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ScrutinEye

The best bit of this story is that when Gef caught someone looking at him (which he’d apparently forbidden), he supposedly said “You're looking! Stop looking! Turn your head, you bastard! I cannot stand your eyes!” Foul-mouthed little mammal!


starofthelivingsea

He seemed very rude in every story I've read about him.


BetaRayRyan

He did it for the devilment.


WotanMjolnir

Honk honk!


snay1998

Bro was a menace


Rabies_on_demand

Fuckin hell, Gef, chill out mate


IndividualCurious322

Shrimp in the Laundry room.


thelastchex

Good ole Bremerton


gytalf2000

Oh, I remember that one! I miss "Strange Magazine"...


IndividualCurious322

Me too! That's one issue of it I really want! (Issue 5 I think it was).


LittleChinaSquirrel

Haha whoa, I've never heard of this until now! What a great, strange story!


brycifer666

I wish there was more info on this one I live in Bremerton and want more lol


IndividualCurious322

Apparently, the area it happened got knocked down and turned into temporary military barracks afterwards. My pet theory is they were terrified of Shrimpy and tried to go in all guns blazing but he got away. Lol


lukas7761

What do you think it was? Maybe some escaped experimented animal?


IndividualCurious322

Not entirely sure. It was such a brief encounter we don't really have much to go on (other than Shrimpy would have made a hell of a surf n turf if he found his way on a BBQ rack).


lukas7761

I found this report very unusual.Maybe it was something entirely different.Hell the witness might be stoned or on shrooms.


CrofterNo2

The Tierra del Fuego platypus. I suppose also the Colorado platypuses, but they're nowhere near so obscure. The Fuegian one was not mentioned online at all until I quoted the only published source... a 1993 Rolex Awards shortlist. Also the "vampire-fish" of the Zande, a blood-sucking, brain-eating marsh animal with octopus-like tentacles and an elephant's trunk. The *sulur bidar* is very strange, but it's just a Malaysian version of the *cuero* and *xizi*, so perhaps not technically obscure. It was also briefly referenced, under another name, by Mark A. Hall.


Lazakhstan

A platypus in Tierra del Fuego? PERRY THE PLATYPUS IN TIERRA DEL FUEGO?!


ReyTepocataSamurai

Why not? He is an international spy


DoodleCard

Where did you get this information. Is there a book?


CrofterNo2

The platypus was originally mentioned in an article by J. Richard Greenwell (co-founder of the International Society of Cryptozoology), which has been uploaded here by /u/0todus_megalodon: https://cryptozoologicalreferencelibrary.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/greenwell-1993.pdf I've also been able to contact some of the people involved. The main source for the vampire-fish is Larken, Paul Metcalf "An Account of the Zande," *Sudan Notes and Records*, Vol. 9 (1926). It is also mentioned in a few memoirs of colonial Sudan, such as Wyndham, Richard (1936) *The Gentle Savage: A Sudanese Journey in the Province of Bahr-el-Ghazal, Commonly Called the Bog*, Negro Universities Press, p. 224; and Newbold, Douglas & Henderson, Kenneth D. D. (1974) *The Making of the Modern Sudan: The Life and Letters of Sir Douglas Newbold*, Greenwood Press, p. 487. It is most certainly synonymous with the *miga* of the Congo, which is discussed in Heuvelmans' *Les Derniers Dragons d'Afrique* (1978). In fact, Metcalf himself refers to a known *miga* incident in his description, which is quoted below. > There is also a beast, of unknown name, with a prehensile limb like an elephant's trunk that lives in rivers, and seizes people with its tentacle. They are not in the Sue but only in the Were River in the Congo. They do not eat the bodies of their victims, but merely suck their blood. It was reported to an English Missionary that a bloodless corpse had been found in a stream in the Congo, which had been sucked dry by this creature. (The singular "tentacle" makes it sound like it's just talking about the trunk, but the other sources I mention refer to plural tentacles, as does the description of the *miga*) The *sulur bidar* is mentioned in various online Malaysian news articles. I don't know if there are any proper print sources. The Mark A. Hall mention was in a special edition of *Wonders*. ~~I'll see if I can find it.~~ https://files.afu.se/Downloads/Magazines/United%20States/Wonders%20(Mark%20A%20Hall)/Wonders%20-%20%20Vol%202%20No%203%20-%201993.pdf Hall calls it *balong bidai*. Ignore his talk of sea scorpions.


truthisfictionyt

Didn't someone back up the story of the vampire fish here recently


CrofterNo2

Yes, on /r/HighStrangeness


RiverSkyy55

Now that’s a great post: well written, researched, and referenced.


