SAMUEL MANASEH: Giant anaconda video

Hello again Jonathan,

I thought that your readers might be interested in the following video that shows two long anacondas in Brazil.

In the first part of the video, Thiago, a Brazilian, happened to capture on his cell phone camera a backhoe lifting an anaconda out of a canal that was being dredged to clean it. This was a few weeks ago.

No one was aware that the anaconda was in the canal. The operator put the bucket in the water, and lo and behold, when he lifted it, there was this anaconda hanging from both sides of the bucket!

Thiago wrote to me that, "from the way we estimate measurements in life everyday," it appeared to be about 9 meters long.

He could be right.

Using the men as references for height for the backhoe, the backhoe could have been 4 meters in height. This is consistent with backhoes sold by companies such as John Deer, Caterpillar and Komatsu, among others, which, indeed, sell backhoes, etc that are over 5 meters in height.

Thiago wrote that the backhoe operator lifted the bucket to its full height, and the anaconda touched the ground on both sides. If one meter of the anaconda was stretched over the mouth of the bucket, it would have an approximate length of (4x2+1)meters = 9 meters.

The second part of the video includes a clip that I was sent when I was requesting more information on anacondas. I was informed that that it is a picture that has been circulating in Brazil since the 1960s, and the snake was said to have been measured at over 12 meters long (3 meters longer than the accepted world record for a snake's length.)

From the angle picture, it is difficult to estimate the length of the snake, but using the people and tractor as a reference, it appears that it would be at least 8 meters.

A very interesting thing about the second snake is that I was informed that it was killed in Mato Grosso, which, as you probably already aware, is the same general geographical location that Colonel Percy Fawcett claimed to have killed a 62 foot (about 18 meters) anaconda.

Here's the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFecQtHsZM8


Cheers!

'GIANT' ANACONDA PICTURE

Recently Lindsay wrote about this photograph of a supposed giant anaconda from Brazil. Both Richard and I had seen the picture before but never in this quality or with the writing on it. However, as Richard writes: 'It's a green anaconda; you can tell from the belly markings. It does look very big but there is nothing to tell you how far away from the camera it is.'

LINDSAY SELBY: The Giant Anaconda

Sucuri Gigante (means giant Anaconda, in South America, the common name for Anaconda is Sucuri), is said to be giant snake that controls the rivers it lives in. There are ancient tales that say it made the Amazon River. Since the discovery of the fossils of Gigantophis garstini, a large snake from the Priabonian age of the Eocene ( about 30 million years ago) that could reach 33 feet (11 metres) in length, and the more recently discovered fossils of Titanoboa cerrejonensis(from about 50-60million years ago) that reached 43 feet (14 metres), there has been some speculation it could actually exist and be an ancestor of the prehistoric creature. There have been supposed sightings of giant snakes in South America for many years .

In 1846 George Gardner wrote about his travels in Brazil. He said he saw a dead giant snake on the lands of a Senhor Lagoeira which was thirty-three feet long.

In 1907 Major Percy Fawcett, explorer, whilst in the Amazon told of two encounters with the Sucuriju gigante. The first mention was when the manager at Yorongas told Fawcett he had killed an anaconda fifty-eight feet long in the Lower Amazon. Then although initially doubtful he has his own encounter:

We were drifting along in the sluggish current not far below the confluence of the Rio Negro when ... there appeared a triangular head and several feet of undulating body. It was a giant anaconda. I sprang for my rifle ... and hardly waiting to aim smashed a .44 soft-nosed bullet into its spine ... As far as it was possible to measure, a length of forty-five feet lay out of the water, and seventeen feet in it, making a total length of sixty-two feet ... A penetrating foetid odour emanated from the snake, probably its breath, which is believed to have a stupefying effect ... The Brazilian Boundary Commission told me of one killed in the Rio Paraguay exceeding eighty feet in length!

In May 1922 Father Victor Heinz saw a monster snake near the town of Obidos, on the shores of the Amazon. He claimed it was nearly eighty feet in length.

In 1923, F.W. Up de Graff reported that an anaconda he had seen lying in the water beneath his canoe measured fifty feet in length.

