OOPA: Emu loose in North Devon

A fugitive emu that went walkabout in a north Devon town has been apprehended by the police.
Amazed residents called the police and two officers seized the flightless bird before it could wander into rush-hour traffic in Barnstaple.

They held the animal – originally a native of Australia rather than south-west England – in the back of their patrol car for half anhour before an animal ambulance arrived and took it away.
Officers are searching for the owner of the bird.

Acting Sergeant Zoe Parnell said she had just begun her shift at 7am on Wednesday when she got a call that an ostrich was on the loose in Riddell Avenue, a residential street in the town.
"I thought it was a wind-up," she said. "I thought we'd arrive and it would be a turkey or something like that." She rushed to the scene, where she was joined by police community support officer Stephen Huxtable.

Parnell said she wasn't sure what the creature was but knew that they had to stop it reaching the main road, where the bird could have caused rush-hour chaos.

"It was trying to get into people's houses. Obviously it was finding that difficult, and would try the next one. I must admit that while I'm not normally scared of birds, I was a bit nervous with this one."
It fell to Huxtable to seize the bird and put it in the back of the police car.

Like many others apprehended by the police, the emu was not happy. "There was a lot of wee-ing and poo-ing and flying feathers in the back of the car," said Parnell. "It's going to have to be specially cleaned."

She thought about giving the bird a drink from her water container "but it was a bit distressed so I thought it was better to leave it", she said.

Instead, the officers called for backup from Diana Lewis, north Devon's "animal angel" and a leading light in North Devon Animal Ambulance.

The emu remains in her care while the search for the owner continues.The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said it was not necessary to have a licence to keep an emu.
However, Wendy Higgins of the Humane Society International/UK flagged up concerns: "In Britain, we keep more exotic wild pets than cats or dogs, and often residents can be completely unaware they are living next door to a python or a primate. Often it is only when an escape or an accident occurs that their existence is revealed.

"Unbelievably, there is no definitive national register of the number and variety of exotic animals being kept in the UK or traded globally.

"Wild and exotic animals are not pets, but a welfare disaster waiting to happen. It is high time the appalling commerce in wild animals for the pet trade was brought under serious control and preferably banned altogether."

Emus used to fall under the Dangerous Wild Animals Act 1976 but have been delisted.
Higgins said: "However, the list of species covered has been seriously reduced, many local authorities fail to effectively enforce he legislation, and there are serious questions regarding the competence of those that do. As a result, non-compliance levels are believed to be high."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/nov/28/escaped-emu-walkabout-barnstaple

*Barnstaple is not far from the headquarters of the CFZ UK - If they never find the owner, perhaps Jon Downes could take it in!

Moa bones and ancient poo dazzles researchers

A combination of team work, community funding and a Waimate archeologist skilled in the field of skeletons and anatomy, has meant the town has a moa exhibition that has impressed some of New Zealand's moa research elite.

The Waimate Historical Museum exhibition which runs until November, received a visit from a group of top moa experts, including from Te Papa, who were on their way to a key moa site at St Bathans. Intending to stay only five minutes, instead they stayed 90.

The exhibition is special to Waimate because of the Kapua moa excavations of 1895. Kapua, at one end of the Waimate gorge, was the resting place of 800 moa skeletons.

The giant birds, naive about humans, were a good package of easy meat to a hunter. Big adults were hunted out first, cutting out the breeders. Younger ones followed, before they could breed. Moa eggs were also being eaten.

Interestingly, museums all over the world still have moa skeletons posed with their necks stretching straight up. Now knowing more about anatomy and bones, researchers know their necks curved horizontally, in line with their backs.

The exhibition features a bone from the Kapua dig which still has its hand-written metal tag attached. Other items come from museums further afield. The Canterbury Museum's contribution was halted, days before it was to be transported, by the February earthquake. Fortunately, Otago Museum was able to step in.

Interestingly, Wikipedia has the number of moa species at 11, but researchers now know that there were nine, adapted to different environments such as the swamp, the uplands, the forest or the coast and climates as differing as the West Coast from the East.

