LINDSAY SELBY: The Kikiyaon, real or imaginary?

The Kikiyaon is a cryptid reported in the Gambia, Africa. It is said to resemble a man-sized owl. Described as having feathers and wings (some say a 20-foot/ 6.5 metres wingspan) with a large spur or spike on its shoulders, and clawed feet. Sometimes it is referred to as the soul cannibal or soul-eater. The creature smells like a rotting snake and has strange: cries either a deep-throated grunting or a scream like a man being strangled. It is a forest-dweller where it awaits its prey: man. It is deadly, being able to outrun a man, and swoops down to grab a person.

The description may also refer to the Sasabonsam, a sort of vampire similarly described in the local myths. Bernard Heuvelmans (1986) discussed a case of an Ashanti carving seen by J.B. Danquah. It depicted the Sasabonsam as human-faced with horns. It had two short arms and bat-like wings. A young man apparently told Danquah that a Sasabonsam had been killed by Agya Wuo, a local man in 1928. He described the creature as about 5 feet tall (1.8metres) with a 20-foot (6.5metres) wingspan, and said that it was spotted black and white. The body was taken to the home of the District Commissioner, L.W. Wood on February 22 1928 where it was photographed. However, when contacted Wood was not sure about taking a photograph and said he had been there in 1918, not 1928. Heuvelmans states that the Sasabonsam is probably a kongamato, a large bat reported in the area.

As these creatures are also said to appear in dreams and hallucinations and be conjured up by witches, it is difficult to know if there is any truth in the stories. Those who see it and live are supposed to die a lingering death from a strange illness; that’s if they don’t die of shock first. The creatures seem to be both real and ghost-like to the local people. The 'real' version could be a giant bat or bird as speculated by Heuvelmans, which may be rare or unknown. Pels fishing owl (Scotopelia peli) comes out at night to fish in slow-moving rivers, swooping down from the trees, and it is brown-spotted. Its cry has been described as sounding like "a lost soul falling down a bottomless pit.” This may account for some of the sounds heard that are said to be the Kikiyaon.

Heuvelmans, B. 1986. Annotated checklist of apparently unknown animals with which cryptozoology is concerned. Cryptozoology 5, 1-26.

RICHARD FREEMAN: The Howick Falls Monster Hoax

There are many legends of dragon like creatures in Africa. I have investigated the Ninki-Nanka of The Gambia, a crested, giant serpent associated with rainfall. It is much feared and blamed for death and accidents even to this day. The beast is supposedly able to strike a man dead just by looking at him. Bridges swept away by rainfall and road accidents have been blamed on the Ninki-Nanka. I even heard of a whole village that was abandoned after one such creature was seen.

In lake Kariba we have Nyaminyami. This serpentine dragon god was known to natives of Rhodesia and Zambia since time in memorial. It was seen as a guardian spirit of the waters. During the construction of the Kariba dam that formed Lake Kariba, workmen were warned of he water god’s wrath. In 1958 the Nyaminyami was blamed the destruction of a large portion of the dam wall. A female supposedly ventured up the Zambezi River during a particularly bad dry season. Whilst upstream she was cut off by the construction of the dam. Workers reported seeing a large, dark object beneath the surface of the river just before the dam shuddered with a massive impact.

Huge cracks ran up the walls of the dam and part of it collapsed sending workers to their deaths in the water.

When the rainy season arrived a male was supposed to have smashed a hole in the dam freeing the female and a brood of young. Some however, allegedly remained in the lake.

One of he best know of these African dragons is he Inkanyamba of South Africa. This creature has a horse like head and a long serpentine body. Legends say that when looking for a mate an Inkanyamba will fly into he clouds. When angry they can create storms much like Asian dragons. The storms that ravaged Greytown, Ingwavuma and Pongola were blamed on Inkanyamba. The storms had tennis ball sized hailstones and 52 mile per hour winds. It made 2000 people homeless. There are even cave paintings of he horse headed serpent hat archeologists have dubbed ‘the rain animal’. It has horns on its head and a crest on its back. It is often depicted as spewing water from its mouth.

Local Zulus and hair Sangomas (witch doctors) sacrifice goats and chickens to the water god. I is also said to eat the bodies of those who drown in the falls. Over thirty years ago he Inkanyamba was blamed for the death of a Zulu girl further up river at another falls. She was playing with her friends beside the river when she was pulled under and vanished. Of course this may have been a crocodile.

Sightings of these creatures still occur from time to time.

In 1962 a Conservation Services Ranger, Mr. Buthelezi saw one on a sand bank whilst walking along the Umgein River near the Midmar Dam. It slithered off the bank as he and a friend approached.

Johannes Hlongwane was the caretaker of a caravan park near Howick Falls between 1969 and 1985. He saw the Inkanyamba twice, once in 1971 and again in 1981. It raised its head and neck thirty feet out of the water. It had a crest running along its back.

In April 2000 reports began to circulate of a monstrous snake like beast in the community of Ezitapile in South Africa’s Eastern Cape. Captain Mpofana Skwatsha of the Aliwal North police reported hat livestock became agitated when the creature was at large. It was described as yellow, with a horse like head and a body as thick as a twenty quart barrel.