Father Heinz then had a second encounter in 1929. This, however, was not quite as dramatic. He was at the mouth of the Rio Piaba, near Alemquer, when he saw two large lights appear near the surface of the water. He was told the giant anaconda lived in the area and presumed it was its eyes in the water.

Father Heinz then started collecting stories about the giant snakes. These included the accounts of trader Reymondo Zima who said that in July 1930 he had come across a serpent with glowing eyes in the Rio Jamunda, opposite the town of Faro. In September 1930 Joao Penha claimed to have seen one in the Rio Iguarape. This snake pushed a wall of submerged debris nine hundred feet (300metres) and also had glowing eyes. More recently was the account of Paul Tarvalho, from 1948, again near Faro. He said saw a snake emerge from the water that was about 150 feet (50 metres) long.

Bernard Heuvelmans wrote the about Sucuriju Gigante, saying a skin kept at the Butantan Institute in Brazil was about thirty feet in length. The painter Serge Bonacase told Heuvelmans of an encounter with a Sucuriju that he had in 1947. Bonacase's sighting took place in the swampy area between the Rio Manso and the Rio Cristalino and twenty other men where with him at the time. Bonacase estimated the snake's length at about seventy feet.

The Diario, the newspaper of Pernambuco in Brazil, on January 24, 1948 published a picture with a headline 'Anaconda Weighing 5 Tons.' The picture showed a part of a giant anaconda that was caught by the river. It was said to measure 131 feet (43 metres) long. Four months later another newspaper A Noite Illustrada printed a photograph of a dead anaconda said to be 115 feet (38 metres) long from the photographs, though it was difficult to estimate if that was the actual size.

In 1995 botanist Grace Rebelo dos Santos saw two bluish lights nearly a foot apart when a net became caught on something large and heavy. She cautiously suggested that this might be a giant anaconda. Later the same year she saw a "waterspout" about ten inches tall, and a long, dark shape could be seen underneath it, perhaps another sighting.

So could a snake really be that big? It is possible as snakes have been found 23 feet (about 7.6 metres) long and who is to say that there are not large versions out there. I would love to see one, but not up close! Snakes are fascinating creatures.

For interest some more about Percy Fawcett:

http://www.phfawcettsweb.org/anaconda.htm

RICHARD FREEMAN: Search for the Bull**** Killer

Guest Blogger time for Richard Freeman again. It almost seems silly introducing Richard to you all once again when he makes an appearance as guest blogger several times a week. However, our viewing audience/ readers (whatever you like to call yourselves) is growing so fast that it is certain that some of you missed the last time I introduced him.

Recently Animal Planet was crowing about a premiere documentary called Anaconda: Search of the Bullkiller. I didn’t recognise the title so I tuned in. You may recall some weeks ago I wrote a scathing review of an unbelievably contrived Loch Ness ‘documentary’. Well, the Animal Planet offering was hardly better. The film, which incidentally was several years old, involved a German expedition to Guyana in search of giant anacondas.

The group boasted a remote controlled submarine, car and helicopter, all fitted with cameras. Apparently they also had the technology to measure the size and distance of living things!

After interviewing an old native man whose brother was almost eaten at a remote lake by a huge anaconda we are never told how huge. All throughout the film we are told that you cannot reach the lake on foot. This begs the question of how the native chap and his brother got there. Anyhow, the team intend to use their technology to hunt anacondas around the unapproachable lake.

On the way we are shown footage of a puma hunting a tapir. The two animals are never together in the same shot and are transparently filmed at totally different locations. Also we are told that the group come upon a black caiman. But the animal is already being filmed from the opposite angle when the group’s canoe appears.

The helicopter is tested out and films and measures a five-metre anaconda. The display we are shown looks suspiciously like computer animation rather than a real computer programme. On its next flight the helicopter crashes and is lost. Next they use the tiny submarine. The group panic when it disappears in a lake but lo and behold, there is already a cameraman in the lake to film the sub getting tangled in weeds. A woman from the group dives in to fix it and meets what we are told is an 8 metre anaconda. Judging by the girth it looks closer to 5 metres than eight.

Next two of the group use the remote control car to explore the jungle. And at the height of farce another two try to use a toy monkey suspended over the water to bait a giant anaconda.

