Hoax Museum Blog: Animals

Quick Links: Eating Sand, etc. —
Woman eats 1.5kg of sand daily
Ram Rati, 80, credits her good health to her sand-eating habit. I'm amazed she's still alive if she really eats that every day. Sounds to me like she may have the eating disorder pica.

A case of gnome-icide
Store causes controversy by selling "stabbed" gnomes. "Shelly Oldfield, of Wakefield, was shopping with her elderly mother at Tong Garden Centre, Bradford, when they stumbled across the lifeless bodies – on sale for £9.99 each – and raised the alarm."

Hamster grounds airplane
A plane is forced to land to search for a passenger's escaped hamster. Big Gary notes: "New terrorist weapon-- hamsters."

Telepathic Chiropractor loses his license
James Burda claimed that "he possessed the power to heal clients via techniques he dubbed "Bahlaqeem Vina" and "Bahlaqeem Jaqem," made-up terms that he said described his ability to go back in time to the date of an injury and realign bones and joints using telekinetic vibration." Now he's lost his chiropractor's license. (But do chiropractor's even need a license to practice?) Check out his website if you're interested in how to do a Vibrational Vina on your weyzic.

Viagra Fish
Tiny Ayrai Kunchu fish have become all the rage in India, thanks to a rumor spread by fishermen that the fish have a Viagra-like effect (i.e. they cure impotence). However, "While it is believed that the fish can cure male impotency, those who sell it are not able to say what quantity of the fish must be consumed to achieve the Viagra-like effect." Sounds like the perfect recipe for a scam. If it's not working, they'll tell you it's because you need to eat even more.

Quick Links: Itsy Bitsy Imposter, etc. — Itsy Bitsy Imposter
Paul Vance, co-writer of the song 'Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini' was slightly startled to read his own obituary - the result of an imposter.

Robot Art Goes On Display
A Portugese artist has devised a robot that creates its own paintings.

Teddy Bear Causes 2,500 Trout Deaths
A teddy bear that fell into a pool at a Fish and Game Department hatchery earlier this month clogged a drain, and suffocated a large number of trout in New Hampshire.
A written warning has been given: "RELEASE OF ANY TEDDY BEARS into the fish hatchery water IS NOT PERMITTED."

(Thanks, Accipiter.)

Quick Links: Henrietta the Four Legged chicken, etc. — Henrietta the Four Legged Chicken
Henrietta had been living peacefully among 36,000 other chickens for 18 months when her owners noticed that she had four legs.

Separation Agency Takes the Stress Out of Breaking Up
A German agency will break up with your partner for you, if you are too scared to do it yourself. The client gives the agency three reasons why they want to break up, which are then passed on to the dumpee. The service costs 20 Euros by phone, or 50 Euros in person.

Dog Starts Car
After George the dog swallowed the immobiliser chip out of his owner's electronic key fob, the only way to get the car started (until the chip was... passed) was to put the dog in the front seat.

Live Fish Discovered in Duck Egg — Biologists at the University of Manchester were on a field trip to the French Alps when they found a duck egg in a small pond. Noticing its movement, they cracked it open, to discover three live minnows inside.

The scientists, despite their combined knowledge of the natural world, are at a loss as to how the fish got inside the visibly uncracked egg.


Dr Cobb and his colleague have written to the magazine New Scientist to see if any reader can come up with the solution.

(Thanks, Iridium and Yashca.)

Quick Links: Man Bites Panda, etc. — Man Bites Panda
A drunken tourist climbed in with Gu Gu the panda at Beijing zoo. When the startled panda bit him, he bit it back.

Jerusalem - There's No Such City!
According to a mistranslated sightseeing brochure, at least. The pamphlet, translated from Hebrew, should have read "Jerusalem - there's no city like it!".

Dog With Knicker Obsession Gets Surgery
Deefer, a Bull Mastiff has eaten at least ten pairs of knickers over the last year. Embarrassing surgery was required recently when the last two pairs became lodged in Deefer's intestine, costing his owners more than £1,000.

Sudanese Man is Forced to 'Marry' Goat
When Mr Tombe was caught having sex with his neighbour's goat, he was taken to a council of elders, who ordered him to pay a dowry of 15,000 Sudanese dinars, and gave him the goat. The neighbour is quoted as saying "They said I should not take him to the police, but rather let him pay a dowry for my goat because he used it as his wife."

(Thanks, Accipiter.)

Quick Links: Fake Steve Irwin Death Videos, etc. — Fake Steve Irwin Death Videos
Unsurprisingly, several videos have popped up on YouTube portraying Steve Irwin's death. They're pretty unconvincing.
(Thanks, Nai Art.)

