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.
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...From CFZ Australia:
From Crypto Squad USA:
From Nick Redfern's blog:
Beachcombing is returning with some relief to familiar territory after the Shakespeare wars of the last couple of days. The subject: unicorns and the earliest human accounts of these mysterious creatures. In the Indus Valley about 3000 BC a series of seals were created that portray an animal with one horn: they predate the mention of unicorns in the Bible by perhaps two thousand years (or more if as seems likely the Biblical unicorn is based on a mistranslation). Read on
Another advantage of the trail cam is that it is small enough to be well hidden, so well hidden that a passing animal may not even know it’s being spied upon. Once again Trevor will demonstrate this ability, cunningly hidden in the undergrowth he can take plenty of pictures of animals going about their lives, and who knows what surprising things he could spy. Today it looks like he has found a Yeti drinking tea from a cup; well you never would have expected that.
Many thanks to those who have so far donated, your contributions are very welcome and much appreciated. Don’t despair if you haven’t yet donated, or if you wish to contact me about the trail cams, the campaign still has many more weeks to run.
Just to recap, to sponsor a trail cam will cost £100. If that seems a little steep why not get a group together to sponsor one of these trail cams, a group of five will pay just £20 each. Sponsors will get an update on any pictures and when something exciting is spotted your name will go up in lights alongside the photo.
Don’t despair if you miss out on Trevor, he has plenty of friends who also need help in breaking free.
Your sponsorship will pay for the release and upkeep of Trevor and kin, but sadly you will have no rights to take him home.
Now doesn’t that sound like a good deal? Armchair cryptozoology at its best. All the fun of an expedition without being bitten by scary tropical insects.
If you like the sound of this then please get in touch, we would love to hear from you.
For further information you can contact me at glen@cfz.org.uk or tel 0161 777 6586.
Donations can be made via PayPal to Trailcams@CFZ.org.uk
This three-toed footprint was found between Chama and Dulce in New Mexico on October 26, 2010. We also saw a bright glowing light moving strangely in the sky to the West, most evenings, but we regrettably did not get any pictures.
--Randy randy.rockey@gmail.com
(This story is courtesy Rick at ParanormalBuffalo. Thanks dude)
On this day in 1953 the first 3D film by a major studio, House of Wax, was premièred.
Followed by a longer technical paper (not by me) relating cranial deformation with the rise of the Patriarchy, and making a case for a recent worldwide diffusion of the traits:
And that is followed up with a note about how an even earlier (basal-Neolithic) diffusion of the Cranial Deformation trait points to an earlier Patriarchy that failed, hence presumably Atlantis in its militaristic phase as described in the Egyptian myths passed through Solon and then Plato.
Except nature, and humanity wasn’t always well ordered, sometimes there are birth defects or complications during pregnancies. These were, in the 18th century often blamed on some animal having interfered with the pregnancy in some manner. The more uncharitable doctors, midwives and gossips might insinuate that the mother had conceived the child from having had congress with an animal and the more tactful might have suggested that this was as a result of the mother having been startled or scared by a similar animal during the pregnancy causing the baby to take on the look or traits of that animal. This bizarre superstition persisted into Victorian times among the great uneducated masses of the city slums of London as it was used by sideshow exhibitors as the explanation for why Joseph “The Elephant Man” Merrick looked the way he did.
These hoaky home-spun theories would be pushed to the limit by a strange case in Godalming, Surry in 1726. Mary Toft, the wife of a clothing salesman, miscarried something that had the appearance of a rabbit but with exterior lungs and heart. About 14 days later Mary was said to have given birth to a live rabbit, followed by several more over the subsequent hours and days. None of the bunnies survived for more than a few minutes, but several people are said to have seen the births and the rabbits afterwards.
Reports of the event were published in Mist’s Weekly Journal and eventually reached the ear of King George I as a result. The king, who was very intrigued by the reports, was to send his own investigators, his surgeon Nathanial St Andre and the secretary to the Prince of Wales Samuel Molyneux, to Godalming to find out more about the case. It turned out the event had not been a one off and that Mary was still giving birth to rabbits and bits of other animals. One midwife, John Howard, who had initially been sceptical of the claims, had supervised at the birth of 3 cats legs, one rabbits leg, the guts of an animal Howard presumed was a cat and the backbone of an eel. The explanation for the rabbit and cat births was thought to be that Mary had dreamed about or strongly desired each creature during her pregnancy so her baby had turned into them.
Shortly after the arrival of the kings investigators Mary gave birth to the torso of a rabbit and St Andre examined her determining that the rabbits had indeed come from her womb. Later that evening Mary gave birth to another rabbit torso in their absence and a head in the presence of the two men. The investigators left either wholey convinced, or perhaps in on the scam although neither actually confessed to it, and submitted a report to the king.
Deciding that all this was so compelling that it needed further study the King then sent another surgeon, Cyriacus Ahlers to investigate Mary Toft and the ever present midwife John Howard. Ahlers was a lot more sceptical of the claims than St Andre and Molyneux had been especially because, when he arrived Ahlers was showing no signs of pregnancy but proceeded to plop out a few bunnies for him on queue. Ahlers noticed that prior to these births Mary had been holding her legs together as if to prevent something falling out and that John Howard insisted in delivering the bunnies with no interference from Ahlers and Mary would cry out in pain whenever Ahlers came too near. When he left he pretended to be convinced in order to get his hands on some of the birthed bunny bits to study further. Ahlers determined that they had been cut with a knife and found straw and grain in their digestive tract and faeces. All was not looking good for Toft and Howard’s story and things were also looking bad for St Andre as well who had endorsed the claims. Howard somehow caught wind of what was happening, probably via St Andre, and wrote a letter requesting the immediate return of specimens. St Andre returned to Surry to see Howard and was handed two more rabbits that Mary had supposedly given birth to. St Andre also used the trip to collect affidavits from all concerned just so he could use them to cast doubt on Ahlders’ version of events should he ever need to. St Andre then gave the king an anatomical demonstration of the births which led to the king asking for Mary Toft to be brought to London for more examination.
To be continued…
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