Of course these clowns find nothing of consequence. In fact the whole sorry saga looked 100% staged from start to finish.

The CFZ wants to return to Guyana with the help of Damon Corrie to hunt the real giant anaconda. So far we have failed to interest any TV company in sponsoring us so when this shit befouls our screens it is all the more galling.

THE GIANT SNAKE EXPEDITION FINAL REPORT

http://www.cfz.org.uk/beta/Warner%20Expedition%20Report.pdf

"Here is the report we promised with our theories on the snake found at the Napo/ Amazon, which you may make available through CFZ. This is for discussion purposes and does not yet have a complete index of references. However, the conclusions made are based on the evidence and research material in our possession (some of which has already been released through CFZ). Mike & Greg Warner"

We are publishing this with no further comment from us. It is in *.pdf format, which means that you will need to have Adobe Acrobat reader to open it. If you are using a version earlier than v.9, right click on the link above and 'save as' to save it to your computer.

Greg also writes that "I haven't had time to export the video to a suitable format yet but I'll work on this over the next couple of days."

PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE STORY: TWO LETTERS

Yesterday I posted a story about the implications of the Peruvian "Giant Snake" and described some of the less pleasant aspects of the reaction that the story and the CFZ have been getting. I received two important letters in reply. The first was from Mike and Greg Warner:

Jon,

I see by your post today that you are taking some abuse over the release of this data (it's being directed at us too). My dad and I release you from our gentleman's agreement to save you any further grief. Let us know and we will respect your decision. My dad's away this weekend and we can't release our findings until next week anyway and then we're finished with this process. I know you disagree with us but I hope that we can make you "happy by proving you wrong" one day. We are now working with scientists who see some merit in the data we have released and some TV producers have approached us following our story breaking in the papers a few weeks ago.

Kind regards

Greg & Mike

This only served to confirm what I have been saying from the beginning: Greg and Mike are decent fellows, with whom it is a pleasure and a privilege to be associated. I wrote back telling them that I wouldn't dream of it; that a deal is a deal and that if I backed out merely because some idiots within the cryptozoological community delight in name-calling and ridicule, then the bully boys would have won and that this was the antithesis of what the CFZ is all about.

My second letter was from David "Geordie Dave" Curtis, a reprobate who currently does CFZery in Co Durham. It read:

Dear Jon,

Regarding those accusations that you are in the pay of the government.: I thought everybody knew that you are in fact Agent Q and you and Richard regularly fly to Seaham in your black helicopter to play Swingball and drink Pimms with the 3 aliens I keep captive in my shed in the back garden.

Regards Davy.C

P.S The Doctor says I am getting much better and maybe allowed out by myself next month if I am a good lad and take my medication.

I wrote back and told him that he was an idiot, but nonetheless a loveable one....

THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE EXPEDITION DATA - THURSDAY

"Coordinates for these images are at 72 37' 45"w, 3 23' 48"s. The video we will release will confirm our theories about a large reptile making major and minor channels and the existence of the enormous snake shape at the Napo/Amazon confluence. We believe we can prove that this shape has moved locations in recent years. Greg & Mike Warner."

PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE - DATA INTERPRETATION FROM A BLOGGO READER

Bloggo reader Jason Pratt has sent this: his interpretation of one of the recent sets of data released by the Peruvian giant snake expedition. He writes:

"As I noted, this isn't enough to resolve anything, pro or con, but it ought to be helpful for readers. JRP"

THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE EXPEDITION DATA - WEDNESDAY

"This is an artist's impression of the Minhocao which matches the descriptions found in our research. I would like you to examine this picture and then compare it with our expedition shot (Image 317) of the creature in the channel. Consider a head and body partially submerged.

It is our theory that the Minhocao (which was considered to be a giant earthworm) is the same creature as the Sachamama. We believe that this animal exists at the Napo/Amazon confluence and is capable of burrowing under the ground.

Tomorrow we will release satellite and video evidence that shows two (almost identical) shapes in two different locations at the Napo/Amazon confluence, which we believe are caused by this creature. Mike & Greg Warner, 16th June 2009."

