Unidentified Mysterious Animals

Its a funny feeling that I get when I look at the digital clock of my computer and realize that I’ve spent the past four hours (yes!) reading descriptions and accounts of imaginative, queer animals rumored or reported to exist. Such animals are referred to as “cryptids” by cryptozoologists. This label applies to creatures as diverse as the Emela-ntouka (a hippo-sized relative of the sauropods, supposedly living in the swamps of the Congo), Mongolian Death Worm (looks like the intestine of a cow, able to electrocute enemies, attracted by the color yellow) and the Shunka Warakin, a prehistoric wolf whose name means “carries off dogs” in the language of the American Indian Ioway people.

Just in case you are about to stop reading because I appear to be babbling on about myths, monsters, and other unprovable symptoms of the hysteria-fueled public imagination, let me assure you that research conducted by noted cryptozoologists PROVING these things are real is going on RIGHT NOW. As a matter of fact, the stuffed trophy of a Shunka Warakin, shot and killed by Israel Ammon Hutchins on a ranch in Montana in 1886, was unearthed last month (December 2007) and is now undergoing DNA testing. The results may show that like the thylacine (the largest carnivorous marsupial of modern times, for hundreds of years presumed to be extinct until discovered living on the island of Tasmania), this slope-headed canine has survived in small packs since the last Ice Age. Or not. The thylacine itself went extinct sometime last century.

In the world of Unidentified Mysterious Animals (named so the acronym “UMAs” could act as a spin-off of Unidentified Flying Objects, “UFOs”), anything is possible. The acid test for these creatures is now DNA testing. Take for example, the case of the Globster. These are organic masses that wash up on all the world’s shorelines, and cryptozoologists have speculated breathlessly that they may be plesiosaurs or giant octopus. In fact, a pair of Canadian scientists proved, through DNA analysis, that the Newfoundland Blob was decayed blubber from a sperm whale. When these sperm whales die, their internal tissues liquefy, held together only by their skin. Eventually the dermal layer is punctured, and huge amounts of blubber pour out. Nature!

I did not come into this evening with this knowledge of dead sperm whales, but four hours on the internet later and there it is. Perhaps it will also interest some of you that dead whales can explode? In 2004, a dying sperm whale beached itself in Taiwan. (Did you know that whales and dolphins beach themselves when injured or sick because as breathing mammals their last survival extincts propel them to land so that they don’t stop swimming and drown? Kind of like how humans get on breathing machines at a hospital.) It was the largest sperm whale Taiwan had ever seen and its corpse drew the attention of local men who were drawn by its five foot penis. I’m not kidding. “More than 100 Tainan city residents, mostly men, have reportedly gone to see the corpse to ‘experience’ the size of its penis,” the newspaper reported.

Anyway, long story short, scientists decided enough of the whale remained to allow for a necropsy by marine biologists, so they put the dead sperm whale on a truck in order to drive it to National Cheng Kung University in Tainan. On the way there, however, gases that had built up in the animals entrails blew up, covering the street and passersby with organs, bloody blubber and greasy guts. No one was seriously injured, and the whale was already dead. Luckily, no cryptozoologists were on hand, or they may have tried to declare that the penis itself was a Mongolian Death Worm, capable of killing by electrocution, and vulnerable only to the nuclear breath of Godzilla himself.

Four hours may seem like a lot, but when you tack on the extra two hours spent blogging, thats a serious time commitment. Its called learning, and I’m not the only one doing it. Especially in respect to unidentified mysterious animals. The man responsible for this blog in the first place, my webmaster Eliot, today emailed me news that a new, cat-sized mammal had been found in the mountains of Tanzania. It is called rhynochocyon udzungwensis, a type of giant elephant shrew, or sengi. It has the snout of an anteater and the spindly legs of an antelope. In the past twenty four hours I have also received, from no less a reputable source than my scientist sister, a picture of a rare, snuggly “kitty monkey dog bear,” pictured here.

Along with the picture, she included a her favorite comment on the subject, posted by Cute Overload reader Holly. The comment is notable because it utilizes a rumored, previously undiscovered form of the verb “want.” Cryptolinguists, take note: “OMG! Daaarling! So poofy and soft looking. Wanty!”