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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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Thursday, May 11, 2017

MUIRHEAD`S MYSTERIES: The crocodile in the Sahara and a strange Japanese sea creature

Dear friends

I found two interesting stories, co-incidentally both from 1884, one of them refers to the existence, up until the late 19th Century at least, of the crocodile in the Sahara, the other is of a mystery (at least to me) sea creature in Nagasaki Bay (presumably) .

Texas Siftings. March 15th 1884 " But Professor Zittel considers that the climate must have been damper (in the Sahara - R) ,the rain-fall heavier, and fresh water denudation more active in pleistocene days than now, to account for the erosion that has taken place, the abundance of fulgurites, and the present distribution of flora and fauna, especially in such cases as the occurrence of Central African crocodiles in the marshes and streams of the completely isolated Ahaggar mountains (of S.Algeria - Rich)


San Francisco Bulletin August 18th 1884.

" The Nagasaki Sun and Express says : " A strange reptile was caught in the bay on July 24th. it measures about 3 ft in length, is rather broad across the the head and shoulders and gradually tapers down to a fine tail. it has four legs with five long sharp claws on each.Its head is slightly tapered to the tip of the mouth, out of which darts a long narrow tongue.In color it is dark, with bright yellow spots, and the back and tail are covered in hard scales. it was apparently out of its element in
the sea, as it is still alive and promises to flourish on live frogs, for which it seems to have a natural weakness.

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