Mike and Greg also asked us to back-link to this comment from Dale Drinnon which was made on June 9th..

DALE DRINNON WRITES:This Sachamama stuff is more than a decade old in Peru and Karl Shuker had an article in FATE about it while that magazine was still in its old, large-size format. Shuker wrote about the Sachamama in 1999-2000 (The FATE article being "Close Encounters of the Cryptozoological Kind" in 2000, following a few in the Fortean Times) and he was connecting it to the Minhocao then but what was being described was a giant snake similar to the current reports. The stories began hitting the news suddenly in the 1990s and were an odd mixture of Sucuriju Gigante and Minhocao features but identified as another different and local cryptid, the "Snail Demon" or "Snake-with- a-shell," Sachamama. It is evidently depicted on Chimu artwork. Karl Shuker did identify it with the Minhocao and he did think it was a gigantic caecilian. It has an entry in Eberhart's Mysterious Creatures.

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/sage-of-peruvian-giant-snake-2.html

INDEX TO PREVIOUS STORIES

Monday's data release
Tuesday's data release


And here are links to some of the earlier bloggo stories on the subject

1. The original story printed by us
2. The plot thickens
3. South American newspapers which claim a titanic snake trashed a woman's house
4. Greg Warner asks Dr Chris Clark a question
5. Dale Drinnon comments
6. We finally release the pictures
7. We try to smooth over the rift with Andre Issi
8. Glen Vaudrey writes
9. Andre Issi and the anaconda


Editor's Note: I still don't get this and am unable to see any trace of a giant snake in these pictures. However, in the interests of free speech and openness, I shall continue to release the remainder of the Warners' data each day. I shall also continue to publish all comments; good and bad; that are non-abusive. However, I would like to stress that whilst the CFZ and I, personally, have every respect for Mike and Greg, and are pleased that we have managed to provide a forum for them to release their material, we do not endorse it and at present, have not seen enough evidence for us to support their theories.

THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE EXPEDITION DATA - TUESDAY

I have given Greg and Mike Warner the chance to present the remaining data from their expedition and over the next few days they will be doing just that in their own words.

This is the second satellite photo of the Napo/Amazon Confluence. If you look in the smaller of the two forked channels you will see an anaconda, which I believe to be of similar proportions to the one in the Morona Cocha incident 2 weeks ago near Iquitos, Peru.

For those of you who are latecomers to the saga, here are links to some of the earlier parts. It is our intention to release a report at the end of the week, when all the data is out, with our theories, conclusions and recommendations from the expedition." Mike Warner

Monday's data release


And here are links to some of the earlier bloggo stories on the subject

1. The original story printed by us
2. The plot thickens
3. South American newspapers which claim a titanic snake trashed a woman's house
4. Greg Warner asks Dr Chris Clark a question
5. Dale Drinnon comments
6. We finally release the pictures
7. We try to smooth over the rift with Andre Issi
8. Glen Vaudrey writes
9. Andre Issi and the anaconda


Editor's Note: I still don't get this and am unable to see any trace of a giant snake in these pictures. However, in the interests of free speech and openness, I shall continue to release the remainder of the Warners' data each day. I shall also continue to publish all comments; good and bad; that are non-abusive. However, I would like to stress that whilst the CFZ and I, personally, have every respect for Mike and Greg, and are pleased that we have managed to provide a forum for them to release their material, we do not endorse it and at present, have not seen enough evidence for us to support their theories.

MORE ON ANDRE ISSI

If one good thing has come out of the ongoing saga of the Peruvian giant snake, it is that we have made friends with Andre Issi and if it had not been for all this stuff about Mike and Greg Warner's expedition to Peru, then none of this would ever have happened.

One of Andre's pictures was taken out of context by a Northern Irish newspaper which implied that it was the 40m snake claimed by ther Warners. It was of course no such thing and the forces of righteousness, led by Dr Dan, said as much. Unfortunately we all jumped to the conclusion that Andre was the bloke claiming that the snake in the pictures, which, as you can see, is dead (or nearly so) and floating in the water, was the one claimed to be 40m. As Andre writes:

"I was traveling alone by kayak from Brasília to Santa Catarina (state of Brazil) in a long journey along 6000 km crossing Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay and Argentina.

