Hoax Museum Blog: Animals

Monster Crocodile in New Orleans — Michael Maffei sent me some giant crocodile pictures that have begun doing the rounds. They're accompanied by this caption:

Now this is a Crocodile ! This crocodile was found in New Orleans swimming down the street. 21 FT long, 4,500 lbs, around 80 years old minimum. Specialists said that he was looking to eat humans because he was too old to catch animals. This crocodile was killed by the army last Sunday at 3:00 pm, currently he is in the freezer at the Azur hotel. The contents of it's stomach will be analyzed this Friday at 2:30pm.

The pictures are real enough, but they're weren't taken in New Orleans. These are pictures of the Monster Crocodile of Pointe-Noire (in the Republic of the Congo). They've been circulating for over two years. David Emery notes that the crocodile was really estimated to be 16 feet long and weighed about 1874 lbs. That's still a lot bigger than I'd ever care to encounter.

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Posted: Fri Sep 16, 2005.   Comments (132)

Fuel From Dead Cats — The German newspaper Bild yesterday reported that an inventor, Christian Koch, had developed a method to make bio-fuel out of dead cats. 20 cats would be enough to fill one gas tank. The story quickly spread to other media outlets, and animal-rights activists expressed concern: "The president of the German Society for the Protection of Animals, Wolfgang Apel, said using dead cats for fuel was illegal... 'We're going to keep an eye on this case,' Apel said." But it now turns out that Bild's story wasn't totally accurate. What they meant was that, in theory, one could use dead cats (or any other organic material) to produce the fuel. But the inventor insists he never mentioned the use of cats: "It’s an alternative fuel that is friendly for the environment. But it’s complete nonsense to suggest dead cats. I’ve never used cats and would never think of that. At most the odd toad may have jumped in." It seems that Bild got the idea for the use of cats from the name of Koch's company, Alphakat GmbH.
Posted: Wed Sep 14, 2005.   Comments (8)

New Orleans Alligator — Here's another New Orleans image that's begun to circulate. (Travis of Ohio State sent this one in.) Evidently this alligator has just enjoyed a good meal. However, this photo isn't a fake. It appeared in Der Stern accompanying an article about the many dangers that now exist in New Orleans, and is credited to photographer Marvi Lacar. The photo's caption reads (in English): "An alligator in the church: the 'swamp critters' are an additional danger."
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Posted: Mon Sep 12, 2005.   Comments (24)

Opossum in the Attic — Over the weekend my wife and I discovered that we have an uninvited guest living in our attic crawlspace: an opossum. (This isn't a hoax.) As we were sitting on our patio we heard it moving around and soon discovered that it had found a gap (that we had never been aware of) in the side of the overhang above the kitchen door whereby it could gain access to the crawlspace. I rigged up a camera and managed to get a picture of it sticking its face out. So my question is, does anyone know what to do about an opossum in the attic? Will it leave of its own accord after a while? (We suspect it's been there for at least a couple of weeks.) Or do we have to get professionals out to remove it? I don't want to hurt it, because from what I understand they're fairly useful animals that kill rats, snakes, cockroaches, and other rodents.
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Posted: Mon Sep 12, 2005.   Comments (38)


Dead Jackalope — In Jackalope news: a Minnesota woman found in her yard a dead rabbit with horns growing out of its head, exactly like a jackalope. A veterinarian declared that it had been infected by Shope papilloma virus, "a highly contagious disease that causes rabbits to grow things on their head and face that look like horns." The veterinarian's explanation is, of course, part of the continuing conspiracy to conceal the existence of jackalopes from the general public.
Posted: Wed Sep 07, 2005.   Comments (23)

Sharks in New Orleans — David Emery throws some cold water on rumors that sharks are swimming through the streets of New Orleans. He points out that the shark sightings seem to be the "seen by a friend of a friend" variety:

I found repeated references to unnamed "authorities" and "officials" reporting one "3-foot shark cruising the city." Which authorities? Which officials? Digging further, I could only find mention of one by name: Mayor Aaron Broussard of Jefferson Parish (a New Orleans suburb), who, according to the August 30 issue of the Palm Beach Post, "told residents Tuesday that at least one 3-foot shark had been spotted." Again, that's one small shark reportedly sighted — exactly where and by whom, we don't know — and as far as we know he hadn't eaten anybody.

But alligators are a different matter altogether. Officials assume there will be alligators in the water.
Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2005.   Comments (9)

Wrinkled Egg — Brian Edwards has sent in these photos of a wrinkled egg. I've never heard of an egg getting wrinkled, but the pictures don't look photoshopped. The egg, however, does look a bit like a potato. Soon I'll have to start a new category for odd eggs, what with my previous posts about a spoon-shaped egg, and a tall-tail egg.