IT Skills in Return For Gropes
The mirror of a now deleted post from Craigslist, the title really says it all. I particularly liked: "I have a lot of tech knowledge in my life and regrettably no boobs."
(Via BoingBoing, thanks Cranky Media Guy.)

Building Using Recycled Paper
"Papercrete [is] a mixture of Portland cement, sand, and recycled newspapers/magazines, which can be used as a building material."
Looks reasonable to me.
(Thanks, Sharruma.)

Australopithecus Afarensis Discovered in Ethiopia
The bones of the 3.3 million-year-old girl have finally been recovered from a block of sandstone originally discovered in 2000. She has now eclipsed 'Lucy', found in 1974, as the girl lived more than 100,000 years earlier.
(Thanks, Tah)

Quick Links: Sheep Rescued from Tree, etc. — Sheep Rescued from Tree
Firemen were called to rescue a sheep, later nicknamed 'Tarzan', from seven metres off the ground.
(Thanks, Gerrit.)

Oldest New World Writing Discovered
A stone slab discovered in Mexico in the 1990s shows the oldest example of New World writing, new evidence suggests.
(Thanks, Dave.)

Pierce Your Ride
As far as I can tell, a non-hoax website selling vehicle piercings. They look pretty cool, and I have to say that, if I drove, I wouldn't mind them on my car...
(Thanks, Big Al.)

Irwin Fans Take Revenge on Stingrays? — In the period of time since Steve Irwin was killed after being attacked by a stingray, at least ten stingrays have been found dead on the East coast of Australia, news sources report.

Many of the stingrays have had their tails cut off. Government officials are investigating, and say there could be prosecutions.

There is no proof that the incidents are related to Mr Irwin, but a quote from a spokesman for the Fisheries Department said that fishermen who inadvertently caught stingrays sometimes cut off their tails to avoid being stung, but such a practice was uncommon.


(Thanks, Dave.)

Quick Links: Heart-In Baby Diamonds, etc. — Heart-In Baby Diamonds
Anybody for an artificial diamond made of baby hair?

Squirrel Sabotages Opera Singer
A squirrel broke the nose of Finnish opera singer Esa Ruuttunen when it ran into the spokes of his bicycle.

Flat Parents
Life-sized cardboard cutouts of deployed service members are being given to their spouses, children and relatives by the Maine National Guard.

Designer Underwear
If you wish to sport the more... hirsute look, this pair of underwear may be for you. (Link not suitable for work.)

Quick Links: Cheese, Aliens, Urine, & Paris Hilton —
Mice Hate Cheese
The popular legend is that mice like cheese, but this legend is false according to researchers at the Manchester Metropolitan University and the Stilton Cheese Makers Association. "As part of a wider study into animals and food, they found that a mouse's diet is primarily made up of grains and fruit. It found that they would reject something as strong in smell and rich in taste as cheese. Dr David Holmes, an animal behaviourist from the university, said: 'Clearly the supposition of mice liking cheese is a popular premise.'"

15 Aliens Arrested in Roswell
A press release from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement announced that 15 aliens were arrested in Roswell, New Mexico. "Some of the aliens were in the process of painting these aircraft when they were arrested." Aircraft... or a spacecraft? I smell a cover-up.

Russian Urine Exporter
Need some urine from Russia? Evidently someone does, and where there's a demand there will usually be a supply. The urine comes in different varieties such as Sea Breeze, Hunter's Brew, and "Not Filtered, Original". I knew that drinking your own urine is a popular health fad, but I didn't know that drinking Russian urine is also popular.

Paris "Banksy" Hilton
A Flickr photoset of the Paris Hilton CD doctored by guerrilla artist Banksy. The Banksy version of the CD is something I'd actually be interested in owning, and apparently a few of them are being auctioned. However, Warner Music is trying to prevent their sale.

Accented Cows — Last month we posted a link to a story about cows mooing with regional accents. I think it's worth revisiting that story because (as was immediately pointed out by Greg in the comments) it turns out to be total baloney. Or should I say bull-oney?

My guess is that the idea of accented moos probably originated as a tall-tale told amongst farmers, but at some point the claim came to the attention of a pr firm hired by the West Country Farmhouse Cheesemakers industry group. The pr firm immediately recognized a great story when they heard it, but they also realized that they needed some kind of scientific authority to transform it into a story that would catch the attention of the media. So they called up John Wells, a Professor of Phonetics at University College London and author of the soon-to-be-released English Intonation. Wells tells what happened next on his blog: Wells is even more specific in an email he sent to Language Log: In other words, there has never been any research that suggests cows moo with regional accents. Nor did Wells ever claim this. He was simply a guy who made the mistake of not immediately hanging up when a pr firm called. The reality is that entire story was conjured out of thin air. Just another example of fake news.