It was so hard and I almost die three times. About a city Guaira (frontier between Brasil and Paraguay) I saw this anaconda floating in the river. I take a lot of pictures and filmed. It has about six meters and his head is under the water arrested in the trees. I had never seen anaconda before and I became very nervous, at the last moment thinking it was alive.

My kayak has 5,20 m and the anaconda has about six meters. Only it. I´ll send you another photo beside the anaconda that i take like a joke because it seems like reference to see the real tale of the snake."

As one can see from the pictures, Andre is clearly an OK dude, who is more than averagely intrepid and is possessed of a silly sense of humour; attributes that would make him an ideal member of the CFZ. Dan writes:

"Convey my apologies to Mr Issi (...) I'll buy him all the beer he fancies; he appears to have achieved a rare feat indeed: he photographed a wild anaconda in its natural habitat without the aid of a team of snake-handlers and he managed to find quite a big one at that. Admittedly, it was dead at the time, which takes a bit of the shine off the achievement but not very much shine;
6m anacondas surely don't die very often and photographing one in the couple of days between death and complete decomposition is quite an achievement (especially seeing as us lot in an overcrowded island have yet to get our hands on even one of the supposedly ubiquitous big cats
that are supposed to be here).

So, apologies to Andre from me and if he's coming to Woolsery at any time, please pre-warn both myself and the landlord of the local pub.... "

And this is the way that disagreements within the Fortean and cryptozoological communities should be managed: like gentlemen, with a handshake and a beer afterwards, and not with endless flame wars and backbiting. There are certain other people within the Crypto community who really should take note of this.

But off my soapbox - over to Andre with a few more pictures....

How can I describe eight months about a journey in one page? I can´t send more images while was traveling by the simple fact was in the forest or in the middle of a poor small cities where a computer was difficult access or days and days without cities. I beginning it in the center of south america and ends it in the south coast of Brasil after the kayak schok in my head while I was returning to the coast between big waves of the Atlantic Ocean, like you can see in the photo with a life guard behind me. I almost was arrested in Uruguay because I was alone without a life boat. I must to do a trailer and buy an old bike to cross Uruguay by land 650 km. In Brasil I return to water and go to the north.I never receive any money cause this or try to receive. I only do my travels by adventure.



CAPTIONS:

(Above left) Tracks of Jaguars where he slept for the night

(Left) "Impossible is only a word. I do it"

(Below Left) Off the Coat of San Catarina

(Bottom) Crossing Uruguay by Bicycle

Dude, it is a pleasure to know you and I hope you remain part of the CFZ family for many years to come!

THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE EXPEDITION DATA - MONDAY

I have given Greg and Mike Warner the chance to present the remaining data from their expedition themselves and over the next few days they will be doing just that in their own words.

"This is one of the first satellite images I had privately commissioned during the research phase of the Napo/Amazon confluence. I believe it is one of the most important pieces of data that I have collected. I invite people to comment on what they see and I will respond with my personal theory later...Thanks, Mike Warner"

Greg also asked me to release the picture below because "it will give a sense of scale to the one released originally."

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN THE SAGA OF THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE..

Greg and Mike Warner have contacted noted herpetologist and TV Presenter Mark O'Shea; a man for whom we have the highest regard. He is unconvinced but has asked to see the rest of the evidence that the Warners have ammassed. Greg and Mike will be posting a video presentation of their results on YouTube later today and we shall be streaming it here on the bloggo. In the meantime, here on CFZtv, these are Richard Freeman's comments on the events so far..

GLEN VAUDREY: The Peruvian "Giant Snake"

Glen is one of the newer additions to the bloggo family. He wrote to me out of the blue last year to ask wherther we wanted a Western Isles volume in our Mystery Animals of Britain series. We argeed that we did indeed want one, and commissioned him. What we were not expecting was such a bloody good writer and all round nice guy, who - by the way - is writing several other volumes for us, and he is even going to be speaking at the Weird Weekend. Wayhay!!

