An epidemic of beak deformities among Black-capped Chickadee and Northwestern Crow and other common birds has been identified in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest region of North America. In affected birds, the beak becomes grossly overgrown, sometimes accompanied by abnormal skin and feathers.
Oh the things you can find in my closets!
This is a snapping turtle penis in a jar of alcohol. Not entirely sure what to do with it but it was too weird of a find to let go to waste!
We know them by many names but collectively they are known as Mystery Spots because of the mysterious events which often occur in, or near them. Lucky for us their owners love to show them off and visitors are welcome to come in and see the resident “alien vortex,” and other strange phenomenon…for a small fee. Mystery Spots are a product of the Great Depression, a time when entertainment was just about the only industry still growing in America. Mystery Spots continue to draw crowds and delight visitors to this day.
Most mystery spots share a basic presentation. You are shown into a special room or small cabin where the strange phenomenon will occur. A friendly guide explains that what you are about to see “lies well-beyond the scope of science.” The patter may differ, but the stage is set for some rather astounding optical illusions. You will see balls roll uphill, and water flow briskly up the spout. You will watch as ordinary chairs defy gravity and cling to the wall without support, while fellow visitors stand around in impossible angles.
Chapel of Bones (Evora, Portugal)
A reverent grimness falls over every soul visiting this chapel (Capela dos Ossos) inside the Church of São Francisco. Its walls and columns are covered in artistically composed designs of bones from more than 5,000 exhumed skeletons. Meticulously placed ribs and tibias form the bands of arches. Tightly arranged skulls and vertebrae fill every gap. Each bone was arranged by a 16th-century Franciscan monk with a message (and a dark sense of humor): Life is temporary.
Chapel tours ($3) take you beneath the entrance’s warning, which is translated, “We bones, lying here, for yours we wait” and into the beautifully lit chapel. On one wall a child’s dried corpse hangs from a chain. That a display can be both gorgeous and gruesome at once is troubling. Here’s a 360-degree view.
Want a quick way to lose those extra pounds? Then tapeworms are the solution for you! Okay, these pills probably didn’t actually have tapeworms in them, but they were definitely filled with pretty repulsive things.
Prince Randian and Johnny Eck on the set of “Freaks” (1932) a film by Tod Browning
BORN TRUE HERMAPHRODITE
Lynn Edward Harris, born Lynn Elizabeth Harris, 09/13/50
On November 8th, 1973 at age 23 Harris was clinically diagnosed by a team of specialists as possessing a rare, complex, congenital condition known as “True Hermaphroditism” [Intersex] with undescended, sub-sized ovotestes i.e. “gonadal mosaicism” found in approximately 1-in-25,000 births.
Due to ambiguously-formed genitalia at birth [stunted penis; divided scrotum; and vagina], Harris, (mal)assigned “female” by both parents and pediatrician, was raised as such and continued living in said social gender role until age 29 - six years after the disclosure of this fixed, irreversible, yet-evolving biological state.
Zan and Spooktastic. Adolescent male llama and a very old male llama.
Allan Grant—Cat eating corn on the cob from the LIFE archive, 1951
1940s Don’t Cry Louisiana Sweet Potatoes
Koo Koo the Bird Girl was born Minnie Woolsey in 1880. She suffered from a rare skeletal disorder called Virchow-Seckel syndrome, which caused her to have a very short stature, a small head, a narrow birdlike face with a beak-like nose, large slanted eyes, a receding jaw, large ears, and mild mental retardation. She was also bald, toothless, and either completely blind or very short sighted.
The Persistence of Memory by S. Dali
