MUIRHEAD'S MYSTERIES: The Herring Hog

Richard Muirhead is an old friend of the CFZ. I have been friends with him for 40 years now, since we were kids together in Hong Kong. He is undoubtedly one of the two best researchers I have ever met; he and Nigel Wright both have what Charlie Fort would have no doubt called a wild talent; a talent for going into a library, unearthing a stack of old newspapers, and coming back with some hitherto overlooked gem of arcane knowledge. Twice a week he wanders into the Macclesfield Public Library and comes out with enough material for a blog post..

Dear folks

In one of those strange coincidences,as I was planning today`s blog,Jon drew my attention to Mike Hallowell`s contribution of June 5th which mentioned The Great Herring Catch of September 1807 in his part of the world.

The coincidence lies in the fact that a few weeks ago whilst in one of my favourites haunts (other than the local karaoke bar!) the Newspaper Library in north London I came across a story which was indexed as being about `The Herring Hog`. This was in the `Dumfries and Galloway Saturday Standard` of October 30th 1909 (see accompanying illustration).

It was doubly rewarding, I thought,”herring hog,what`s this a new type of cryptid?” and also, my ancestors were Scottish. But alas, on doing a Google search on `herring hog` I found out that this is in reality the common porpoise of the Atlantic and Pacific(1) So, it`s always best to check when coming across a possible new cryptid.

REFERENCE

1. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/herring+hog

I have two items for sale which may also be available for viewing or sale on the Internet, I haven`t checked. First come first served!

a) Amphipacifica Vol 1 Suppl. 1 An account of Cadborosaurus willsi,a new genus,new species,a large aquatic reptile from the Pacific coast of North America. £3 I will pay postage

b) Porcupine! Newsletter of the Department of Ecology and Biodiversity,Hong Kong University. No.15 Dec.1996. £3. I will pay postage.

Wanted. Fortean Studies. Offers please. And that issue of Fortean Times (1980s?) which featured a female alien in a hollow vessel on the front cover.

Thanks.

Best wishes,


Richard Muirhead

GUEST BLOGGER NEIL ARNOLD: The Block Ness Monster

It is with great pleasure that we welcome Neil Arnold to the CFZ bloggo with this first guest blog. I have known Neil for fifteen years now since he was a schoolboy with ambitions for adventure and I was an earnest young hippie who merely wanted to start a club for people interested in unknown animals. Nothing much has changed over the years. We are just both a tad older...

One of my favourite monster mysteries pertains to the Rhode Island carcass. Partial remains, measuring almost twelve-feet, of a huge aquatic creature were dredged up from the breakwater of Old Harbor in the June of ’96. 49-year-old local fisherman and conservationist Lee Scott stored the mass (Gary Hall caught the ‘monster’ which attracted more than 1,000 people), which consisted of ninety-six cartilage vertebrae, in ice before it was shipped to the National Marine Fisheries Laboratory in Narragansett.

“It smells like a dead sea monster”, commented Mr Scott at the time.
“I got the Block Ness monster in a freezer…”

Initial investigations determined the beast could well have been a sturgeon.

The mystery deepened however when World Explorer magazine in 1997 featured the story, Block Ness Monster Is Stolen -:

“The remains of a fourteen-foot (strange, considering the remains started off at twelve-feet!) , as yet to be positively identified creature have been kidnapped from their frosty holding tank near New Shoreham, Rhode Island. In June of 1996, two fishermen aboard the Mad Monk scooped up an unusual serpentine skeleton. The spine stretched longer than the two men and its narrow head with vacant eye sockets was adorned by some mighty strange looking whiskers.”

Photographs were allegedly taken of the monster by Mr Scott, but shark specialist Lisa Nathanson believed the remains belonged to a basking shark, prime candidate for many sea serpent finds over the years. However, Scott then countered the claim by stating that if it was a shark then it must be a new species. The snout of the beast measured twelve-inches but, according to Nathanson, the basking shark snout only measures six-inches.

Even so, despite the find, the local kidnappers believed that the carcass they held should never leave the island for it may never return. Of course, for a brief period the beast and the local area prospered by attracting several tourists, all eager to snap up the Block Ness t-shirts and posters.

Tragically, no-one knows what happened to the most ridiculously named sea-serpent of all.

MUIRHEAD'S MYSTERIES: A giant basking shark and three white hares

Richard Muirhead is an old friend of the CFZ. I have been friends with him for 40 years now, since we were kids together in Hong Kong. He is undoubtedly one of the two best researchers I have ever met; he and Nigel Wright both have what Charlie Fort would have no doubt called a wild talent; a talent for going into a library, unearthing a stack of old newspapers, and coming back with some hitherto overlooked gem of arcane knowledge. Twice a week he wanders into the Macclesfield Public Library and comes out with enough material for a blog post..

I`ve been ill in bed most of the day with an appalling cough and cold but fortunately I have a small back log of animal stories from the pages of the Macclesfield Courier from late 1812 to mid 1813: Selling a basking shark for £600 seems alot even by early 19th century standards:

"Another fish of the basking shark species,measuring in length 32ft, girth 19ft,caught off Brighton on Friday se`nnight* (sic), in the herring nets of an industrious fishermen,named Collins-sold next day by Dutch auction,for £600 to some person who mean to exhibit it in London." Macclesfield Courier December 12th 1812. p.3.

This would make it one of the largest ever basking sharks? And if it was not a basking shark, what was it?

"A few days ago three white hares were found in a field of Mr Maws(?)of Hacknew(?) near Scarbro`about one month old."

Macc.Courier June 25th 1813.

* Se'nnight = seven nights (one week), an archaic usage, though fortnight (14 nights, or two weeks) is still widely used