The West Wins TO Goes NFL

Well that was a spectacular set of CFL finals on the weekend. As I said to my partner it would be sweet to see the Blue Bombers beat the Argonuts. An all West Grey Cup in the city we all love to hate; Toronto.

After all Torontonians could care less about the CFL they want the NFL. Torontonians have no use for Canadian sports, they view themselves as home to American sports, like baseball and basketball. The CFL well that's just a prairie league. And the prairie league is coming to their home town to show them how the game is really played.

The program OTR (Official Toronto Report) on the Toronto Sports Network (TSN) , a program given to prestidigitation on when the perennial losers the Maple Leafs will win the Stanley Cup ,had Paul Godfrey and Pinball Williams on earlier this year once again talking trash about bringing in the NFL. The premise is if they do the CFL will collapse.

Paul Godfrey, the president and chief executive officer of the Toronto Blue Jays who has been pressing Toronto's NFL viability for 20 years, said that Larry Tanenbaum, chairman of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment, and media mogul Ted Rogers have joined forces and will bid on bringing an NFL regular-season game to Toronto in 2008 and 2009.

What a pretentious proposition. The CFL is a Western League always has been. Its greatest support and fans are in the West and Hamilton. Toronto has always viewed the league as second best next to the NFL. Ottawa is gone, Montreal collapsed and came back. But in the West the teams are strong. And because of that they were able to bail out Hamilton and Montreal when they had tough financial times. Because unlike privately owned teams that go bankrupt, the majority of teams in the West are community owned.

If Toronto gets the NFL it's impact on the CFL will be minimal. The game will continue. It is a blue collar sport, where the players at the end of the season go back to their jobs, their farms, and work until next season. Unlike U.S. pro sports.

If Toronto got a NFL franchise then the CFL would still have Hamilton, could revive Ottawa, and look east to a team in the Maritimes. Lack of a team in Toronto would only hurt Toronto. And for the CFL no great loss except for Skydome, and that can be rented. And if Toronto gets the CFL the Skydome rent will be cheap because the plan is for Godfrey and pals to build a new stadium for its NFL team.

Toronto must prove mettle as host of the Grey Cup
Tue, November 20, 2007
By TERRY JONES, SUN MEDIA

Bubbling in the background of the 95th Grey Cup is the fight for the right to play host to the 100th anniversary edition.

Should the 2012 Grey Cup be in Toronto? Or out West?

With Toronto to be flooded by football fans from the West for a surprise Saskatchewan Roughriders-Winnipeg Blue Bombers Grey Cup, there will be no lack of fans here to support the concept of the 100th anniversary belonging where the Grey Cup has flourished since Toronto last fumbled the football here in 1992.

Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatchewan and Winnipeg each have held two successful celebrations of Canadiana in the interim with almost no Toronto fans showing up to participate.

But there's more to it than that. Looming in the background is the NFL and the Buffalo Bills. Toronto will have one pre-season game and one regular season game of the Buffalo Bills for each of the next five years.

It's possible the 100th anniversary Grey Cup game could be held here the same year Toronto becomes a full-schedule NFL city.

A Grey Cup on Sunday and the Toronto Bills hosting Monday Night Football the next night? Would that be a good thing or a bad thing?

Canadian Colts? NFL team considering move to Toronto

By Dave Forister, THG Sports

Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay was recently quoted as saying the Colts would consider a move to Toronto in 2007 if the team can’t come to an agreement with the city of Indianapolis on the building of a new stadium by that time.

The Colts, whose revenues are among the worst in the league, feel they need a larger, more modern stadium with luxury skyboxes to be able to compete financially with other teams in the NFL. If the city won’t build them a new stadium, then it is very likely they will move. “The RCA Dome is a very nice facility—by 1984 standards. It is depressing when we go on the road and see all these great new facilities and then have to come back here and play,” said Irsay in a Sunday afternoon interview.

Irsay told The Hoosier Gazette he would like to keep the team in Indianapolis because of the tremendous fan support the team receives, sometimes even selling out a game when a very good opponent comes to town, but in the end the decision will come down to finances. “It is all about the Benjamins,” said Irsay.

