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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...

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Wednesday, December 04, 2013

PINE MARTEN IN SOMERSET

One of the perennial questions asked by critics of cryptozoology, is "what animals predicted by cryptozoologists have actually been found?"  In 1996 I published a book called The Smaller Mystery Carnivores of the Westcountry which - amongst other things - presented evidence for a surviving population of pine martens in Devon and Somerset. Now - 17 years later - I have been proved right, and am quietly confident that other claims that I have made over the years will also eventually be substantiated. 

A confirmed sighting of a pine marten on Edington Moor has been reported to the Vincent Wildlife Trust (VWT) – the research charity which studies the wellbeing of British and Irish wild mammals.

According to the VWT, this is the first report of a Pine Marten in Somerset since human persecution resulted in the disappearance of the creatures from the whole of southern England by the end of the 18th century.
  1. Photo by Vincent Wildlife Trust/Tony Braithwaite
    Photo by Vincent Wildlife Trust/Tony Braithwaite
"I was driving home from Burtle across Edington Moor with my daughter Sarah," said Neil Champken, who reported the sighting.

"We knew immediately that it was something that we had not seen before. It was a little larger than a stoat, with longer legs and neck, a long bushy tail and a pure black face," said Mr Champken – who is the owner of the Somerset Cider Vinegar Company and lives on the Poldens.


Read more: http://www.thisissomerset.co.uk/Confirmed-sighting-rare-pine-marten/story-16895542-detail/story.html#ixzz2mVrFAsmn 


Many thanks to Richard Muirhead for this news item. Also, by the way, the VWT claim is wrong: the species was meant to have been extinct here since the end of the nineteenth century.

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