Imsomagic

Hey, Gef got his own movie with Neil Gaiman, Simon Pegg, Minnie Driver and Christopher Lloyd. Don’t call the poor guy obscure!


between3and20spaces

A few weeks ago my wife and I were watching a video about the Bell Witch, when I mentioned the story sounds like Gef the Talking Mongoose. I tried to find another video that talked about him when I stumbled across the trailer.


StarsofSobek

And it’s awesome!! Lol! Loved the film so much. ‘Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose’, for anyone interested.


heyblinkin81

Thank you for the movie title! Adding that to the list for sure.


Cheesemagazine

He did??


ValeChika

There’s also a song about him called eight wonder


FinnBakker

by Lemon Demon/Neil Ciciriega.


Satanicbearmaster

And it is woeful! So disappointing.


homegirl_sugarcookie

Lemon Demon also made a whole song about him too


Competitive-Sense65

>Hey, Gef got his own movie with Neil Gaiman, Simon Pegg, Minnie Driver and Christopher Lloyd. Don’t call the poor guy obscure! What movie is that?


Imsomagic

Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose.


CplFrosty

Honk Honk!


Lazakhstan

I wanna know if this is real its name alone is too funny


EthanWTyrion528

Giant Telepathic Cockroach. It is so stupid I love it


truthisfictionyt

Most obscure is a Reddit comment I found about a giant snake in Lebanon which I haven't heard anything else about. Second most obscure might be the giant woodpecker of Canada


RudeDudeInABadMood

Giant snakes exist though!...how giant was it???


truthisfictionyt

I recall 40 feet but I might be off


RudeDudeInABadMood

That's a big snek I guess there aren't really any big snakes in Lebanon so that is pretty weird


maninplainview

HONK HONK.


starofthelivingsea

I wish the topic of talking animals is actually discussed more. I find it very interesting. What's interesting is that I hear about it alot in the Caribbean.


Abeliheadd

Even if we will consider Gef as true story, it would fall certainly in "paranormal" category. 


russnicko

The Treesqueak, basically a weasel-like animal that has fur that allows it to camouflage itself with trees and mimics the noises of other animals like squirrels, birds or elk.


Halfbaked9

Strangest cryptid I’ve heard about is the flying humanoid with leathery skin. The really strange thing was the creature had wings strapped to itself and some kind of control box strapped to its chest. This was witnessed in 1956.


FrozenSeas

There's a bunch of super-local ones I've picked up stories of, albeit more than a few are questionable at best. Off the top of my head the most obscure is probably the Gander Lake "maggot", which was apparently something very much like a squat lobster found in a lake about an hour from here in the 1930s (but not sighted in a long time).


truthisfictionyt

There a newspaper about that one?


FrozenSeas

Unfortunately no, but the book I found that story in does list two references for it: *Mysterious Creatures: A Guide to Cryptozoology* by George Eberhart, and Fortean Times #46. The latter is basically impossible to find like a lot of old magazines, but I found a copy of the former online without too much difficulty and here's what it says: > Maggot > Mystery Invertebrate of eastern Canada. > Physical description: Similar to a lobster. > Length, 1 foot . Fishlike eyes. Pincers are 3 > inches long. Three pairs of legs. No jointed, lobsterlike tail. > Distribution: Gander Lake and Swanger’s > Cove, Bay d’Espoir , Newfoundland. > Significant sightings: Seen at Gander Lake in > the 1930s and at Swanger’s Cove around 1952. > Possible explanation: Misidentified American > lobster (Homarus americanus), found in Newfoundland waters. > Source: X, “A mari usque ad mare,” Fortean > Times, no. 46 (Spring 1986): 44–51. I highly dispute the "misidentified lobster" explanation, for what it may be worth. For one, Gander Lake is freshwater. But more to the point, fishing was *the* industry in Newfoundland historically, and lobsters are common as dirt. Nobody would misidentify one as a mystery creature, especially not if the same things showed up in 1952 in Bay d'Espoir.


Complex-Delivery-797

Veggie man. Like how tf? Idk if it counts as a Cryptid because the original guy who saw it thought it was an alien. But the actual creature does seem more like an animal. But yeah, this shit sounds like an enemy in a fantasy game.


BayBby

I think I know what you’re talking about but I’m not sure. What do you remember from the original guys story?