Toronto has a metropolitan area of over 5.5 million, five times that of Indianapolis, and is willing to build a new stadium if the NFL wanted to move a franchise into Canada’s largest city.

“We would welcome the NFL to Toronto with open arms,” said the city’s new mayor David Miller, “Except if the Cardinals wanted to move here of course. They suck.”

If the Colts can’t come to terms with Indianapolis and do decide to move, they would play in the Toronto Sky Dome until a new football-only stadium was built. The Sky Dome seats 53,506 for football and is currently the home of Major League Baseball’s Blue Jays and the Canadian Football League’s Argonauts.

SEE:

unintended consequences

Edmonton Eskimo Moon's NFL Hall of Fame

SKYDOME THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SPORTS

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
TSN, OTR, Grey Cup, Rona Cup, Paul Godfrey, Pinball Clemens, sports, NFL in Toronto, Canada, Canadian Football, CFL, Skydome,Football, NFL, CFL

Harpers War Costs More Lives

Harpers War; the body count has increased to 65

And it's a land mine by any other name that killed them. And the reason was that they were traveling in a 'light armoured vehicle' an ATV by any other name.

And as per usual the Afghani killed remains unnamed. As if he was just a bystander in the war.

Nov 19, 2007 05:32 PM

THE CANADIAN PRESS

MONTREAL – The family of a Quebec soldier who died in battle in Afghanistan says he was committed to making a difference in this world.

Cpl. Nicolas Raymond Beauchamp, 28, of the 5th Field Ambulance of CFB Valcartier, was killed on Saturday when his light armoured vehicle struck a roadside bomb.

Pte. Michel Levesque, 25, of the Royal 22nd Regiment – also known as the Van Doos – was also killed in the blast, as was an Afghan interpreter.

SEE

Clarification

Harpers Body Count

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
NDP, liberals, Afghanistan, PB, BT, Canada, Progressivebloggers, bloggingtories, blogs, blogging, bringthetroopshome, Layton,NDP, Layton, TroopsOut, Afghanistan, War, Harper, Conservatives, Liberals, Canada, politics, military, NATO, peacekeeping, Karzai, NDP, liberals, Afghanistan, PB, BT, Canada, Progressivebloggers, bloggingtories, blogs, blogging, bringthetroopshome, Layton,NDP, Layton, TroopsOut, Afghanistan, War, Harper, Conservatives, Liberals, Canada, politics, military, NATO, peacekeeping, Karzai, Liberals, Canada, Soldiers, Death, Injury, Afghanistan, Government, Politics, values,

Chandler Wins Egmont Nomination

Well Craig Chandler sold enough memberships to his extreme right-whingnut pals to win the Calgary Egmont Conservative MLA nomination. You may remember Craig " Alberta; Love it or Leave It" Chandler from my previous posts. If not check them out.

There is a silver lining to his victory though. It opens Calgary Egmont to a possible Liberal victory. As Calgary Grit writes;

As a constituent in Calgary Egmont, I'm a little torn about this one. Having Craig Chandler as my MLA is a scary thought but, at the same time, it puts a riding that was never going to elect a Liberal MLA before into play. The Alberta Liberals have nominated former Catholic school board trustee Cathie Williams in the riding - quite the catch. Cathie is an accomplished woman who is smart, politically astute, passionate about policy, and not Craig Chandler. These four qualities of hers should make Calgary Egmont a riding to watch during the upcoming provincial election.

Or perhaps an NDP sneak up the middle.
Or maybe not.

And PB blogger Daveberta apparently live blogged Chandlers victorious nomination win. live from the edmontonians for craig chandler party

posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Alberta, Premier,Ed Stelmach, PC, Calgary, Conservatives, Calgary Egmont,social conservatives, PGIB, Alberta, MLA,
Alberta, Premier,
NDP, Liberals, MLA, Taft,

Japan's Scientific Whaling Hoax

Apparently rumours are that Japan might consider abandoning their hunt of the endangered Humpbacks. However that is a classic red herring.