Jon,

I just thought I should add a few comments to the ongoing giant snake saga. Having looked at the this mornings pictures I couldn’t honestly tell you if I thought it was a giant snake or a sandbank to me both points of view hold water and are of equal merit. Certainly I have great difficulty imagining a snake of such size being in existence and yet undiscovered by science but then who am I to judge on Greg and Mike’s opinion, after all I like to think that Stellar’s sea cow is going to be rediscovered in the next year and it’s only a question of time before the great auk appears in our northern waters.

I can also see that the picture could be nothing more than a simulacrum, just nature playing tricks with sand, water and trees. But without being an expert on the geography of the region I question, I can not discount the possibility of the image indeed being a very large snake.

It all makes a good conundrum just enough information to tease, without the obvious fakery that some other recent mystery animal sighting have been plagued with.

I for one want to thank Greg and Mike for sharing this information with the CFZ family and hope that there pursuit of this giant one day yield the goal that may of us long for the discovery of a new mystery animal.

It goes without saying I wish them the best of luck in their continued searching for evidence.



Glen

MORE PERUVIAN "SNAKE" DATA

As promised, here is the second trenche of data sent us by Greg and Mike Warner. For those of you not aware of the ongoing saga, the story broke last sunday when a couple of Northern Irish newspapers carried the story of two explorers from Belfast and their self financed expedition to darkest Peru in search of a rumoured 120ft snake.

We were the only cryptopundits who picked up on the story, and over the next week we became involved in a dialogue with Greg and Mike. We must have done something right because, even though we disagreed with their conclusions extrapolated from the data that they sent us, they asked us to make their data available through the CFZ bloggo and allow the cryptozoological community at large to view their data and make their minds up.

We have the highest respect for Greg and Mike, we simply don't agree with them, that's all, and would love to be proved wrong.

So over the next few days we shall be publishing their data and asking your opinion on it...

For those of you who are latecomers to the saga, here are links to some of the earlier parts...

1. The original story printed by us
2. The plot thickens
3. South American newspapers which claim a titanic snake trashed a woman's house
4. Greg Warner asks Dr Chris Clark a question
5. Dale Drinnon comments
6. We finally release the pictures
7. We try to smooth over the rift with Andre Issi

ANDRE ISSI

Over the last few days as the subject of the alleged Peruvian snake pictures, which - we believe - are most probably nothing of the kind, despite the best intentions of the two blokes who took them, one man has been dragged into the fray much against his will, and - pretty well - undeservedly.


This picture was taken by Andre Issi some years ago, and - according to the man himself - shows an 18ft anaconda, not an animal of 40m as implied by the original press story from the 2009 expedition. Poor Andre. I don't blame him for feeling a bit beleagured at the moment as, following the use of his pictures by various Northern Irish newspapers, people across the Cryptoverse mixed up his claims with those of Greg and Mike Warner.


He also claims, and once again this seems eminently reasonable, that the pictures of him brnadishing a machetre Indiana Jones style, were a "joke", and implies that because none of us can actually speak Portuguese (perfectly true) and therefore had to use computer translation software (also perfectly true) then the nuances of his article were lost in translation.


I think that this is very likely. After all, can you imagine what a non-English speaker would make of some of Richard Freeman's comedy posturings about "Johnny Foreigner" and British "spunk"? Probably wise to not even go there.


So Andre, I hope that you don't feel too badly about us. One day if you are in England or we are in Brazil we will shake hands and I will buy you a beer....

THE SAGA OF THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE (2)

DALE DRINNON WRITES:

This Sachamama stuff is more than a decade old in Peru and Karl Shuker had an article in FATE about it while that magazine was still in its old, large-size format. Shuker wrote about the Sachamama in 1999-2000 (The FATE article being "Close Encounters of the Cryptozoological Kind" in 2000, following a few in the Fortean Times) and he was connecting it to the Minhocao then but what was being described was a giant snake similar to the current reports. The stories began hitting the news suddenly in the 1990s and were an odd mixture of Sucuriju Gigante and Minhocao features, but identified as another different and local cryptid, the "Snail Demon" or "Snake-with- a-shell", Sachamama. It is evidently depicted on Chimu artwork. Karl Shuker did identify it with the Minhocao and he did think it was a gigantic caecilian. It has an entry in Eberhart's Mysterious Creatures.