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Posted: Tue Aug 30, 2005.   Comments (49)

Hoof Hearted — I received this email from "Doctor Psi":

I remember a British horse race in which one of the entrants was named 'Hoof Hearted'. This horse was obviously named so as to cause the maximum amount of amusement when listening to the commentary! Anyway, I was looking for a picture of said horse to show a friend, and found the following website:

http://www.hoofheartedoutfitters.com/index.htm

It looks genuine, but I can't believe that these guys haven't stopped to think just how their business name sounds when spoken at a slightly quicker tempo than usual!


It took me a few seconds to get the double meaning, but I eventually got it. I'm guessing it never occurred to HoofHearted Outfitters.
Posted: Thu Aug 25, 2005.   Comments (44)

Giant Alligator — image An image has been circulating showing a giant alligator hanging from a crane, as a person in uniform walks behind it. But according to the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission (as quoted in the Texarkana Gazette), the image is fake:

"It's fake. It didn't happen. We don't just go out and kill alligators just because they are there. I don't know why anyone would perpetuate something like that," he said. "There is a lot that comes across the Internet that is fabricated," said Arkansas Game and Fish Commission Lt. Don Albright...
According to the photograph's accompanying text, Evening Shade, Ark., residents Charles and Anita Rogers, who may or may not exist, said they could hear "bellowing" during the evening hours. According to the story, their neighbors attributed the alleged noise to a giant alligator they saw in the pond that runs behind their home.
"I didn't believe it," Charles Rogers said in the story.
Albright said the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission has detained large alligators in the past like the one seen in the picture. However, he said the organization has a policy to protect the alligators rather than shooting them, hanging their remains from a suspended crane and taking pictures of their trophy.


But how exactly is it fake? That's not clear to me. Is it the caption that's fake? Or has the image been photoshopped? Snopes suspects the image is genuine, but has the incident occurring in Texas.
Posted: Thu Aug 25, 2005.   Comments (97)

Munchkin Identified — image I think I first became aware of the picture of Munchkin the Monster Cat two years ago. The picture always perplexed me because Munchkin seemed too big to be real, but I couldn't see any evidence it was photoshopped. The Sydney Morning Herald, however, decided it was a hoax. But it turns out Munchkin was real. His owner, Susan Martin of Ontario, Canada, just contacted me with more pictures of her former pet (he died at the age of 8 of heart disease). His real name was Sassy. He certainly was a big guy. She says he weighed forty pounds. Here are more details from Susan:

Sassy was born in Virginia, and moved to Canada in 1991 with me. He was a kitten then and after we had him fixed he started getting fat. I never thought anything of it cause he slept so much. His visits to the Blair Animal Hospital did not find any problems with him and could not figure out why he was so fat. He was on diet food for about 8 years. In 1999 he was noted as being 15.9 kilos. in 2001 he was listed as 40 pounds and then lost 8 when he died. He did not eat an excess amount of food and did not eat table scraps. A bite or two of chicken or tuna was his favorite. I miss him very much and often find his picture posted on various web sites.

The fattest cat in the world weighs about fifty pounds. Here are more pictures of Sassy:

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Posted: Wed Aug 24, 2005.   Comments (30)

Homing Pigeon Find Right Address, Wrong Country — Something seems strange about this story. A homing pigeon took off from Malung, Sweden. It was supposed to head for Tangenveien, Norway. Instead it ended up in Tångenvägen, Sweden. It went to the wrong country, but it found a nearly identical street address. Could the bird have been reading street signs? I doubt it, but that's what the media is suggesting. From what I've read, researchers still don't completely understand how homing pigeons navigate, but some believe they follow landmarks on the ground (such as roads). But even if this is the case, I don't think they can read.
Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2005.   Comments (16)

Mutant Three-Eyed Toad — image James sent in this photo of a "supposedly mutant toad." He writes, "I would like to know whether it is real or not. I have heard stories about chemicals in ponds effecting the tadpoles, and causing deformaties in frogs legs, maybe the same thing has happened to this toad?"

If it is fake, it's a pretty decent photoshop job. It doesn't look like either the right or left eye has simply been cut-and-pasted into the middle. However, memories of the four-eyed kitten make me want to say it's fake.