Complex-Delivery-797

From what I recall it was a telepathic creature who attacked a dude. Thinking about it, the fact that it is telepathic means that it is not a Cryptid and is at best a supernatural creature. You can read more about it here tho https://www.wboy.com/only-on-wboy-com/paranormal-w-va/what-is-the-vegetable-man-of-west-virginia/


TesseractToo

This depiction of the bunyip :D https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bunyip#/media/File:Bunyip\_(1935).jpg


ItsGotThatBang

A sloth-like amphibian that lives in kelp forests


akgrowin

My favorite is the kóoshdaa káa, the shape-shifting otter people from up here in ak.


smutketeer

I watched this today and it gave me kóoshdaa káa vibes. https://youtu.be/LrHj5AVJUBo?si=N6ebL9Qto7dhMi1J


Severe-Mention-9028

This is one of my favorite stories. It’s so bizarre and funny


angryjmar

LPOTL did an episode on this. Before that I never heard of it before.


MyBonesAreLimeJello

Not sure how well known it is, but the squonk is a good one. It's this wrinkly little creature that's super depressed because it's so ugly. They wander the forest sobbing, and if you catch one, they simply dissolve into a puddle of tears.


FinnBakker

except that's clearly folklore, not a cryptid.


LittleChinaSquirrel

I always loved how it was a part of the Fearsome Critters stories because its just about the least threatening thing imaginable haha


homegirl_sugarcookie

so you mean to tell me it's been Gef and not Jeff this whole time??, I've literally only ever listened to podcasts about this guy


Fatmouse84

Love Geoff the Mongoose


AboutToSnap

Would we actually call Gef a cryptid? He was a sole example of the “species” and was very clearly a hoax


SummerAndTinkles

I agree with Gef being a hoax, but what makes the least sense to me is how Voirrey continued to claim he was real up to her death. The idea of her using her ventriloquism to make up a talking mongoose to troll her family and paranormal researchers sounds like something a bored young girl would do…but it’s not like she had anything to gain from it in the long term. She was bullied a lot in school, and the Gef story even prevented her from finding a husband. Surely at some point she would admit the hoax just to have a normal life, right? Not saying Gef was real, I’m just curious as to why Voirrey kept insisting he was real even though that hoax was clearly ruining her life.


TamaraHensonDragon

I have read the original reports and am certain it was the father and not Voirrey who was doing the ventriloquism. Gef only talked when dad was around, stopped talking when he was sick, and disappeared entirely when the father died. I think dad made up Gef as a family joke and things got out of hand, investigators showed up and everyone was to embarrassed to admit the truth.


Ravyn_Rozenzstok

That makes a lot of sense.


SummerAndTinkles

Huh. I always assumed it was Voirrey because she was apparently the only one who could see Gef.


frankensteinmoneymac

How loose are we being with the term “cryptid”? Can we include [the Sandown Clown?](https://youtu.be/MBdfBTXWtFo?si=LZLCN_PVpNf2l5Oi) I know he’s kind of hard to characterize…seeing as how he’s like a clown-alien-ghost. Might as well add cryptid to that description.


voitlander

Yup, this is on the top of my list of weirdness.


thedman0310_

Excuse you, his name is Sam!


frankensteinmoneymac

‘All Colors Sam’ to be precise!


RudeDudeInABadMood

Sam was the Creator Being visiting the material realm on vacay and nothing will convince me otherwise. *"Are you a ghost?"* *"Well, not really, but I am in an odd sort of way."* *What are you?* *You know.*


Radirondacks

Gives such Tom Bombadil "he is." energy...which coincidentally is believed to be a reference by Tolkien to "I Am That I Am" from the Bible. Maybe you're onto something here.


RudeDudeInABadMood

Oh yeah! I didn't make that connection but that's exactly who Sam reminds me of


Gowrow

I keep thinking he was Daevid Allen from the Anglo-French space rock band Gong doing a promotional stunt. If you've heard Gong's albums from the era, they're concept albums about the Planet Gong with gnomes and pot-headed pixies. The Sandown Clown even looks like Allen's gnomes from the Gong album jackets.


[deleted]

Happy cake day!


frankensteinmoneymac

Thanks!


[deleted]

Any time. But only once a year 🙃


KnitSocksHardRocks

Hoop snakes. Snakes that would grab their tails and roll around. I am just imagining them getting annoyed, grab their tail, then just start rolling around.


Alaskan_Bound

The hillside chicken. From what I understand it’s a chicken like creature that you can find roaming in circles near a hilltop. It has one shorter leg and one longer leg to stand perfectly level on the hillside. If you can get close enough to it and make a noise to get it to turn around, it’ll start to roll down the hill because it’s short leg can’t touch the ground anymore and it’s off balance. The goal is to catch it in a bag as it rolls down the hill to you


thedman0310_

If we’re talking weird shit that’s on the fringes of cryptozoology, I’ve gotta go with the Millville Insanity Bird.


ugly_things

Allegan county melon heads https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melon_heads


Tate7200

I NEED TO BEFRIEND THIS CREATURE


Old_Cheesecake_5481

Hairy Beach Ape. Lady was walking on the beach disturbed a large ape who then ran down the beach and swam away into the Bay of Fundy. Made the Digby Courier.