I have a theory myself that the damage being done by the Minhocao is mostly being done by an unknown crocodile (reportedly up to 80 feet long on its own!) when it is not natural damage attributed to it supernaturally (more likely) The tunnels and channels are being made by this creature, American Alligators are capable of shifting river courses and toppling trees with their burrowing. The Minhocao is supposed to have banded armor like an armadillo, horned "ears' and a piglike snout, which together sounds like a sort of alligator or caiman. It is also not necessarily the same creature that is reported in both the Peruvian Amazon and the Chaco, although they might both do equivalent damage by their burrowing. A crocodylian six feet broad is on a par with a saltie Indopacific croc, and there are reports of evidently more than one type of croc (Crocodylus) in the Amazon. The one doing the damage in Peru might not necessarily be the same creature as reported in the Chaco, but as you say that is a separate matter.

It seems that in this current case the main bulk of the evidence is actually coming from the newspapers and actually represents what is alleged locally. That does not mean that it corresponds closely to reality

MORE ON THIS STORY AT:

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/giant-anaconda-plot-thickens.html

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/great-snake-or-no-great-shakes.html

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-on-saga-of-peruvian-giant-anaconda.html

THE SAGA OF THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE (1)

Greg Warner and I are still in dialogue about the possibility of him releasing the photographs he says were taken by the expedition to Peru, and which he says show a snake that may be 130ft long. Greg was interested in what our old mucker Dr Chris Clark had to say the other day and asks:

"Chris, I am interested in your comment about focal point and hight of plane. I have this data, how can we work out size from this? Our scale reference was coming from known sizes of trees in the area."

Over to you Chris...

MORE ON THIS STORY AT:

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/giant-anaconda-plot-thickens.html

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/great-snake-or-no-great-shakes.html

http://forteanzoology.blogspot.com/2009/06/more-on-saga-of-peruvian-giant-anaconda.html

THE ORIGINAL STORY ABOUT THE PERUVIAN GIANT SNAKE AS IT FIRST APPEARED

MORE ON THE SAGA OF THE PERUVIAN GIANT ANACONDA

The saga of the supposed giant snake from Peru continues. I am now in a dialogue with Greg Warner, the younger of the two explorers who claim to have taken photographs of a 130ft snake in South America. And - much to my surprise - he does seem to be a decent and polite bloke. But his story is so extraordinary that we would not be doing our job properly if we did not approach our investigations of the affair with as much rigour as possible.

Despite recent political changes in this country people are still just about inocent until proven guilty. However, when one is approaching a case like this one, one has to take the opposite tack.

But one thing is paramount: whereas we have to treat all claims, especially ones as extraordinary as this, with a great deal of suspicion, we also have to treat the people making them with respect.

Last year I was quoted in a press story about artist Pollyanna Pickering's trip to Bhutan where she saw what appeared to be a yeti scalp, and I was
pilloried (often illiterately) on websites across the cryptoverse. I know what it is like to have your claims under suspicion, and to be treated with ill-bred rudeness both from the canaille and from those who really should know better. Greg and his father Mike have treated us in a polite and gentlemanly manner, and we have every intention of treating them the same.

The first mystery that had to be cleared up was the matter of the photograph that accompanied the original press story, reproduced in facsimile here just in case anyone thought that we had made it up.

If you read the article, it doesn't claim that this photograph was actually taken by the expedition. Indeed it wasn't. It appears to have been taken by a dude called André Issi and was used to illustrate a journal that can be found here. Tony Lucas in New Zealand and Dr Dan Holdsworth both provided translations which can be found here

Dan went on to write:

This page too is written in Portuguese, and once again Google translate only seems to want to translate part of it, however searching through for the word "anaconda" and translating those sections of text still doesn't seem to yield much info on the photos.

Chris Kraska wrote:

Jon-

That's looks like a dead yellow anaconda on its side. It could also be a dead green anaconda on its back but the photo is so tiny I can't tell if I'm seeing ventral scales or dorsal/lateral scales.

Bobbins.