More: Rumours from Tokyo: Humpbacks to be spared the harpoon?

This is pretty incredible, and will be wonderful if it happens. Of course, saving the 50 humpbacks may be a red herring by the whalers; with everyone excited about the humpbacks - which are threatened and very iconic - it's easy to forget about the 50 less recognisable endangered fin whales and the 935 minke whales that the whaling fleet plans to kill over the next few months.

The bottom line is that Japan's Whaling operations are not for science but sushi.

Catching whales for science is a hoax

The Fisheries Agency of Japan (FAJ) and the Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR) make more frequent defences of their research than usual - probably feeling the pressure. Here is an analysis of the failed research by our whales specialist John Frizell.

By John Frizell

In 1987, the ban on commercial whaling came into force for Japan. Yet despite the ban the whaling fleet which had previously conducted the commercial hunt sailed at its usual time to the same whaling grounds in the Antarctic to take the same species of whale they had caught the year before and return them to Japan boxed in 15 kg cardboard cartons, ready for sale. This was made possible by ‘scientific’ whaling.

When the last remaining high seas commercial whaling company in Japan was dissolved in 1987, it gave its factory ship and catchers to a new company whose shareholders were all companies formerly involved in whaling. In the same year a non profit organisation called the Institute for Cetacean Research (ICR) was founded. The new company that now owned the whaling fleet donated nine million US dollars to the ICR. The ICR promptly chartered the whaling fleet from the new company and set off for the Antarctic using the factory ship, catchers and crew from the commercial hunt to catch whales in the name of science.

See my Facebook campaign to oppose Japanese Whaling. I have also posted a link in the sidebar to the left.

Here are some posts from fellow progressive bloggers on the outrage of Japans Whale Hunt.

Japan Whaling Again

Primitive Japanese Whaling Practice Resumes

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Japan, whaling, Greenpeace, Esperanza, Japanese Whaling Fleet, anti-whaling, whales, Star Trek IV,endangered species, Sea Sheperd, International Whaling Commission, Cetacean, ocean mammals, sea, ocean, seafood, fish, fishing, UN, Canada, Hearn, Newfoundland, trawlers, draggers, extinction, climate-change, Government, Ottawa, politics, US

Dino In The Basement

There is no need for expensive expeditions to exotic locales to discover rare or undiscovered dinosaurs. One simply needs to go to the basement.

ROM uncovers dinosaur bones --in its basement

For the Royal Ontario Museum, the recent discovery of a massive Barosaurus skeleton is quite a find: It was inside the museum, and it's been there for 45 years.

In 1962, ROM curator Gordon Edmund brought the dinosaur skeleton to the museum in a trade with the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. But the specimens were forgotten when Dr. Edmund retired from the museum in 1990; he has since died.

"Nobody at the museum knew about them, or what their significance was," said David Evans, the ROM's associate curator of vertebrate paleontology. ''Or that they belonged to a single animal. The curators here over the last 20 years didn't realize we had the specimen in the collection and didn't know what it was."

ROM director William Thorsell, standing with a 150-kilogram Barosaurus thigh bone and drawing of the dinosaur, describes the upcoming Age of Dinosaurs exhibit, opening on Dec. 15.

Untouched on a shelf for 113 years: a dusty bone of the dinosaur no one knew existed

Mike Taylor was rummaging among the shelves of the Natural History Museum in London when he came across it - a label stuck to a dusty fossil that struck the part-time dinosaur enthusiast as distinctly wrong.

For 113 years it had barely attracted a second look, stored deep below the museum after being dismissed as just another fossil from a common North American dinosaur. In fact, what the computer programmer from Gloucestershire had found was evidence of a new species that lived 140m years ago.

The dinosaur, now named Xenoposeidon proneneukus, belonged to a previously unknown family of sauropods, according to the journal of the British Paleontological Association, which reports the discovery for the first time today.

It was about the size of an elephant and weighed as much as 7.5 tonnes, the paper suggests.