Unfortunately for Wells the story refuses to die. Recently the Sunday Observer, thinking they were being clever, mocked Wells for claiming that cows have regional accents. Wells responds: "I fear my scholarly reputation must have been destroyed for ever. For the record, I have never claimed that cows moo with a regional accent." But no matter what he says this story will probably keep going and going and going.

Quick Links: Canine Antics — Horse-riding Dog
Children are flocking to see Freddie the dog and his friend Daisy, a Shetland pony.

Give The Dog A Bone
Sharp-eyed readers of the IKEA catalogue have noticed something odd about one of the pictures. IKEA claim the suspect area shows nothing more than the dog's leg...

Woman Crashes Car Whilst Teaching Her Dog to Drive
There's not much to say about this that hasn't been said here on the forum.

Big Dog — Just a quick note to say that I've been away for the past few days (still am), visiting my parents in the Northern Neck region of Virginia. I arrived at their house just hours before Tropical Storm Ernesto hit, temporarily knocking out our power. Which meant that I was also without an internet connection. Here's a photo of me with their dog, Falcon, a 180-pound Great Dane. He's the biggest dog I've ever known. He's literally almost as big as that hoax photo of a giant dog that was circulating a year or two ago. I'm six-foot tall, but I look tiny sitting next to him.

Mysterious Creature Washed Up on Beach — I received links to two different pages featuring a series of pictures showing what is described as a 'monster' and an 'unknown creature'.

On one of the sites, this description is given:


Ignoring the unverified description, I'm fairly sure it's a beluga whale.
A site describes them as: "... a small white whale measuring 9 to 15 feet in length (Seems about right, sizewise). Belugas are found throughout the Arctic Ocean and in a few other isolated populations. Belugas were once heavily hunted for their meat, hide (for leather) and oil.

(Thanks to Sarah and Gerrit for the links, and Charybdis for his excellent googling skills.)

Virgin Mary on Turtle — I'm posting a lot of these lately. I guess it's Religious Icon season or something.

Shirley McVane believes her two-year-old turtle is developing an image of the Virgin Mary on its belly.

She has since renamed the turtle and its mate (you guessed it!) Mary and Joseph.

Is it just me, or are these getting weaker and weaker?
Cute turtle, though.

Quick Links: Falling Cow, etc. —
Woman Avoids Falling Cow
If Sally Brown hadn't moved when she did, she would have been hit by a cow that had tumbled 50ft off a cliff above her.

Man Claims Penis Pump is a Bomb
Madin Azad Amin really didn't want his mother to know he'd packed a sex toy for his trip to Turkey. So he told officials it was a bomb.
(Thanks, Big Gary C)

Cows Have Accents
A group of British farmers claim that their cows moo with regional accents.
(Thanks, Beverley.)

Man Survives 1000m Fall
A South African man survived a 1000m fall almost uninjured when his parachute failed to open on his first ever jump.

Snakes In A Theater — A story got out on the news wires claiming that a prankster had released two diamondback rattlesnakes in a theater during a showing of Snakes On A Plane. The source of the story appears to have been AMC spokeswoman Melanie Bell, which gave the story some credibility. But now the police are saying that the report isn't true: Well, it was a good story while it lasted. And incidentally, I haven't yet seen Snakes on a Plane. It's getting decent reviews, but I think I'm going to wait until it comes out on DVD.

Quick Links: Odd Chickens, etc. —
Odd Chickens
This site includes a rare photo of Mike the Headless Chicken.
(Thanks, Dethcheez.)

Women send private emails to the world
Yep, it's another case of someone hitting the wrong button, and things taking a turn for the embarrassing.

Chicken or rat?
Could you tell chicken from rat when it's been properly prepared and cooked? (Perhaps not suitable for those of a nervous disposition.)

Maine Mystery Beast Killed — Quite a few people have emailed me this story. Seems that some kind of ugly beast looking like a "hybrid mutant of something" has been found dead outside of Turner, Maine, apparently hit by a car while chasing a cat. People are speculating that the creature is "Maine's own Chupacabra." Others suggest it might have been either a wolf-dog hybrid or a deformed coyote. Here's a description of it: Unfortunately we'll never know for sure what it was since no DNA tests were done on it. Local animal control officers didn't think it was worth driving all the way out to Turner to inspect it. My guess: It was a Hodag.

Quick Links: 3D Crop Circle, etc. —
3D Crop Circle
Seeming to look down on skyscrapers, experts are impressed by what is being touted as the world's first 3D crop circle.

Swiftly followed by:
Pig Circle
A pig-shaped crop circle measuring more than 250m across has been discovered in a field in the English countryside.

Two-faced Kitten
A kitten with two faces has been born in Ohio.

Man Wins Lawsuit Over Decade-long Erection
Charles "Chick" Lennon has won his $400,000 lawsuit after his steel and plastic penis implant went wrong, leaving him with a permanent erection.