ana_pirogova | Entries tagged with звери

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Fossilised bones of a dinosaur believed to be the largest creature ever to walk the Earth have been unearthed in Argentina, palaeontologists say.

Based on its huge thigh bones, it was 40m (130ft) long and 20m (65ft) tall.

Weighing in at 77 tonnes, it was as heavy as 14 African elephants, and seven tonnes heavier than the previous record holder, Argentinosaurus.

Scientists believe it is a new species of titanosaur - an enormous herbivore dating from the Late Cretaceous period.

A local farm worker first stumbled on the remains in the desert near La Flecha, about 250km (135 miles) west of Trelew, Patagonia.

This giant herbivore lived in the forests of Patagonia between 95 and 100 million years ago, based on the age of the rocks in which its bones were found.

But despite its magnitude, it does not yet have a name.

BBC

Rockwell Syrock had a hobby. Jocko rather liked it too.

Together they toured the towns of Victorian North Carolina, whiling away the empty days before the invention of Twitter by joining the crowds of spectators at public executions.

Jocko was a monkey - a cheeky one by all accounts, who was quite a favourite with children for miles around their Goldsboro home. Like his owner, Jocko took a keen interest in the gruesome rituals of capital punishment.

On a summer's day in 1880, the flamboyantly-named Mr Syrock had been cheerfully looking forward to the hanging of a convicted murderer when the state governor thwarted his plans by postponing the execution.

If Mr Syrock was downhearted he made the best of the situation, grabbing the opportunity to take a closer look at the gibbet which was ready and waiting for its indisposed victim.

Jocko, of course, joined him, watching the workings of the scaffold and trap with especially studious eyes.

Back home, the primate scurried off to busy himself in his master's barn. The result of his private endeavours was nothing less than an evolutionary breakthrough. Alas, it was almost instantly annulled by what the Liverpool Echo called "one of the most novel suicides of the century".

Jocko was found dead, suspended by a clothes line to one of the rafters of the building, a victim of his own ghoulish experimentation.

ВВС

Мораль сей байки из викторианской жизни такова: в России пора вернуть смертную казнь, и сделать мероприятие публичным. Патриоты будут ходить, смотреть, а потом... ничего не случится. Они ж не облизьяны зеленые.