The astonishing find came last January during a day of PhD research spent picking through bones to learn more about sauropods, the largest creatures ever to walk the Earth. Taylor was visiting the museum as part of a his research at Portsmouth University. He hoped to work out what fossil fragments tell us about sauropods unearthed in a giant slab of rock that stretches under most of Britain and out to the continent.

The bone of a Xenoposeidon proneneukus dinosaur. Photograph: Portsmouth University/PA

That was two finds last week.

Then there was this case of the dino in the basement at the University of Alberta last year.

Edmontonian Discovers New Dinosaur

And this case as well.

Old croc looks like bizarre crossbreed

Rossella Lorenzi Discovery News

Friday, 27 January 2006

The discovery of a six-foot-long, bipedal and toothless fossil in a museum basement suggests crocodile ancestors looked like some bird-like dinosaurs that lived millions of years later, scientists say.

The crocodile ancestor fossil, found in the basement of New York's American Museum of Natural History, is an example of how similar body types can evolve several times over.

A museum team excavated the 210-million-year-old fossil in the 1940s from the Ghost Ranch Quarry in New Mexico.

This site has produced numerous fossils of Coelophysis, small, carnivorous dinosaurs that lived in the Triassic period.

SEE:

Hooversaurus


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Royal Ontario Museum, ROM, paleontology, fossils, dinosaurs, Natural History Museum in London, Mike Taylor, paleontology, prehistoric, Carnegie Museum of Natural History,
Coelophysis, Xenoposeidon proneneukus, Gordon Edmund, Barosaurus

Hooversaurus

Don't have a Mesozoic cow man.

See even dinosaurs required janitors.

Dinosaur found with vacuum-cleaner mouth

By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID AP Science Writer

Article Launched: 11/16/2007 03:26:20 AM PST

WASHINGTON—A dinosaur with a strange jaw designed to hoover-up food grazed in what is now the Sahara Desert 110 million years ago. Remains of the creature that "flabbergasted" paleontologist Paul Sereno went on display Thursday at the headquarters of the National Geographic Society, where they will remain until March.

Sereno and colleagues recovered, assembled and named the creature—Nigersaurus taqueti—that he said seems to break all the rules, yet still existed.

"The biggest eureka moment was when I was sitting at the desk with this jaw," he said. "I was sitting down just looking at it and saw a groove and ... realized that all the teeth were up front."

It's not normally a good idea to have all the teeth in the front of the jaw—hundreds in this case.

Sure, "it's great for nipping," Sereno said, "but that's not where you want do your food processing."

"That was an amazing moment, we knew we had something no one had ever seen before," Sereno recalled.

Sereno, a National Geographic explorer-in-residence and paleontologist at the University of Chicago, said the first evidence of Nigersaurus was found in the 1990s and now researchers have been able to reconstruct its skull and skeleton.

While Nigersaurus' mouth is shaped like the wide intake slot of a vacuum, it has something lacking in most cleaners—hundreds of tiny, sharp teeth to grind up its food.

Fossil is new family of dinosaur [BBC News]

Herbivore dinosaur grazed like a cow

It has been 60 years since French paleontologists found the dinosaur's bones in Saharan Africa, and 10 years since Paul C. Sereno of the University

Whole new picture of plant- eating dinosaurs

Could an elephant-size dinosaur with a skull so thin that a karate chop would have split it in two, teeth that lasted only a month, and a brain …

Structural Extremes in a Cretaceous Dinosaur [PLoS ONE]

Dinosaur from Sahara ate like a 'mesozoic cow' [Press Release]

National Geographic: http://www.nationalgeographic.com/dinosaurs and http://www.projectexploration.org.

SEE:

Sudbury And The Dinosaurs

Dinos and World Systems Theory

Prehistoric Bi-Plane

More Dino News

Prehistoric Happy Feet

Creationism Is Not Science

Paleontologist Versus Paleo Conservatives

T-Rex In Your Gas Tank

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
University of Chicago, Nigersaurus taqueti, paleontology, fossils,
dinosaurs, Paul Sereno, Cretaceous Dinosaur, paleontology, prehistoric, Museum,
Sahara, niger, Mesozoic cow , Nigersaurus

Japan's Whaling Outrage

Clearly the sushi market sets the 'scientific research' agenda in Japan.

