, Mythology, and Mystery (CFZ Press: Bideford, 2012): 

Several centuries before any of the modern-day specimens had appeared on the scene, an exotic British mystery cat was big news not all that far away from where I live today. Indeed, its case may even be one of the earliest records of a so-called alien big cat (or ABC for short) in Britain that did not involve some unidentifiable feline creature heavily enshrouded in fable and fancy but rather featured a bona fide non-native big cat on the loose. Although certain details differ from one account to another, the basic facts of this historic case in British cryptozoology are as follows.

Read on...

FORTEAN BIRD NEWS FROM THE WATCHER OF THE SKIES (CFZ)

In an article for the first edition of Cryptozoology Bernard Heuvelmans wrote that cryptozoology is the study of 'unexpected animals' and following on from that perfectly reasonable assertion, it seems to us that - whereas the study of out of place birds may not have the glamour of the hunt for bigfoot, or lake monsters - it is still a perfectly valid area for the Fortean Zoologist to be interested in. So, after about six months of regular postings on the main bloggo, Corinna has taken the plunge and started a 'Watcher of the Skies' blog of her own as part of the CFZ Bloggo Network.

• High-Speed Video and Artificial Flowers Shed Light...
• A warning for backyard bird watchers
• Bird smashes through windshield of Nantucket-bound...
• Birds descended from gliding dinosaurs — evidence ...
• Rare bird eggs found on beach
• New Strain of Bird Virus Sweeps Across Britain

DALE DRINNON: Igor Burtsev, Cedar and Willow, Benny's Blog

New at the Frontiers of Zoology:
http://frontiersofz

oology.blogspot.com/2012/11/urgent-message-from-igor-burtsev.html

The Cedar and Willow blog on Raquel Welch as Red Sonja just came out:

http://cedar-and-willow.blogspot.com/2012/11/origins-of-red-sonja.html
And 
Benny just published another blog item dovetailing with my blog:
http://bennypdrinnon.blogspot.com/2012/11/captain-america-and-sharon-carter.html

ANDREW MAY: Words from the Wild Frontier

News and stories from the remoter fringes of the CFZ blogosphere...

From Nick Redfern's World of Whatever:

• The Weirder Side of Cryptozoology — Monster Diary: When Mysteries Collide...
• The Legacy of the Red Lion — A YA novel with a cryptozoological tinge...
• A British Bigfoot: In Kent — Recent sightings of the Kentish Apeman...

From CFZ Canada:

• Bigfoot Doesn't Live Next Door — The New York Department of Environmental Conservation has made an official pronouncement...

I'M YER GONZO BLOG DOO-DAH MAN

Life is not particularly easy at the moment, but I hope that next week will bring some light to the end of the tunnel. In the meantime my fervent apologies to everyone who has been ignored in the computer problems of the last few days. There are all sorts of groovy things in the pipeline, however, and all will be made clear in the fullness of time...

We start off today with another visit to Thom the World Poet

http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/thom-world-poet-daily-poem_24.html

My generation, which basically means anybody born between 1940 and 1970, have a completely different relationship to music than have the people who came before us, or indeed, the generations who came afterwards.  For us, music was a call to social and intellectual revolution and pushed an entirely different set of buttons than it did to other generations.I cannot help but wonder why.  

http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/talking-about-my-generation.html

Has anyone heard of this? I was pootling about on Spotify this morning when I saw an Eric Burdon album with a release date of 2012. So I checked it out. And I found....nothing at all.

http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-eric-burdon-mystery.html

Martin Stephenson and the Daintees are back in Darwen

http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/link-martin-stephenson-and-daintees.html

A great review of the Move DVD in our acclaimed 'Lost Broadcasts' series.

http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/review-of-move-dvd.html

A great new Hawkwind Digital Magazine

http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/check-this-out-boys-and-girls-hawkwind.html

The Gonzo Daily is a two way process. If you have any news or want to write for us, please contact me at jon@eclipse.co.uk. If you are an artist and want to showcase your work, or even just say hello please write to me at gonzo@cfz.org.uk. Please copy, paste and spread the word about this magazine as widely as possible. We need people to read us in order to grow, and as soon as it is viable we shall be invading more traditional magaziney areas. Join in the fun, spread the word, and maybe if we all chant loud enough we CAN stop it raining. See you tomorrow...

 

The Gonzo Daily is - as the name implies - a daily online magazine (mostly) about artists connected to the Gonzo Multimedia group of companies. But it also has other stuff as and when the editor feels like it. The Editor is an old hippy of 53 who - together with his orange cat - puts it all together from a converted potato shed in a tumbledown cottage deep in rural Devon. He is ably assisted by his lovely wife Corinna, his bulldog/boxer Prudence, and a motley collection of social malcontents. Plus.. did we mention the orange cat?

OLL LEWIS: Yesterday's News Today

http://cryptozoologynews.blogspot.com/

On this day in 1991 Freddie Mercury died.

And now the news:

The Paleo-Diet: Dinosaurs Lose Weight in New Study...

Campaign to rid Galapagos of 180,000,000 rats is l...

Mystery Molelike Mammal Survived Dino Extinction

New Species Sit on Museum Shelves for 21 Years

Great apes may have 'mid-life crisis', a study sug...

Another huge seizure of ivory in Hong Kong – 4th i...

Borneo will probably lose 50% of its orang-utans

Fourth Critically Endangered Red wolf killed in No...

The last song Freddie Mercury sang with Queen, recorded just days before his death:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qcd_DW9Qhg

CRYPTOLINK: Endangered indeed: Bigfoot on the run from, presumably, heartless state bureaucrats.

What is with these small-minded state bureaucrats? The founder of the Chautauqua Lake Bigfoot Expo in the western corner of the state – the heart of New York’s Bigfoot country — asked the Department of Environmental Conservation to ban the hunting of the furry hominid.
But despite the species’ obvious status as endangered – not to mention the impact on the upstate economy if New York’s Bigfeet were to be hunted to extinction — the state declined to act, reports Capitol Tonight NY.
“No program or action in relation to mythical animals is warranted,” the department’s chief wildlife biologist, Gordon Batcheller, wrote to the citizen, Peter Wiemer of Maywood.

Mr. Batcheller’s missive would seem to put to rest, at least from the state’s point of view, Mr. Wiemer’s claim that because Bigfoot is not on New York’s official list of animals that may be hunted, it is automatically protected.

Read on...