WELCOME TO THE CFZ BLOG NETWORK: COME AND JOIN THE FUN

Half a century ago, Belgian Zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans first codified cryptozoology in his book On the Track of Unknown Animals.

The Centre for Fortean Zoology (CFZ) are still on the track, and have been since 1992. But as if chasing unknown animals wasn't enough, we are involved in education, conservation, and good old-fashioned natural history! We already have three journals, the largest cryptozoological publishing house in the world, CFZtv, and the largest cryptozoological conference in the English-speaking world, but in January 2009 someone suggested that we started a daily online magazine! The CFZ bloggo is a collaborative effort by a coalition of members, friends, and supporters of the CFZ, and covers all the subjects with which we deal, with a smattering of music, high strangeness and surreal humour to make up the mix.

It is edited by CFZ Director Jon Downes, and subbed by the lovely Lizzy Bitakara'mire (formerly Clancy), scourge of improper syntax. The daily newsblog is edited by Corinna Downes, head administratrix of the CFZ, and the indexing is done by Lee Canty and Kathy Imbriani. There is regular news from the CFZ Mystery Cat study group, and regular fortean bird news from 'The Watcher of the Skies'. Regular bloggers include Dr Karl Shuker, Dale Drinnon, Richard Muirhead and Richard Freeman.The CFZ bloggo is updated daily, and there's nothing quite like it anywhere else. Come and join us...

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Friday, April 12, 2013

TODAY'S BIG CAT NEWS ROUNDUP

The hunt for British Big Cats attracts far more newspaper-column inches than any other cryptozoological subject. There are so many of them now that we feel that they should be archived by us in some way, so we should have a go at publishing a regular round-up of the stories as they come in. In September 2012 Emma Osborne decided that the Mystery Cat Study Group really deserved a blog of its own within the CFZ Blog Network.


  • US SIGHTINGS: Pet cat masquerades as 'mountain lio...
  • NEWSLINK: Domestic Little Cats Acting Like Wild Bi...
  • NEWSLINK: Argentina's Lujan Zoo Stirs Controversy ...
  • NEWSLINK: 'Tiger Tiger' coming, watch out!
  • UK SIGHTINGS: The beast of West Dorset seen again
  • NEWSLINK: Tiger eaters! Trend dangerous for the bi...
  • UK SIGHTINGS: New Cross woman 'freaked out' after ...
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    DALE DRINNON: Lake Champlain/Ohio Grassman/Benny's Blogs

    The links were overdue from yesterday due to technical errors.
    New at the Frontiers of Zoology:
    New at Benny's Blog, The Ominous Octopus Omnibus:
    A couple of blog entries have had to be held back and that was what caused the delay. They should go out later today.
    Best Wishes, Dale D.
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    SHERI MYLER THE CFZ INTERN: Day Six


    Sheri Myler, our student who is doing a series of placements with us over the next year or so is back for her second stint. Once again, I am putting her to work and she will be blogging each day about her time here...

    Another day, another crack at Eberhart. We’ve got most of the way through “C” totally finished, pictures, formatting and all. I did some of this on my own, while Jon got on with other, more pressing, things, such as a fag break, but the majority was collaborative.

    There was also a trip out in an attempt to locate some frogspawn. There is a theory that the January frogspawn, being genetically inferior, is supposed to die and, in doing so, leaves more nutrients in place for the later lot of frogspawn. This is potentially the reason that all the frogspawn that the CFZ has attempted to rescue in January always dies.

    While we didn’t actually manage to find any frogspawn, we did see the most amazing rainbow that I have ever seen. It was the full rainbow, rather than just one end, and was of the brightest of colours. Living in a city, there is more pollution and buildings in the way of things like this.

    There were considerably less moths about on the cat hunt. However, tonight did up the ante a little with a rat, a vole and finally another badger. Also, Jon did seem to be hallucinating frogs, as he pointed out several that nobody else saw. Perhaps last night’s amphibian antics were still playing on his mind.
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    FORTEAN BIRD NEWS FROM THE WATCHER OF THE SKIES

    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.


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    THE GONZO BLOG DOO-DAH MAN WANTS A POND


    Last night, once again we went for a cruise around Huddisford Woods whilst taking Sheri back to her B&B. The weather is getting warmer, and the smaller prey species are beginning to stir from their thermally imposed seclusion. There were plenty of fogs and toads, quite a few moths, and even a few rodents. The only carnivore we saw was a young badger, but now there are things more readily to eat, I would not be surprised if we start to see more of the larger animals in the next few days. I have come to the conclusion that the tragic events of the weekend were the result of the cold weather. The rabbits and chickens were only killed because there was a dearth of wild edible protein.I received a heft parcel of Gonzo CDs and DVDs yesterday, and am looking forward to perusing them. But none of this has anything to do with what I am supposed to be writing about, so I will shut up.
    Devotees of the Roger Waters story will appreciate that he has just gone to visit his father
    http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2013/04/ant-bee-pure-electric-honey-and-his.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 same team also do a weekly newsletter called - imaginatively - The Gonzo Weekly. Find out about it at this link:     http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/all-gonzo-news-wots-fit-to-print.html

    * We should probably mention here, that some of our posts are links to things we have found on the internet that we think are of interest. We are not responsible for spelling or factual errors in other people's websites. Honest guv!

    *  Jon Downes, the Editor of all these ventures (and several others) is an old hippy of 53 who - together with his orange cat (who is currently on sick leave in Staffordshire) and a not very small orange kitten (who isn't) puts it all together from a converted potato shed in a tumbledown cottage deep in rural Devon which he shares with various fish, and sometimes a small Indian frog. He is ably assisted by his lovely wife Corinna, his bulldog/boxer Prudence, his elderly mother-in-law, and a motley collection of social malcontents. Plus.. did we mention the orange cats?
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    CFZ CANADA: Cryptozoology MVP



    One of the key sticking points that non-believers like to bring up when criticizing Fortean Zoology is that of “Breeding Population”  This is the number of animals which can interbreed freely.  It also would, by definition, allow evolutionary change. In other words, this is the number of males and females of a species that is sufficient to reproduce at a rate that would keep the species from extinction.

    Within the calculation of Breeding Population is something called Minimum viable population (MVP).   This is the lowest number of the population of a species that can survive in the wild. In biology, ecology, and conservation biology, MVP is the smallest possible size at which a biological population can exist without facing extinction from natural disasters or demographic, environmental, or genetic order or plan.  This is usually estimated as the population necessary to ensure between 90 and 95 percent probability of survival between 100 to 1,000 years.

    Read on...


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    OLL LEWIS: Yesterday's News Today

    Yesterday’s News Today
    http://cryptozoologynews.blogspot.com/

    On this day in 1961 Yuri Gagarin became the first man to fly into
    outer space and orbit the Earth.
    And now the news:

  • Der Steppenworm? Two New Species Differ from the E...
  • New species of see through fish discovered in Amaz...
  • Baby orangutan rescued from a sack in Sumatra
  • Amur tiger crosses from Russia into China
  • Early Warning Signs of Population Collapse
  • Goosefish Capture Small Puffins Over Deep Water of...
  • When art becomes a crime - the Jan Fabre case
  • Circus elephant injured in drive-by shooting

    • The USSR's achievement in getting first Sputnik then Gagarin to orbit
    the earth signalled the start of the Space Race, which culminated in
    the Moon landings. Which gives me opertuninty to post a link to a good
    song that mentions the Moon (and it's the guitarists birthday today as
    well, hows that for linking?) :
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX1PwkgwsG0
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