Japan hunts 50 humpback whales for research

As if the stupidity of their phony 'scientific research' expeditions for whales, whale hunting by any other name, was not bad enough now Japan intends to hunt the endangered Humpback Whale.

In Moby-Dick, Herman Melville describes the Humpback Whale as "the most gamesome and light-hearted of all the whales, making more gay foam and white water than any other of them".

Guess Star Trek IV is not as popular in Japan as it is here. Or perhaps it lost something in the translation.

The Esperanza, Greenpeace's anti-whaling ship, could use the Enterprise's help now.

Because they won't get any help from the Canadian Government.


Send letters of protest to the Embassy of Japan in Canada
255 Sussex Drive
Ottawa, Ontario
K1N 9E6
Tel: (613) 241-8541
Fax: (613) 241-7415
infocul@embjapan.ca

And copy your protest letter to your MP and the Party Leaders.

I am so outraged over this I have started a Facebook cause.

BLOOD ON THEIR HANDS: A Japanese whaling ship harpoons a whale off Antarctica, in this file picture.

A defiant Japan embarked on its largest whaling expedition in decades Sunday, targeting protected humpbacks for the first time since the 1960s despite international opposition. An anti-whaling protest boat awaited the fleet offshore.

The whalers plan to kill up to 50 humpbacks in what is believed to be the first large-scale hunt for the once nearly extinct species since a 1963 moratorium in the Southern Pacific put the giant marine mammals under international protection.

The mission also aims to take as many as 935 minke whales and up to 50 fin whales in what Japan's Fisheries Agency says is its largest-ever scientific whale hunt. The expedition lasts through April.

Japan says it needs to kill the animals in order to conduct research on their reproductive and feeding patterns.

While scientific whale hunts are allowed by the International Whaling Commission, or IWC, critics say Japan is simply using science as a cover for commercial whaling.

The Japanese hunt, which puts meat from the whales on the commercial market, is growing rapidly despite an increasingly vocal anti-whaling movement. This winter season's target of up to 1,035 whales is more than double the number the country hunted a decade ago.

The head of Japan's Fisheries Agency said Sunday the fruits of Tokyo's research would help prove that sustainable whaling is possible.

"The scientific research we carry out will pave the way to overturning the moratorium on commercial whaling, which will better help us to utilize whale resources," Shuji Yamada told the ceremony.

The focus on this year's hunt is the humpback, which was in serious danger of extinction just a few decades ago. They are now a favorite of whale-watchers for their playful antics at sea, where the beasts — which grow as large as 40 tons — throw themselves out of the water.

Humpbacks feed, mate and give birth near shore, making them easy prey for whalers, who by some estimates depleted the global population to just 1,200 before the 1963 moratorium. The southern moratorium was followed by a worldwide ban in 1966.

Since then, only Greenland and the Caribbean nation of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines have been allowed to catch humpbacks under an IWC aboriginal subsistence program. Each caught one humpback last year, according to the commission.

The American Cetacean Society estimates the humpback population has recovered to about 30,000-40,000 — about a third of the number before modern whaling. The species is listed as "vulnerable" by the World Conservation Union.

Japanese fisheries officials insist the population has returned to a sustainable level and that taking 50 of them will have no impact

"George and Gracie," the humpback whales in Star Trek IV,
were Walt Conti's first animatronic creations back in 1986.

GreenPeace Follow the Great Whale Trail!

Today we launched the Great Whale Trail, following the migration of humpback whales from the warm tropical waters of the South Pacific, where they breed, to the icy Southern Ocean around Antarctica, where they feed. And we're doing it via satellite tracking and Google Maps. Nifty.

