Mythopoeika
I am a meat popsicle
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Aye, there's one in the Dublin Dead Zoo* too.https://theconversation.com/friday-...source=facebook&utm_medium=facebookbutton#_=_
Preserved thyacines in London collections.
Perhaps canny enough to finally evade humans altogether Just a thought.
Here! Here!
( Heart ruling head
Am rather at a loose end: "non-report" here, about a fascinating but non-cryptozoological book in my possession. "Pre-1936" seems the most appropriate thread; although this post first prompted by Mungoman's telling in the "Post-1936 Sightings" thread, of the struggle of Queensland's Kalkadoon people (hitherto unheard-of by me).
Book concerned, is Back O' Cairns by Ion Idriess, first published 1958: a basically factual memoir of time shortly before World War I, spent by the author in his youth, in the southern Cape York Peninsula area of Queensland -- he put in some years there in rugged "Boys' Own Paper"-type occupations: mining for various product, railway-building, and exploring. "Picture got" from the book, is that the local Aborigines -- unlike the hapless Kalkadoons of the Mount Isa region -- were then holding their own quite well: they were (mostly) "friendly", but continued to run their own show on the lands which they still held; they came visiting now and again, and the whites handled them with caution.
When the book first came into my hands, I had hopes of its containing material about potentially mysterious creatures in this then faraway and little-known region of Australia. Sadly, not so: in part I reckon, because it becomes clear that the author -- while appreciative to some extent, of the splendours of fauna and flora -- is much less interested in the natural world, than in the general "human comedy". In one section of the book, the author tells of an exploring foray in the company of an experienced bushman: sad bushman is quoted at length, in an anecdote about his difficult doings with a "porcupine". One thinks it likeliest, that the creature concerned would have been an echidna; it's to figure, though, that Mr. Idriess is far from being an impassioned naturalist.
No allusions at all, to possible relict thylacines / thylacoleos; or Yowie-type creatures -- all of which some folk in recent decades, have claimed to be around even now, in this remote part of the continent -- as said, stuff of this kind unlikely to have been prominently on the author's radar. In one recounted bit of interaction, involving a threatened fight between (placental) dogs, a local chap is quoted as saying, "A dog bred in this district is a coward if it won't tackle a tiger". The whole quote, no commentary from the author. One suspects that the author, not a wildlife buff, interpreted this as a flight of fancy referring to genuine feline, placental tigers from Asia; but it would be interesting to know what the speaker actually meant to refer to.
As said, this book is a "lemon" cryptozoologically; but I find it an absorbing read in its own right.
Yet in 1923 Ion Idriess had discussed the north Queensland tiger. Here's the link to the Trove results, http://www.scandikitchen.co.uk/prod...tmC2vJkVf12pWBfUSZkxwKx7PM5D4LFEaAhw6EALw_wcB
I knew I'd heard that name before, but credit to Malcolm Smith's (who we've come across before a few years back) blogfor nailing it down.
http://malcolmscryptids.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-great-north-queensland-tiger-hunt.html
One major problem in Idriess' account is that he speaks of the animal snarling, which sounds impressive and tigery, but marsupials can't do that. When enacting a threat display they yawn and hiss. At least the Dasyuramorphians do, and this is also the case in their sister group (I think that's what it is now anyway) the Thylacinidae. Of course the thhlacoleos were from an entirely different group again, overwith the wombats and koalas, but I don't think any of them can snarl. Soeither artistic license, or Idriess was the Australian version of William Hitchens.
Interesting point about the dog not being worth its salt etc, but they may have meant tiger cat or quoll. As far as I know there are two speces up there the northern and the spotted tail. And the latter can get pretty big. So perhaps....
Another thing that caught my eye in Smitj's blog is the mention of this 'tiger' liking the moonlight, and in these reports this tiger is framed as being feline, whereas the phrase 'moonlight' immediately made me think of the 'moonlight tiger' cited in the current James Cook university 'thylacine search' currently going on in the Cape York area. But as Mike Williams (who I think you'd get on with really well) points out, this is actually funded as a bettong surveyof the region, not a tiger hunt. But as I've said before, mentally picture a thylacine, now mentally picture a bettong. You can see why they wanted to attach some celebrity to the study which would otherwise probably be largely ignored rather than syndicated internationally.
... But then I bought a book from the same era Isle of Mountains which has a beautiful reproduction of the Sheppatd photo...
That link indeed leads to material about Swedish fermented herring -- nothing at all marsupial-related !