The only known photograph hat purports to show Inkanyamba was taken in the wake of a sighting local man Bob Teeny in September 1995. Whilst on a viewing platform beside the falls he claimed to have seen a snake like head and neck rear up out of the water. He had no camera at the time but put up a reward for anyone who could take a snapshot of the monster. A resulting picture showed a long necked animal, apparently rising from the water. It appears to be holding waterweed in its mouth and has a distinctive banding of the skin. As soon as I saw the picture I knew it was a hoax. How? I recognized the ‘monster’ as an illustration of an Apatosaurus from a children’s book of dinosaurs published in the 1970s. I had the book myself; in fact the same picture had been used in two children’s books. Whilst recently rummaging around in a pile of old books in my grandparent’s house in came upon one of the books.

He tome in question is called ‘Know Our World; Prehistoric Life’ published by Holywell House Press in 1977 and printed and bound in Italy by New Interlitho, Milan. The picture in question appears at the bottom of page 14 and shows the dinosaur (then erroneously known as brontosaurus) wallowing in water and eating water weed (also erroneous as these creatures lived on land).
Posted above are two versions of the Howick Fall photo. One darker, one lighter. And on the left is the illustration from the book. Though the picture has been reversed you can clearly see it is the same image. The head and neck have been superimposed on to the water. Look closely and you will see the waterweed in the ‘monster’s’ mouth and the banding on the neck (meant to be rings on muscle in the original illustration).

Inkanyamba and its ilk my well exist but this is not a photograph of one.

THE SQUIRMING PESTILENCE

Townspeople in Belefanai, Liberia reported a noise like the sound of heavy rain cascading down through the leaves. It was caterpillar droppings. Millions upon millions of the creatures were writhing around in the trees. In early January, when the long, black caterpillars reached the creeks that serve as the main water sources for the town of Belefanai in north-central Liberia, the creatures' faeces instantly turned streams dark and undrinkable.

Moving through the forest canopy on webs, devouring the leaves as they went, the caterpillars advanced like nothing the townspeople had ever seen. They ate food and cash crops—coffee, cocoa, citrus, plantain, banana, and cassava. They took over homes and people fled. Venturing into the forest meant being hit by a wave of caterpillars that appeared to be moving forward about as fast as the average person walks.

"The worms would drop on you from all angles," said Moses M. Kolinmore, a mason who arrived in Belefanai just as townspeople realized they had to get word to the government. "They would cover the whole ground—thousands upon thousands of thick, strong, stubborn worms. It was fearful, very fearful."

The outbreak, which began in December in a remote, forested region of Guinea just over the border from Belefanai, has affected an estimated half million people in more than a hundred towns and villages, prompting the Liberian government to declare a state of emergency.

This week entomologists identified the insect as a moth with a name only scientists had heard before: Achaea catocaloides. Government officials and international experts are searching for a strategy to control the outbreak, which threatens to spread because first -generation Achaea caterpillars are dropping to the ground and turning into pupae, then moths.

The moths can fly long distances—up to 620 miles (1,000 kilometers) if the winds are right—and then lay eggs that will hatch into still more caterpillars. Each moth not killed will lay 500 to 1,000 eggs and start the cycle again. Johnson Nyelartah, a teacher in Belefanai, said townspeople are bracing for another worm invasion, "It is our fear that these butterflies will multiply into more than we had before," he said.

One cause for optimism: The caterpillars and moths are dry-season pests, and Liberia's dry season should last only another month or so, experts say. "We are hoping the rains will end the outbreak," said J. Qwelibo Subah, director general of Liberia's Central Agricultural Research Institute (CARI), who is coordinating the response to the infestation.

In the interim, the Ministry of Agriculture is scrambling for solutions.

Fifty-five field staff are scouting for concentrations of the caterpillars and moths, spraying them with pesticide from the ground and collecting and burning the pupae in their cocoons. Farmers have been setting slow-burning fires in leaf litter to smoke caterpillars out of trees and incinerate them. Because the caterpillar infests wide areas so rarely, scientists have not researched a way to safely and selectively kill large numbers of Achaea catocaloides.

If all other measures fail, Subah said, he would not rule out aerial spraying, even though UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) officials have advised against the technique, because it would kill many other species and further contaminate open water supplies. "We are considering all options," Subah said. No one is sure what turned Achaea catocaloides—one of the most common moths across central and West Africa—into a nightmarish plague in Liberia's forest.

It could have been the weather, experts say. During the dry season, a strong wind called the harmattan blows from the Sahara across West Africa. Perhaps in late 2008, this wind picked up Achaea catocaloides moths and then deposited a large concentration along the Guinea-Liberia border. Or perhaps there was an unnoticed local increase in Achaea catocaloides numbers and, when the temperature was right, the population exploded, said Gregory Tarplah, an entomologist with Liberia's Ministry of Agriculture.

Whatever happened, once the caterpillars emerged in great numbers they needed an expanded food supply. They turned from eating their favorite food, the Dahoma tree, to eating most any tree in their path. And they began to migrate in search of more.