It's a collaboration between Greenpeace and scientists studying humpback whales in the South Pacific. We provided the financial support, while the humpbacks have been tagged by the Cook Islands Whale Research, and Opération Cétacés (New Caledonia). Why are we doing this? Well, it's simple, really: whales must not be allowed to die in the thousands for needless, discredited "research," - like that carried out by the Japanese whaling fleet. We're satellite tracking whales in the Southern Ocean to prove that non-lethal means can be used to do some real research!

The Great Whale Trail follows the migration of humpback whales from the warm tropical waters of the South Pacific, where they breed, to the icy Southern Ocean around Antarctica, where they feed. Click on the whale icon to see more information about the individual whales.

The whales are heading to the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary, which should be a safe haven for them. Unfortunately, whaling still continues there.

Why the Japanese Fleet can't use this map to find and kill the humpbacks.

Greenpeace has a long history of defending the whales of the Southern Ocean by activists putting themselves between the whale and the harpoon. We would never let a whale be put in danger. The posting of the location of the whales on this website has been delayed to ensure the whaling fleet cannot locate them through the Great Whale Trail.

In addition, to justify their whaling as "science", the Fisheries Agency of Japan (FAJ) fleet is obliged to follow strict pre-determined search patterns or 'transects', when they hunt the whales. They claim this is to show that they are doing random population sampling. Any deviation for a single whale or large groups would automatically negate their so-called "scientific" programme.

Real live Humpback Whale and her calf courtesy Greenpeace.

SEE:

Your Sunday Bible Reading: Moby Dick

Belugas

Our Whales Are Missing

High Crimes On The High Sea's

Dolphins Say Scientist A Dim Wit

Whales Were Not Always Vegans

General Jackson Slaughters Luna

Canadian Anti-Whalers Attacked

Confrontation on the High Seas

Piracy on the High Seas

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
fishing, Moby Dick, Humpback Wahle, Herman Melville, Ishmael, Call-Me-Ismael, Japan, whaling, Greenpeace, Esperanza, Japanese Whaling Fleet, anti-whaling, whales, Star Trek IV,endangered species, Sea Sheperd, International Whaling Commission, Cetacean, ocean mammals, sea, ocean, seafood, fish, fishing, UN, Canada, Hearn, Newfoundland, trawlers, draggers, extinction, climate-change, Government, Ottawa, politics, US

Tags
endangered species
environment
Japan
Whales
Greenpeace

Global Warming Headlines

World on the verge of climate 'catastrophe': UN chief

Climate change accelerating, top scientists warn

Climate change will affect poor countries most, but will be felt everywhere.

Huge death toll after Bangladesh typhoon

Climate change fuelling water crisis

Aid Workers: Climate Change, Rising Prices Threaten Africa's Food Supply

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Canada, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, Nobel, Nobel Peace Prize, Environment, UN IPCC,
climate change, environment, global warming,
Kyoto, UN, IPCC

Chupacabra A Shunka Warakin

A what? Well thanks to BigCityLiberal perhaps we have a solution to what the Chupacabra is. Perhaps this cryptozoological phenomena is just another name for a different cryptozoological creature. Perhaps they are one and the same. Since they are both cryptids. Perhaps the Chupacabra is a Shunka Warakin.

In the Great Plains of the American West, from at least Montana to Nebraska, there have been reports of an animal that seems to be a hyena. With a sloping back and hyena-like features, this beast was known to the Ioway Indians as the shunka warak'in. Similar creatures, with different names, were reported from the lands of other tribes. This animal was generally described as having dark fur, often black and sometimes red. The shaggy areas were distributed in a different way than on wolves. White settlers also thought they had seen this creature, and some were even mounted as trophies. Although the present wherabouts of these trophies is now unknown, one famous trophy had a picture taken of it, although it might have been a strange-looking wolf mounted by an incompetent taxidermist. Only DNA testing could settle the question.

After all the later is a supposed extinct North American Wolf Hyena hybrid as this picture shows of one shot and preserved in the 19th Century.

Shunka Warak'in

In the late 19th century, the Hutchins family moved into an area of Montana along the Madison River's West Fork, in Broadwater County. They were soon to report encounters with a mysterious canine beast known to Native Americans.

