• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

What (Exactly) Is A Bunyip?

A

Anonymous

Guest
I have read several accounts and reports of this creature, but they all seem to somehow conflict. Are we talking about more than one animal or several types of the same species of animal?
Can anyone help with this question?
 
Nobody knows what a bunyip is or what it looks like. Early aboriginal cave paintings show an emu type creature but it seems to have evolved with time and is described in many different ways none of them bird like
 
alot of people think the bunyip is a species of marsupial called the Diprotodon that died out hundreds of thousands of years ago, it resembles a large wombat but there are also people who think the bunyip is a new type of seal that hasnt been discovered yet then there is the bunyip that is said to resemble a yowie that aboriginies feared thinking that it could attack them in their dreams.

but its thought that most of the sightings of Bunyips from the early parts of the 20th century were of nothing more then fugitives hiding in the swamps and billabongs, even the infamous Ned Kelly was believed to be a bunyip at one point. Im afraid the bunyip (if it does exist) is more than one type of animal it is a name given to alot of unknown animals in the out back

oh look a big frog! its a bunyip
 
Somewhere on a website (probably linked to from this MB or the FT website) I saw a picture of an Australian stamp with a 'picture' of a bunyip on it! Looked a bit like a rabbit...!
 
rynner said:
I saw a picture of an Australian stamp with a 'picture' of a bunyip on it! Looked a bit like a rabbit...!

here are 2 australian stamps with bunyips on them. If you have rabbits running around your back garden that ressemble any of them i suggest you take photos of them and post them on the board for us to all look at. :D

bunyip01t.jpg


bunyip02t.jpg
 
Justin Anstey said:
Oh tang, how could you miss this one?

http://www.cryptozoology.com/cryptids/images/bunyip03.jpg

We could throw boomerangs for him to fetch, aaah!

ive seen this picture before, its known as the dog face bunyip. I doubt that this creature does exist, it seems more like a taxidermist mistake than a bunyip! why would half it be hairy and the other half be bauld? it looks like a dog with flippers

also dont boomerangs come back when you throw them? ;)
 
Neither of the two bunyip stamps look like the one I recall seeing - but given the diversity of all all the other bunyip images, that's hardly surprising!

It seems that there is no definite answer to the original question.
 
You must be thinking of the very cutesy illustration on page 18 of FT156.

-J
 
bunyips

There are 2 distinct different types of Bunyip.The larger type aparently is a diprotodontid Palorchestes Azael a large vegetative eater .These were known to the southern Aboriginals by a variety of names, Katenpai, kinepratia and tanatbah on the Murrumbidgee.It supposedely had huge koala like claws,enormously powerful rear limbs,a long ribbon like tongue and a elephant like trunk.The second animal is a different kettle of fish known to the southern Qld Aboriginals as Mochel Mochel.It supposedly looked like a black(sometimes)large dog?seal/waterrat.This animal ate flesh and Aboriginals lived in terror of it.Its extent is from Tasmania to about Bundaberg I suppose the southern extent of fresh water crocodiles.In the Wagga Daily Advertiser April 1872, it was described as "IT lay on the water perfectly still,and I had a splendid view of the creature that surprised me more than anything I had ever seen in my life.The animal was about half as long as a retreiver dog;the hair all over its body was jet black and shining,its coat was very long,the hair spreading out upon the surface for 5 inches,and floating losely as the creature rose and fell of its own motion.I could not detect any tail, and the hair about its head was too long and glossy to admit seeing its eyes,and the ears were well marked"It was credited with being able to see and hear underwater,others have remarked that "it head was exactly the bald head of a blackfellow"Aparently the last stronghold of this animal is the Macquarie River between Wellington and Warren,the other rivers suffering from the rivers lock system.
 
bunyips

People constantly even here say these animals dont exist.Well I put it to you most people live in Urban areas and certainly dont spend much time outside at night.Most of these remains of the mega fauna forage and hunt at night,in fact most animals do this.We will see the evidence in the next few years as digital video cameras ability to operate in zero lux becomes more common.If you dont beleive me come out and well go and look-hard and maybe youll get spooked too.I havent seen one yet but the wind has been put up me more than once.
 
My question about BUNYIPS

Thanks everyone (especialy WILDMAN-so much detail and info-that was really great!) for all your input.
Please keep responding- I want to learn all I can.
WILDMAN- hope that someday I can come and visit you and we can go BUNYIP sighting together- THANKS!
 
If you had, like me, a copy of the Call of Cthulhu companion book Terror Australis, you'd know that the answer to the question "What is a bunyip?" is "Old fellah, that bunyip!"
 
I seem to remember a Bunyip featuring in Dot and the Kangaroo which I had a sort of audio book of before they were a thing but I can't find mention of it in the synopsis.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dot_and_the_Kangaroo
Although there was apparently a Bunyip song in a film made of the book. I don't remember ever seeing the film but perhaps it was in the book after all?

 
Mysteries and Monsters: Episode 268 Bunyips and Water Beasts with Tony Healy
 
Bunyips are usually associated with water. My personal belief, based on no evidence whatsoever, is that 'bunyips' were a myth invented by Indigenous families to try to persuade the kids to stay away from water holes to avoid the danger of having the kids fall in the water and drown.
 
Back
Top