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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Unlike some of our competitors we are not going to try and blackmail you into donating by saying that we won't continue if you don't. That would just be vulgar, but our lives, and those of the animals which we look after, would be a damn sight easier if we receive more donations to our fighting fund. Donate via Paypal today...




Friday, October 17, 2014

TODAY'S BIG CAT NEWS

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 are publishing a regular round-up of the stories as they come in. 

The worldwide mystery cat phenomenon (or group of phenomena, if we are to be more accurate) is not JUST about cryptozoology. At its most basic level it is about the relationship between our species and various species of larger cat. That is why sometimes you will read stories here that appear to have nothing to do with cryptozoology but have everything to do with human/big cat interaction. As committed Forteans, we believe that until we understand the nature of these interactions, we have no hope of understanding the truth that we are seeking.



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  • BIGFOOT NEWS IN BRIEF



    The Kentucky Bigfoot Vocalizations (Video)
    “The Kentucky Vocalizations” are recorded sounds that some Bigfoot researchers think are being made by Bigfoot. The vocalizations were recorded at 

    Yakima Bigfoot Round-Up 2014, Sasquatch Revealed Exhibit
    Henry May is a huge Bigfoot enthusiast. He has studies the Sasquatch phenomenon for many years and attends as many Bigfoot events as he can.

    Osceola News-Gazette

    Guests go ape at Gatorland. Has Bigfoot's cousin really been found at the theme park?
    Now, in apparently, the latest lost footage documentary, sort of, the notorious Skunk Ape of Florida (think Big Foot, only stinkier) is apparently making ...

    History: Was that Sasquatch?
    So what was it — Bigfoot? Sasquatch? Yeti? Or was it merely a lonely, really short resident whose razor blades had gotten too dull to work. Crazy you ...

    Bob Gimlin Is a Legend
    In 1967, Patterson and Gimlin filmed what they claimed was a real encounter with a Bigfoot along a creek in Northern California. The controversial 

    FORTEAN BIRD NEWS FROM THE WATCHER OF THE SKIES

    What has Corinna's column of fortean bird news got to do with Cryptozoology?

    Well, everything actually!

    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.





    WEIRD WEEKEND 2014: Friday Night Part Two



    Published on Sep 16, 2014
    The Weird Weekend is the biggest predominantly cryptozoological conference in the English Speaking World, and has been presented every year since 2000. The 15th Weird Weekend, was held on the third weekend of August 2014, at the Small School in Hartland. The whole event is being posted on CFZtv.

    * Ronan's Birthday Cake
    * Shoshannah McCarthy: Some Cryptozoological creatures from a veterinary perspective
    * Ronan Coghlan: Bogus Bibles

    THE GONZO BLOG DOO DAH MAN DUCKING AND DIVING INNIT

    The Gonzo Daily - Friday
    Yesterday was a pleasant and mildly productive day. Way back in my misspent youth (OK, my late twenties and early thirties) I travelled around this sceptre'd isle with a beat combo called Steve Harley and Cockney Rebel. My first wife and I travelled with them for nearly five years, and during this period made friends with a lanky dude called Roy Weard who was their soundman. Fast forward a quarter of a century and Roy has written a delightfully scurrilous autobiography about his life in the music business working with everyone from Pink Floyd and The Rolling Stones down to Stump. Gonzo are publishing it and I spent much of yesterday with my editor hat firmly wedged upon my cranium.
    Whilst on the subject of new books, Adam Davies' new tome is definitely a good 'un. He writes:  "This book is not a detailed analysis of the various cryptozoology creatures and their respective merits. Please look to researchers such as Craig Woolheater, Loren Coleman or Dr Karl Shuker, Nick Redfern, and the like for that. This book is about how I felt about, and how I reacted to, the situations in which I found myself, while hunting for proof of the existence of animals unrecognised by science. Some of my adventures were exciting, some amusing and some dangerous, but all are memorable. The expedition with Bryan Sykes and Lori Simmons stands out as one of the most truly bizarre experiences of my life. I find it somewhat ironic that it was not on some mountain top in remote Nepal, or in the deep Sumatran jungle that I was to have the most amazing of my encounters, but rather in the Pacific Northwest of America, not far from a small town."
    Judge Smith, Peter Hammill, Edgar Allan Poe fans, Wings fans, Carl "Blue" Wise fans, Hawkwind fans, Gong fans and all sorts of other people, had better look out! The latest issue of Gonzo Weekly (#99) is available to read at www.gonzoweekly.com, and to download at http://www.gonzoweekly.com/pdf/.
    It has Judge Smith on the cover, and features an article by him about the latest performance of his celebrated opera based on Edgar Allan Poe's "The Fall of the House of Usher". There is also an interview with him about it. But there's more! We have an interview with Carl "Blue" Wise about Denny Laine, Wings, Joey Molland, Badfinger and playing alongside some of the sopul stars of Stax records (amongst other things). Doug Harr goes to see King Crimson, and Jon asks whether repackaging and remixing and remastering music is morally acceptable. The new album by Aphex Twin is critiqued and there are exclusive words Hunter Ayling is backstage at Hawkwind's Hawkoktoberfest. There are also new shows from the multi-talented Neil Nixon at Strange Fruit and from M Destiny at Friday Night Progressive, and the massively talented Jaki and Tim are back with their submarine and Maisie the cow. There is a new show from Canterbury Sans Frontières, but sadly it will be the last for a while. There is also a collection of more news, reviews, views, interviews and doves making coos (OK, no musical members of the Columbinidae, but I got carried away with things that rhymed with OOOOS) than you can shake a stick at. And the best part is IT's ABSOLUTELY FREE!!!
    Read the previous few issues of Gonzo Weekly:

    All issues from #70 can be downloaded at www.gonzoweekly.com if you prefer. If you have problems downloading, just email me and I will add you to the Gonzo Weekly dropbox. The first 69 issues are archived there as well. Information is power chaps, we have to share it!
    You can download the magazine in pdf form HERE:
    http://www.gonzoweekly.com/pdf/

    *  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: www.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 54 who - together with an infantile orange cat named after a song by Frank Zappa 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 infantile orange cat?

    NEWS FROM NOWHERE - Friday




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  • AND TO WHISTLE WHILE YOU WORK... (Music that may have some relevance to items also on this page, or may just reflect my mood on the day)