Prehistoric big bird discovered in Nullarbor cave

Fossilised remains of a prehistoric bird, possibly a wedge-tailed eagle, have been found in a cave on the Nullarbor Plain. The bird is more than 780,000 years old!

The discovery was made during a Flinders University-led expedition involving the WA Museum.

Flinders’ palaeontologist, Dr Gavin Prideaux said the almost complete skeleton was unearthed amid dozens of bird bones in a cave known as Leaena’s Breath Cave – about 70 kilometres on the WA side of the border with South Australia.

“We’ve only ever found one partial eagle fossil before so, given how complete this specimen is, it would be an exciting discovery,” Dr Prideaux said.

“We’ll need to get the specimen back to Flinders University to determine whether it is, indeed, an eagle and, if so, whether it is the same species as the modern wedge-tailed eagle or something new,” he said.

“It may be new given that it is at least 780,000 years old and probably much older. Surrounding these larger bones are literally hundreds of songbird bones, a situation mirrored through the rest of the deposit.

“This cave has been acting as a bird death trap for at least a million years, which is just one thing that makes this one of the most interesting and unique palaeontological sites in Australia.”

The discovery was made on only the second day of the field trip which is a collaboration between Flinders University and the Western Australian Museum.

Video and blogs of the expedition can be found at:

http://www.museum.wa.gov.au/cave/videos

http://www.flinders.edu.au/cave/

http://www.museum.wa.gov.au/cave/bloggers/gavin-prideaux

On the lookout for the Powerful Owl

The Powerful Owl (Ninox strenua), one of Australia's iconic birds, is currently listed as vulnerable in NSW with only 20-30 mating pairs in the Sydney region.

In response Birds Australia has put out a call to the general public to report sightings of the Powerful Owl. They are also giving people the opportunity to volunteer as trainer-observers and gather more detailed data.

A large cause of the birds’ vulnerable status is land clearing of their natural habitat. In recent times the owls have been known to live in fragmented habitats such as farms and suburban areas - a significant change from open forest and woodland areas where the birds' main nesting location is inside tree hollows, a perfect space for females to incubate eggs and brood their young.

The owl is the largest of Australia’s nocturnal birds: 50-60cm in size so when identifying the bird size is a definite factor to consider.

The owl is prevalent in eastern and south-eastern Australia, mainly on the eastern side of the Great Dividing Range, from south-eastern QLD to VIC.

The bird is a carnivore, commonly known to eat Ringtail Possums, Great Gliders and other tree-dwelling mammals, as well as rabbits and small marsupials. The bird catches prey with its feet.
Communication:

The bird can also be distinguished by its call: a deep, double hoot “woo-hoo”, with the males' call generally deeper than the females'.

The Powerful Owl mates for life and defends an all-purpose territory. Breeding season is April to September, so in this time period it will be much more likely to sight the male bird.

To report a sighting or volunteer as an observer, email: birdsinbackyards@birdsaustralia.com

Meet the Cryptozoologist: Ken Gerhard

How did you first get involved in researching strange and mysterious creatures?
Unlike other researchers I know, I didn’t experience anything quite as dramatic as a life-changing encounter. When I was young, I developed a deep-rooted fascination with Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster, as well as UFOs, ghosts and other mysteries. I didn’t really pursue my interest too much until about a decade ago, when I began working with a group of passionate Bigfoot researchers from Texas. I observed first-hand some things that I felt couldn’t be explained and cryptozoology subsequently became my obsession.

What were some of the early influences in your life?
Well, my mother mainly, because she took me on so many amazing adventures around the world. She always wanted me to be an archaeologist and writer, so we would often travel to famous ruins like Machu Pichu, Stonehenge and Carthage. But, I was mostly interested in legendary animals, as well as the native wildlife wherever we traveled. Looking back, I had many defining moments that led me to where I am now, but there are just too many to cover here.

Have you personally seen one of these creatures?
No. I never have, although I’ve interviewed many credible eyewitnesses. I did see two eyes reflecting in a spot where other researchers and I thought we heard a Bigfoot creature vocalizing just minutes earlier. But from that distance, I’m just not sure what I was looking at. If it was a deer or other animal, it must have been very tall.