Chris

However, Greg Warner has written to me that "The photo used is a research photo not one from the expedition although we believe it has all the charictoristics [sic] of a Yacumama or Black Boa 15-20 Meters long." That is fair enough, although I think it shows a dead yellow anaconda about 12ft long. But it is a relatively convincing explanation for how this picture became associated with the case, so I think that it is time that we took Senor Issi and his picture out of the equation, for the time being at least.

If one reads the original newspaper article from the Belfast Telegraph carefully, a lot of the more outlandish claims for the creature (which sounds far more like the minhoaco than a giant snake, but that's another issue) are from stories originally from the South American newspapers reproduced on this page.

Greg kindly provided a translation of these newspaper articles. His translations can be found here Being a suspicious bugger, (although I prefer to call it an adherance to some level of scientific rigour) I also got Chris Kraska to translate them:

(PS although I can make myself understood in New World Spanish, after my expeditions to Mexico and Puerto Rico, my grasp of the language is rudimentary at best, and mostly only good for buying beer and cigarettes, and finding the nearest bar or airport - and as I have since quit smoking, a large chunk of my bilingualism is rendered completely pointless)

It destroyed their home and devoured domestic animals. (smaller above)

Sachamama frightens elderly couple (larger below)

Next. From the text (Btw, this is basically one big run on sentence):

A nearly inexplicable act was what happened to an elderly couple residents of Committee 11 of the Michaela Bastidas settlement who from one moment to the next were swung from one extreme to the other by something large that came out from the depths of the river, from the depths it came out like a hurricane that destroyed my poor house that is more than 50 meters from where it was located, I was dying of fright because I saw it, saw it's gigantic jet black head that was about to kill me, expressed Mrs. Dolores Suna, who was sure that what had left her exposed to the elements with one canoe worth of supplies, is the mother of that island that is in front of ours, there you find her, in the aguaje tree there, finished Dolores, who along with her husband Artemio, was comforted by her neighbors, who didn't doubt in their prayer, now they wait to have the same luck with Civil Defense, we hope.

#3

Smaller above:

Knocked down a house and panicked two residents

Larger below:

Giant Boa in Moronacocha

Smaller below:

People say monster has huge eyes, scales and horns

Iquitos (Peru)-

With fear they are found the neighbors of the settlements of El Porvenir and Micaela Bastidas, located in the sector of Moronachocha, by the presence of a gigantic boa. Antonio Mayta Aricaya (64), fisherman of Moronacocha lake, attests that months prior, in the zone there were plenty of fish and that now there are none owing to the enormous reptile.

"The island is always alive at night and sounds are heard in the river, it's all a mystery. It appears the giant animal uses the vegetation as camoflage to slide through without being seen", decared Mayta Aricaya.

Admin Perez Gutierrez related that all the time the island was a peaceful place, and now it's the opposite. "Until it knocked down a house that was in the middle of the lake. It's the first time this has happened and the river has grown too much."

In the meantime, the people of the two settlements, don't go close to the edges of the river, for fear that the animal will appear, that has been catalogued as a monster with huge eyes, horns and scales.

In RED at center.

"That zone is known for having animals; previously there was a lizard that ate hens, but this incident was different because I saw that there was a huge one with eyes that sparkled like a lantern" says Carlos Caballero Dahua (47), subsecretary of the Micaela Bastidas settlement. According to the neighbors, the boa travels in a zone of vegetation and moves from one end to the other during the night, when there are no humans present.

In my opinion the two sets of translations are substantially the same, and that unless Greg and Mike have far too much time on their hands, and have gone to the trouble of faking two sets of South American newspapers, which is not impossible, but would seem ridiculously unlikely, that the stories that they claimed came from the newspaper were exactly that!

Whether or not a snake did attack someone's house and cause the damage described (which sounds incredibly unlikely), Greg and Mike are making no such claims from their own experience. It is tempting to suggest that someone at the Peruvian newspaper has resurrected stories of the minhoaco and used them to explain damage done to a crappily built building by a flash flood or something similar. Who knows?

The events overnight (and forgive me if they are a little confused, but I was up late watching the election results and I am less than 100% compos mentis this morning) seem to have clarified the matter considerably. And at the moment I have to say that Greg and his father Mike are coming out of this looking much better than I had at first expected.

Watch this space, for there will undoubtedly be more updates later..