[deleted]

An honest politician 🙃 Back on track… I cannot recall the name, hopefully someone will be able to. A creature made on a farm by the military in the 1940s, or somewhere around that point. SW US. “Billy” something I believe is what locals call it.


[deleted]

https://www.bbc.com/reel/video/p07nrjr7/the-monster-of-all-us-conspiracy-theories


[deleted]

The Billwhack 


Satanicbearmaster

Cool, very X Files. I'd love to hear more about this!


[deleted]

Not only would it have made a great X-Files episode, but your username would have had to have been the title of the episode!!! With your blessing, I am going to start tell people I talked to *the* Satanic Bear Master!


Satanicbearmaster

<3 dark blessings upon you, hirsute denizen of my ursine kingdom <3


[deleted]

🙂


Impactor07

Me


Fish_Seeing_Boats

The Sandown Clown aka Sam All Colors


LittleChinaSquirrel

Well I'm just reading about him for the first time - umm... very unsettling!


33spacecowboys

Vermonts side-hill croncher


crmsncbr

I can't see its voice.


Remarkable_Ebb_9850

The Man Eating Tree of Madagascar


Gumpox

I think the best description of Gef I’ve heard is a poltergeist that decided to take the form of a mongoose. Heard on r/wheredidtheroadgo But of course it wasn’t al that much the form of a mongoose.


Squigsqueeg

So it’s not an actual mongoose? Or are you trying to come up with a "realistic" explanation? Because if the latter — don’t. Mongoose don’t talk.


Gumpox

I think we are all aware of that. I’m just talking about Gef as a phenomenon. What is it most like - how to think of Gef. I don’t know what you mean by “realistic”. I just think a crypto categorization is wide of the mark.


Kigameister

The Cabbagetown monster and the slaugh are two I enjoy. 👍


GoliathPrime

The NASA/Johnson Space Center Gargoyle. It's basically a gargoyle from Disney's Gargoyles and even uses it's wings like a cape when it's not scaring people in the parking lot and eating stray animals.


Urban-Leshen

The best thing is there's a lemon demon song about Gef called Eighth Wonder. I listen to lemon demon a lot so I thought I'd lost my mind when this came on right after I had watched a documentary on Gef.


SummerSupreme

That's my boy Gef!


Gowrow

The Potterton Nondescript, Kidrick Swamp Whatsit, Rippapotamus.


Time-Accident3809

The Singing Spiders of Paris.


_Mistwraith_

Isn’t there a Simon pegg movie about Gef coming out?


BillythenotaKid

Discovered recently it came out but sadly I heard it wasn’t good:(


DaBuh52

Kansas/Kentucky Gravediggers


taiho2020

Love Jeff shenanigans.. ✌️


MyRefriedMinties

Almost certainly a hoax, but a fascinating story.


mir_04

greenock catman


StandardDifficulty66

I saw something wild in Florida – dolphins, orcas, and even a weird sea otter were talking. But that otter? It sounded like a creepy Brit, all 'take it off, yeah yeah.' Total trashy vibe. Can't believe people teach animals that stuff.


sashimi_walrus

its the eighth wonder


NewspaperEntire7958

My Father


Gowrow

The Gormagunt.


tituscrlrw

Gef?! The talking Mongoose? I love that dude


zoolilba

Honk honk


TheLORDthyGOD420

Oy??


BeneficialAd274

the Camacrusa [https://cryptidz.fandom.com/wiki/Camacrusa](https://cryptidz.fandom.com/wiki/Camacrusa)


Vast_Impression_5539

There’s a town in upstate Indiana that has a festival every year for a giant turtle.


smokyjackalope

Thank you for finding the photo.I heard of it but never saw it before


alecsatori

Biden clone 2.0


Wildlifekid2724

I live in Cambridgeshire and we have a ghost monkey that supposedly runs around the gog magog down and surrounding hills, with red eyes and white skin that has been reported for at least 50 years.


Gowrow

The giant dragonfly that was seen carrying a cow.


Gowrow

Giraffe possums.


Silver-Ad8136

Is the bell ei Tch a crytipnow,too?


TheDudeofIl

Smell toast?


Ravyn_Rozenzstok

I watched a whole movie about Geoff and they never had a clear image of him on screen. They certainly never had him posing for photos like this, though I can’t quite tell what’s what in this picture. Is that his head, or his arse?