Am kicking myself for non-on-the-ball-ness -- cryptozoology has been mentally on back burner with me lately: I'd totally forgotten about the "Queensland marsupial tiger-cat". Brought back to me by your mentions above; and -- Heuvelmans's On the Track of Unknown Animals (splendidly described by you, in words to the effect of "a marvellous classic -- unfortunately, it's complete bollocks throughout"), of which I have a copy: gives a whole chapter to the QMTC. Heuvelmans cites, as in your Malcolm Smith link, George Sharpe's quasi-encounters (while egg-seeking; and the farmer with the goats and the shot-but-largely-destroyed tiger-cat); and those from Idriess -- the fight with the kangaroo, and the tiger-cat / staghound "lethal draw".
Idriess is mentioned in the Smith link, as long domiciled at Coen in the north of the Cape York peninsula. His shortly-pre-World-War-I doings chronicled in in Back O' Cairns, as cited in my post, were basically three or four hundred kilometres further south -- "as per": in the broad hinterland of Cairns. Clearly, in fact he had plenty of interest in the natural world; just, in Back O' Cairns he seems mostly not to be in that "mode".
A few years ago, at a chance "charity" used-book venue, I came across a 1963 work, Tasmania: Isle of Splendour, by one Bill Beatty, seemingly an Australian writer on varied Australiana. Just had to get it -- Tasmania fascinates and delights me for assorted reasons. The author gives a short chapter to fauna (illustrated with a photo of a Devil, but none of a thylacine), including several paragraphs on the thylacine; of which he writes: "is the largest flesh-eating marsupial and is on the verge of extinction". He tells in fair detail, of the animal's physical make-up and habits; re a fair bit of this lore, citing "old bushmen". Quoting this guy's final "thylacine" paragraph: "Occasionally one reads a newspaper report that the animal has been seen. Thus, in February 1963, it was reported by a car driver that a Tasmanian tiger loped across the Bass Highway. The newspaper added: 'The sighting strengthens the belief that the tiger still roams the uninhabited forests of Tasmania's rugged north-west coast. The last positive evidence that the animal was not extinct came two years ago, when one was killed at Sandy Cape, on the west coast. Mr. Trevor Buckby, of Redpa, said he saw the animal in his car's headlights crossing the Bass Highway on the Smithton side of Pegaram. It was about 35 to 40 yards from the car.' "
(I'd imagine that these "contacts" are mentioned somewhere in the thylacine correspondence on here; though I don't recall seeing them thus-placed.)
The fermented herring; I know your interest in football is every bit as keen as mine but a friend of mine from Warwickshire said, as a throw away comment, that she'd eat this surströmming if England lost its match with Sweden. I intended to make sure she kept her word. No idea how I managed to mix the links up, I suppose I must have been chatting to her while replying. Sorry. As it happens I am very curious to try this.
As for the thylacines in Bill Beaty's book, the Bass Highway certainly rings bells but Sandy Cape isa very well known case. It involved two fisherman camping out at Sandy Cape on the north-west coast, Laurie Thompson and Bill Morrison. I've heard if it from time to time, but these days if there's a tiger involved my absolute cut off date for any in depth checking is 7/9/1936 as that's the last time we have a body (where that body ended up though is another matter, so we should say what we actually have is documented evidence (attached below) of a dead tiger. Although coming this year is a paper which suggests that there might finally be an answer to what happened to the last captive's mortal remains. I'm eager to read it, but so far catious).
Anyway, Bill and Laurie manage to aciddentally club a tiger to death one night when it's raiding their bait supply. In the morning they look and find a dead juvenile male streched out on the sand. Now they're out in the sticks and so realising the importance of what they've found, what do they do? Yes that's right, they carry on fishing. Which turns out to be a mistake because when they get back to their camp, you will never guess what happened, someone had only come and stolen the body! Talk about oppurtunist crime. I think that's the only time I've heard of a story like this, what about you?
What is original in this case though is what happened next, according to Michael Sharland they looked around and found hair and blood samples which they submitted for analysis? At the time the 'experts' agreed that the hair was from a tiger, or so Sharland reported. Yet in 1998 according to Guiler and Goddard the hairs were described as 'possibly' thylacine, and in 1980 Morroson had changed his story anyway, and claimed it was in fact a devil they'd killed. (Quotes for thus appear on the website of Chris Rehberg, Where Light Meets Dark)
This is one of the many reasons I stop in September 1936.
The picture one generally gets, is that surstromming (can't do fancy foreign accents on letters these days) is utterly vile unless you're Swedish -- and quite often, even if you are. Jamie Oliver reckons it delicious -- but he's weird in assorted ways... I too wouldn't mind trying it, just in case of its turning out against all expectations, to be a real treat.
Ah, the "two fishermen" episode -- have indeed read in the past, about that one. I feel actually, that the story has something of a wearisome familiarity about it: it seems that always, always on the "crypto" scene -- any really good evidence, somehow fails to survive to be actually presented as evidence: the finders are quite irresponsibly casual and non-urgent in their treatment of their find, and / or some annihilating misfortune befalls the find, "out of the blue". Confess that I can understand sceptics' response to this ever-recurring tendency: "doesn't all this, tell you something?"
