STRANGE DAYS
FRANKENSHEEP
Arthur “Jack” Schubarth, 80, a Montana rancher, fell afoul of US wildlife laws with his plan to let paying customers hunt “massive hybrid sheep” on his property. He created the creatures by importing tissue from the giant Marco Polo sheep of Kyrgyzstan, getting a lab to create cloned embryos from it, then implanting them into ewes on his ranch. This resulted in a single, pure genetic male Marco Polo sheep. Next, Schubarth used this animal’s semen to impregnate local sheep to produce the hybrids he turned loose to be shot by trophy hunters, who appreciated their giant horns. yahoo.com/tech, 13 Mar 2024.
TOSS UP
To test whether both sides of a coin really do have equal chance of coming up when tossed, researchers at the University of Amsterdam got students to flip coins from 46 different currencies. After several intensive 12-hour days of tossing, during which participants were given regular shoulder massages, 350,757 coin tosses were carried out and it was discovered that the face that was upwards at the start of the toss won 50.8 percent of the time. This was not enough to be statistically significant, so researchers concluded that the chance of either face winning really was equal. “It’s fun to do some stupid stuff from time to time,” said researcher Frantisek Bartos. S.Telegraph [Sydney], 29 Oct 2023.
LOTTA BOTTLE
Researchers from Copenhagen University have named a new South American beetle species they discovered Loncovilius carlsbergi after the city’s famous brewers because it has a penis shaped like a bottle opener. The “unique shape” of the insect’s genitals “stood out” they said. A bottle opener inspired by the beetle will be available to buy. Metro, 15 Nov 2023.
FLORIDA MAN
Thomas Devaney Lane, 61, attracted attention in Indialantic, Florida, by screaming obscenities and making threats. Briefly detained by police, he continued his rant, before leaving the police station and returning to the parking lot of a 7-Eleven store where he declared himself a saint and threatened to destroy civilisation with a vast army of turtles, leading to police detaining him a second time and charging him with disturbing the peace. foxnews.com, 10 Apr 2019.
COLOUR BOX
From the end of January until the beginning of March, residents of the Temple Hill area of Dartford in Kent found their Royal Mail postboxes frequently changing colour. Some were painted gold, one got a union jack pattern, another ended up with leopard print. Others were painted to resemble a Drumstick lolly,