Update: The original image was found, thanks to Citizen Premier. So the mutant toad is definitely a fake.
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Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2005.   Comments (33)

Bear On The Green — image Michael Perkins sent in this image (click the image to enlarge), asking whether or not it's real. I've never seen the image before, so I don't know where it comes from, but it looks like a fake to me. The background image of the bear in the woods seems to have been pasted onto the foreground image of the golfers. Note the unnaturally straight line where the green meets the forest directly behind the flag.
Posted: Tue Jul 19, 2005.   Comments (49)

Where Is Toby? — First there was Save Toby, a site on which some guy (whose name apparently is Bion) threatened to eat his pet rabbit if he hasn't received $50,000 by June 30 (apparently he's already raised almost $30,000, which is pretty amazing, if true). Now there's Where Is Toby, on which one of Bion's friends offers to expose Bion's full contact information... for $5,000. I guess this will appeal to rabbit rights activists who want to send Bion hate mail. A while back someone also had a Cook Toby site up, but that now appears to be gone. However, Screw Toby is still up. (Thanks to David Emery for giving me a heads up about this).
Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2005.   Comments (15)

Suicidal Chicken — image I've posted before about dogs who commit suicide, so when I saw this story about a chicken who committed suicide I thought I better add it to the site:

The man's son said that the chicken probably decided to kill itself being unable to lead the horrible life in the provincial village. The chicken is a vulnerable and sensitive bird that might not have the energy to handle stressful situations. Most likely, the Russian suicidal chicken has lost the will to live. The poor bird was not left hanging on the fence: it was cooked and eaten.

Maybe I'll have to start a new category for suicidal animals.
Posted: Thu Jun 02, 2005.   Comments (19)

Art Cats — image Artists work in all different kinds of mediums. Some work in oil. Others in stone. Dave Powell's medium is cats. He breeds cats and then displays them as art in plastic containers. He tries to breed for mutations such as polydactylism. He seems a little sensitive that people won't think his cat-in-a-box displays qualify as art, but he argues that they are since anything created with 'artistic intent' is art. I actually disagree. I think that art is whatever art critics define as art. In other words, it's up to the audience to decide what qualifies as art, not the artist. But as a cat lover, I'm perfectly to happy to regard cats as art.
Posted: Mon May 23, 2005.   Comments (16)

Big Squid — Edna Barrie has forwarded along some pictures of large fish (and one large frog). I don't see any reason to think any of these aren't real.

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Posted: Wed May 11, 2005.   Comments (64)

Lion vs. Midgets — A faux BBC news article describing a match between one lion and 42 unarmed midget fighters has been linked to by a lot of sites. However, the article is now clearly labelled as a fake. Apparently what inspired the article was a debate some guy was having with his friend about who would win in a hypothetical fight between one lion and 40 weaponless midgets. He created the fake BBC piece in order to convince his friend that the lion would win. Personally, I don't think it matters if it were 40 midgets or 40 pro-basketball players. The lion would still win, because a lion has claws and sharp teeth, and people don't. Plus, the lion is a lot stronger. Incidentally, I just learned that 'midget' is considered a derogatory term. But I don't think the author of the faux article was too concerned about being PC.

Posted: Mon May 09, 2005.   Comments (29)

Cow Urine — Apparently cow urine is the hot new drink in India. I'm not sure what people believe to be the health benefits of it, but there's a brisk market in sales of the stuff. The only problem is the nasty smell:

A few suppliers even have suggestions for battling the odour. "You can kill the smell if you add some essence while consuming it. But if you store it in a bottle again, the odour returns," says Lakshmanananda of another ashram in Gandipet, on the outskirts of the city.

Demand is so strong that it's even spawning a market for fake cow urine:

As cow urine does booming business, can the fakes be far behind? The city has a supply of about 500 litres a day, but now buffalo urine and that of other animals are being passed off as the real thing. "Spurious products have sprung up from nowhere," says Prashant Kumar Vyas, a supplier from Siddiambar bazaar.
Posted: Thu May 05, 2005.   Comments (15)

Snake in Breakfast Food — Seems like people are suddenly finding all kinds of things in their food. A boy in England just found a two-foot long snake in the box of his breakfast cereal:

Ms Willett, who was eating breakfast with her son at the time, said she first thought the snake was a free gift.
Describing the incident, she said: "My lad, he went to open his cereal and luckily enough I was behind him because a snake popped out.
"I just screamed. I grabbed the box off him and found some Sellotape." ...
An expert called in to examine the corn snake, which is non-venomous and feeds on mice and birds, said he was sure the animal had been kept as a pet in England and had been well looked after.


She thought it was a free gift? That would be an unusual surprise toy: a Happy Meal with a free snake! (thanks to Iain and Melanie for the links about this)
Posted: Thu May 05, 2005.   Comments (2)

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