Thursday, August 13, 2009

Woman attacked by otters in Wisconsin lake

An Austrian woman on vacation in Wisconsin is getting rabies shots after she said she was bitten several times by at least two otters while swimming in a lake.

Brigitte France, 51, told the Duluth News Tribune that she was swimming on Lake Owen near Drummond, Wis., last Wednesday when she heard something hissing behind her.

She spotted an otter. "I thought it was really cool," she said. "I'd never seen an otter before. Then, all of a sudden, there were three of them."

She felt uncomfortable and swam to shore. She said she had her hands on the shore and legs in the water, "and there they were -- one on the right leg and one on the left leg"...

Capital Times

Monday, June 01, 2009

Connecticut bride saves family from house fire while wearing wedding gown

A Connecticut family has been saved from a house fire by a new bride who rushed inside through thick smoke while wearing her wedding gown.

Officials say Georgette Clemons had just left her wedding reception Sunday evening when she spotted smoke coming from a Bridgeport home.

Clemons got out of the car she was riding in and ran into the home. She says a woman was yelling about her animals and didn't want to leave, so she had to pull her out, according to the Connecticut Post...

--USA Today

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Brown Highland cattle produce rare white calf

The five-day-old calf, named Heather, was born to cow Isabelle and bull Robert, which both have the species' distinctive long and shaggy brown hair.

Breeders say Heather is not albino, but has a recessive gene which means she has been covered in completely white and pale hair.

The distinctive Highland cattle are one of Britain's oldest breeds and are instantly recognisable for their rusty, red and brown hair and long horns.

Heather's owner Andrew Nunn, 42 from Bere Ferrers, Devon, said he was surprised when he saw her colouring.

He said: "I looked out of the window after breakfast and just saw this pure white calf – I was stunned. I could see her from right across the field.

"At first I thought I was seeing things, but there she was. I was elated. She is just gorgeous. She is so friendly, a lot of cattle are wary of people, but Heather will come up to you like a dog...

--Telegraph.co.uk

Dolphins join fight against Somali pirates in Gulf of Aden

A pod of dolphins has hampered an attempted Somali pirate attack on a convoy of Chinese commercial vessels in the Gulf of Aden, Chinese media reported on Tuesday.

International Radio China reported that more than 1,000 dolphins had encircled several Chinese ships sailing through the Gulf of Aden on Monday, creating a live barrier between the commercial vessels and the Somali pirates.

The China Daily reported that the dolphins "suddenly leaped out of water between the pirates and merchants when the pirate ships headed for the Chinese vessels." The pirates were unable to approach the Chinese commercial vessels and had to retreat...

--RIA Novosti

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Top 10 oddballs of the animal world

From the outside, the platypus looks like a grade-school art project assembled by a kid too busy making spitballs to pay attention in class. The creature, which is classified as a mammal, has a duck's bill and webbed feet, lays eggs like a reptile, but has fur and rears its young on milk.
Researchers say the platypus genome is equally cobbled together from bird, reptile and mammalian lineages. One more oddity: Males can deliver venom from tiny spurs on each hind limb. Click on the "Next" arrow above to learn about nine more oddballs in the animal world...

--MSNBC

Friday, February 20, 2009

Woman's hair weave stops bullet

Police said a woman's tightly-woven hair weave saved her life.

Police were called to a Kansas City market at about 11:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Arriving officers found the 20-year-old woman there. She told police she had pulled into the market and saw a man with whom she had recently ended an eight-month relation with inside a car, NewsChannel5 sister station KSHB-TV reported...

--MSNBC

Tuesday, February 03, 2009

Donor kidney removed via vagina

US surgeons say they have successfully removed a healthy donor kidney through a small incision in the back of the donor's vagina.

Removing the kidney through "a natural orifice" speeds up recovery and gives a better cosmetic result - avoiding a six inch abdominal scar - they say.

The Johns Hopkins team say the 48-year-old woman who donated the organ to her niece on 29 January is "doing well".

Surgeons have also removed gallbladders and appendixes through the mouth.

Diseased gallbladders, kidneys and appendixes have been removed through the vagina before.

But this is believed to be the first time that doctors have managed to harvest a healthy donor kidney for transplantation in this way...

--BBC News

Monday, February 02, 2009

Mexico, Radio Shack turn to voodoo to beat United States

A Mexican sports daily is pinning its hopes of beating the United States in a World Cup qualifying match on voodoo — with help from a U.S-based electronics chain.

An advertisement in the sports daily Record on Tuesday invited fans to clip a coupon and redeem it at their local Radio Shack store for a voodoo-doll likeness of a U.S. player. The hope was that a little black magic might help Mexico break a decade of futility on the road versus its northern neighbor.

"Help end the losing streak so Mexico advances," the ad read.

An illustration showed a pair of scissors slicing off the leg of a doll in a U.S. jersey that was bruised, crying out in pain, leaking stuffing, and stuck with pushpins.

The press office of Radio Shack in Fort Worth did not immediately return phone calls and e-mails seeking comment...

--USA Today

Sewage yields more gold than top mines

Resource-poor Japan just discovered a new source of mineral wealth -- sewage.

A sewage treatment facility in central Japan has recorded a higher gold yield from sludge than can be found at some of the world's best mines. An official in Nagano prefecture, northwest of Tokyo, said the high percentage of gold found at the Suwa facility was probably due to the large number of precision equipment manufacturers in the vicinity that use the yellow metal. The facility recently recorded finding 1,890 grammes of gold per tonne of ash from incinerated sludge.

That is a far higher gold content than Japan's Hishikari Mine, one of the world's top gold mines, owned by Sumitomo Metal Mining Co Ltd, which contains 20-40 grammes of the precious metal per tonne of ore.

The prefecture is so far due to receive 5 million yen ($55,810) for the gold, minus expenses...

--Yahoo! News

N.J. disc jockey to part with Jenny's number

After five years fielding thousands of calls to one of rock 'n' roll's most celebrated phone numbers, disc jockey Spencer Potter is hanging up on Jenny.

Her seven digits are familiar to anyone who paid attention to pop music in the early 1980s: 867-5309, immortalized by the band Tommy Tutone.

Potter and his roommates requested the number on a lark for their home phone in northern New Jersey. They got it, along with about 30 to 40 calls a day...

--Yahoo! News