One of the descendants of the original clan was zoologist Ross Hutchins. In 1977, he would write Trails to Nature's Mysteries: The Life of a Working Naturalist. Within this book is reference to one of the most obscure creatures to grace North America's cryptozoological landscape. The following account is reproduced from that book.

One winter morning my grandfather was aroused by the barking of the dogs. He discovered that a wolflike beast of dark color was chasing my grandmother's geese. He fired his gun at the animal but missed. It ran off down the river, but several mornings later it was seen again at about dawn. It was seen several more times at the home ranch as well as at other ranches ten or fifteen miles down the valley. Whatever it was, it was a great traveler...

Those who got a good look at the beast described it as being nearly black and having high shoulders and a back that sloped downward like a hyena. Then one morning in late January, my grandfather was alerted by the dogs, and this time he was able to kill it. Just what the animal was is still an open question. After being killed, it was donated to a man named Sherwood who kept a combination grocery and museum at Henry Lake in Idaho. It was mounted and displayed there for many years. He called it ringdocus.

An Ioway Indian named Lance Foster approached Loren Coleman in 1995 and informed him of traditions existing in that tribe of an animal called a shunka warak'in ('Carrying-Off-Dogs') which cried like a human when killed. Foster's descriptions of an animal that looked something like a hyena and the existence of one in an Idaho museum are testimony that the animal killed at the Hutchins ranch was a Shunka Warak'in.

Coleman speculates that the creature may have represented a survival of a prehistoric species known as Borophagus, although my own researches into the animal makes it seem even more likely that it may belong to another prehistoric species, a creodont known as Hyaenodon montanus. H. montanus was a rather lightly built member of the Neohyaenodon subspecies

And these pictures shows the alleged Chupacabra caught in Texas this summer.

Eric Gay / AP

Phylis Canion holds the head of what she is calling a Chupacabra at her home in Cuero, Texas, Friday, Aug. 31, 2007

Creature ID'd As Coyote, Not Chupacabra

updated 8:32 a.m. MT, Fri., Nov. 2, 2007
SAN MARCOS, Texas - The results are in: The ugly, big-eared animal found this summer in southern Texas is not the mythical, bloodsucking chupacabra. It's just a plain old coyote.

Biologists at Texas State University announced Thursday night they had identified the hairless doglike creature.

Oh well.....there are lots more Chupacabra still out there.

But the Shunka Warakin is extinct. Or perhaps not....

Wolf,dog,Shunka Warakin?

Posted by Mark on February 24, 2007, 11:04 am

Did anyone ever here of the dna results on that wolf creature they shot from a helicopter in Nov 2006 in Montana,that killed 120 sheep? It was 106 lbs,& orangeish color.In the 1800's a settler in Montana shot & mounted what they called Ringdocus,the Indians called it Shunka Warakin ("carrying off dogs").I have a picture of the mount in a book I have.Anyway both storys r neat but I never read a follow up story on the dna results.Some said it could've been a wolf from the great lakes region but I never saw an orange wolf out here.Mabey a Wolf-dog X. Who knows?

Your True Tales
August 2007 - Page 6

Shunka Warakin
by James

I was eight in 1992 and went camping with my friends in his backyard. We made camp and lit a fire. We were in the tents when a shadow was cast on the side. We thought it was a dog at first and I went outside to chase it off. But it was not a dog. The most I remember is its eyes, they were red. The fur was black and reminded me of a hog. It smelled awful. Its front legs were longer than the back legs. It just stared at me and then it just walked back into the woods.

I talked to an Native friend of mine and he heard of it. My wife brought home a book called Weird Georgia and it had a picture and an article about it. The picture made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. The book called it a "wog". We Googled "wog" but didn't get much, but then we found a picture of "shunka warakin" and the hair stood up again. I live in southern Georgia and actively deer hunt, but have never seen another creature like this - and hope never too.

Cue eerie music....


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Monsters, myths,cryptid,Shunka Warakin,coyote, legends,Chupacabra,Texas,cryptozoology,