Alas, that seems wisest -- things on this whole scene, appear fated always to be fraught with doubt and dissension and stories-changing, to a greater or lesser degree.
Thanks for link to the Trove results -- 1920s-time actual or potential happenings. A frivolous thought: the very first item is headed what at any rate looks like: "A Mountain Troul". This actually refers to a type of fish (quickly veers into tiger-cat-related material instead): presumably word should be "trout", and the reproduced century-old printing either features what is actually a "t" but looked to me like an "l"; or it's an "l" as a typo. On first seeing the apparent "Troul" in the headline, my mind leapt to, "is this a variation -- bad spellers, or typo -- on 'troll'? Is this going to be about Yowies?" We crypto-fanciers are everlastingly hopeful in this kind of way -- no wonder the sceptics think we are, at best, a bit odd :beye: .
The picture one generally gets, is that surstromming (can't do fancy foreign accents on letters these days) is utterly vile unless you're Swedish -- and quite often, even if you are. Jamie Oliver reckons it delicious -- but he's weird in assorted ways... I too wouldn't mind trying it, just in case of its turning out against all expectations, to be a real treat. ...
In the video I found they too said it was the onion which was one of the keys. Although the poor sap reporter had to eat it just in some flat bread.The trick to surströmming lies in the presentation and build-up to the tasting, which (given proper preparation) involves negating the gag-worthy odor at close quarters. It's all in the onion, as I described last year:
http://forum.forteantimes.com/index...ings-as-food-drink.26516/page-19#post-1682531
I have gone off the idea of it a bit. While looking for a UK supplier I came across a video actyally showing what came out of the tin. I had been expecting something like garum, or gentleman's relish, as in fermented and broken down into a dark mass which I could easily cope with, but it turns out that what you actually get is whole, ungutted, fresh looking fish that smell bad enough to strip paint. Not as keen as I was but still, it really might be amazing. Fancy it more than lutfisk anyway.
Sadly, even as a cryptid the Queensland tiger/tiger cat seems to have become extinct, out competed by the mainland tiger craze. Many of the accounts describing clearly more feline animals having been co opted into thylacine lore, largely it seems because they've got the word tiger in them.
The trick to surströmming lies in the presentation and build-up to the tasting, which (given proper preparation) involves negating the gag-worthy odor at close quarters. It's all in the onion, as I described last year:
http://forum.forteantimes.com/index...ings-as-food-drink.26516/page-19#post-1682531
Have seen more than one "angle" on lutefisk -- think I have yet to hear from anyone who actually likes the stuff. "Horror" material about it, I believe because of its being soaked in a lye = caustic soda solution -- such horrors seemingly especially from the USA: I gather that Minnesota, with very many inhabitants of Scandinavian origin, is big on lutefisk -- a preference which strikes other Americans as little short of appalling.
Sophie Grigson, having sampled lutefisk in the Lofoten Islands, has a different take on this comestible. Per her description: it's dried cod, already "as hard as a bone -- then soaked for 4 -- 7 days in frequent changes of water. Next it is plunged into a lye solution -- actually water spiked with a shot of caustic soda -- and left for 2 days or longer, according to taste. The caustic soda, which is not a substance our bodies take to happily, must then be washed out, which is done by submerging the lutefisk in running water for several more days. Then, and only then, is it ready to cook... [the] bizarre jellyish consistency and terminal blandness seems a cruel destiny for what was once good fresh cod." So for Sophie, not a thing of nightmare: just an elaborate, pointless, and essentially "unimproving" food-preservation exercise.
I've mentioned this before; but the name "tiger" has always seemed to me, a silly one for the thylacine. Just because it had stripes... I first learnt of it -- as a child, from illustrated encyclopaedia-type books passed down in the family -- under the name of "Tasmanian wolf", which has always struck me as nearer the mark, and preferable. Although of course taxonomically it was neither a wolf nor a tiger; its appearance was a lot more canine than feline.
One major problem in Idriess' account is that he speaks of the animal snarling, which sounds impressive and tigery, but marsupials can't do that. When enacting a threat display they yawn and hiss. At least the Dasyuramorphians do, and this is also the case in their sister group (I think that's what it is now anyway) the Thylacinidae.
Interesting. You know, I had no idea of this. Any idea as to why that is - a different shaped throat or larynx or something?
A his can certainly be threatening. And a yawn might SOUND unthreatening, but any creature that wouldn't be at least in some part intimidated by a view of all those teeth in that long thylacine jaw would probably be a little bit foolish.