What creatures particularly interest you?
Probably the flying creatures like Big Bird, because I’ve spent so much time investigating those. I receive new reports on a regular basis and I’ve had many people confide in me about their sightings of enormous, winged monsters. I think this is a highly neglected branch of cryptozoology. There are apparently some unknown things soaring through our skies and not too many people are taking it seriously.

What cryptids are most likely to exist in your opinion?
Well, certainly there must be some large, undiscovered species in the Earth’s oceans, which are just so vast, deep and unexplored. Based on centuries of reports I think that there is an animal out there that would explain centuries of sea serpent and lake monster reports. It seems to possess some mammalian characteristics, so perhaps we are dealing with some type of snake-like whale or long necked seal. There may also be gigantic, prehistoric marine reptiles that survived exitinction. Oh, and the thylacine of course, which is most likely not extinct in my opinion.


What’s your favourite?
That really changes all the time, depending on what’s going on with my research. But, I must admit that I find guilty pleasure in the really weird man-beast hybrids, like Owlman, Goat Man and the Lizard Man, even though they have nothing to do with zoology or the natural world.

What’s your favourite Australian cryptid?
My trip to the Australian Outback when I was young was an unbelievable adventure. I had the great honor of climbing Ayers Rock. I remember taking a keen interest in the Bunyip at the time. From a cryptozoological point of view, Australia is a dream. The Yowie, Bunyip, thylacine, megalania and surviving diprotodons are all very compelling and valid possibilities.

Have you developed any theories around where the more unusual animals - i.e. yowies/bigfoot - have come from?
Well, they have always been here I think. Just look at all of the fossil hominoids that have been discovered in the past century. During the Miocene epoch, the planet was literally crawling with upright primates that looked exactly like what people are describing in modern times. Therefore, the most likely assumption, regardless of how unbelievable it seems, would be that a population of these beings have survived extinction and that they have been completely disregarded by western scientists.

Have you written any books/articles? 
I recently wrote an article about the Texas Chupacabra for Fate Magazine, which was a great honor. My most recent book - Monsters of Texas, was co-written with my good friend Nick Redfern. I also wrote a book titled, Big Bird! Modern Sightings of Flying Monsters, which was published in 2007. Before that, I had a self-published pamphlet I was distributing called Monsters are Real. I’ve also written a couple of articles for trade publications.

Do you have a website?
I have a Facebook fan page where I post my photos and latest findings. I also write a blog for the San Antonio Current. My latest venture is a cryptozoology excursion team where we are train aspiring cryptozoologists - www.cryptidseekers.org

How many mystery animal reports would you receive a year?
On average, I probably receive about one report a week. Although, people are constantly sending me weird photos, hairs or bits bones they can’t identify. Most of those can be explained in familiar terms, which doesn’t make people too happy. We all love to keep a little mystery in our lives.

What’s the closest you’ve personally come to finding something?
I’ve recorded some compelling Bigfoot vocalizations and have found several structures that resemble the alleged nests or markers constructed by these beings. When I was in Belize, I found some humanoid footprints in a very remote area where people would never think of walking around barefoot. They fit the descriptions of tracks attributed to the small, manlike Dwendi.


What’s the farthest you’ve traveled to go ‘in search of’ mystery animals?
I tend to focus on the cryptids in my region, since it gives me a home court advantage. But, recently I was in the south of France investigating a famous werewolf known as the Beast of Gevaudan. I’d really love to return to Australia and conduct some serious research there some day.


What’s next for you - any trips planned? Books or articles to write? Talks to give?
I’m constantly doing interviews and lectures and I have several ongoing investigations that I am involved with. I’ve also started to write my next book, since it takes me so long to finish one!


Could you share some of your favourite cryptozoology book titles with us?
Well, On the Track of Unknown Animals by Bernard Heuvelmans is considered to be the bible of cryptozoology. Other than that, I greatly respect certain other authors, whose research is highly scientific and influential. Those would include Ivan Sanderson, Roy Mackal, Grover Krantz and Karl Shuker, to name a few.

What advice would you give anyone getting into the field of cryptozoology?
The same two words that iconic cryptozoologist Loren Coleman uttered to me when I was just getting into the field – “passion and patience”.