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...

Search This Blog

WATCH OUR WEEKLY WEBtv SHOW

SUPPORT OTT ON PATREON

SUPPORT OTT ON PATREON
Click on this logo to find out more about helping CFZtv and getting some smashing rewards...

SIGN UP FOR OUR MONTHLY NEWSLETTER



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...




Monday, May 16, 2011

ANDREW MAY: Words from the Wild Frontier

From CFZ Australia:
Banjo the koala's back where he belongs
Meet the Cryptozoologist: David Hatcher Childress
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9

WEIRD WEEKEND 2011

Here is the first draft poster for this year's event.

Sadly, Alan Murdie has had to pull out because the WW clashes with another conference he is attending... in Brazil.

That's a pretty good excuse, I think.

We have also lost Paul Vella because of a conflict with a family occasion.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9

RICHARD FREEMAN: Giant anaconda stories

Whilst pootling about on the internet I came across the following anaconda-related stories.

The first involves a 30-foot or nine-metre specimen found floating dead in a lagoon eight kilometres from the town of Matupá in the state of Mato Grosso in Central Brazil. It had apparently swallowed a capybara before dying.

http://www.peixotoonline.com.br/index.asp?Pagina=Noticias&NomeTipoMateria=Matup%C3%A1&CodigoMateria=75533&CodigoTipoMateria=15


The second story I stumbled on concerns a spectacular statue I had never before seen. The statue shows a giant anaconda fighting a bull. Giant anacondas were sometimes called Manatoro or bull-killers as they were thought to over-power, constrict and swallow whole bulls. The sculpture represents man’s attempts to interfere with the course of the São Francisco River in Brazil. The anaconda represents the river and the bull, modern man’s interference. It´s a work of art by Diocleciano Martíns and it was inspired by a poem by Castro Alves. In the poem The Waterfall, the bull represents the rock, the force; the anaconda, the waters in coil, breaking the rock, from there appearing the great waterfall. The Paulo Afonso Dam was built in 1955. The hydroelectric plant now provides electric power for the whole of north-eastern Brazil. Four other large hydroelectric plants were later built. : Três Marias built in 1961, Sobradinho Dam in built in 1977, Luiz Gonzaga (Itaparica) and the and the Xingó Dam built in 1994. The Sobradinho reservoir is one of the largest artificial lakes in the world, with an area of 4,214 square kilometers and almost certainly harbors large anacondas.

The carranca is a type of carved gargoyle that was once put on the prows of boats traveling along the São Francisco to scare away evil spirits. Legends of water monsters persist to this day and may be based on giant anacondas.
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9

CFZ PEOPLE: James Hore-Ruthven

James, an old friend of the Downes family and (more recently) the CFZ, is gravely ill.

Remember him in your thoughts and prayers to whichever deity you believe in.




Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9

HAUNTED SKIES: Bunnies, Superwoman, Bananaman, Nigel and UFOs

http://hauntedskies.blogspot.com/2011/05/bunniessuperwomanbananaman-nigel-and.html
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9

OLL LEWIS: Yesterday's News Today

http://cryptozoologynews.blogspot.com/

On this day in 1931 Marshall Applewhite was born. Applewhite was the leader of the Heavens Gate cult that committed mass suicide believing that if they did this then an alien spaceship travelling in the wake of the Hale-Bopp comet would pick them up and save them while it recycled the Earth.
And now the news:

Osprey chick is earliest to hatch in UK
9 a.m. update: Bear sighted in lower Bidwell Park ...
Illinois authorities puzzled by armadillo sighting...

Mmm, crunchy:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZwTHVZHqSb0
Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.9