“Frog from Hell”February 20th, 2008 by Roy Berman |
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How could I not point out this BBC report?
A 70-million-year-old fossil of a giant frog has been unearthed in Madagascar by a team of UK and US scientists.The creature would have been the size of a “squashed beach ball” and weighed about 4kg (9lb), the researchers said.
They added that the fossil, nicknamed Beelzebufo or “frog from hell”, was “strikingly different” from present-day frogs found on the island nation.
February 20th, 2008 at 9:01 am
Back in summer of 1983.I was thirteen and in the daycamp at Bronx Zoo in New York and taking care of zoo animals.One of my assignment there was to feed Goliath frog from west africa.
Their meal…live mouse!
I caught a live white mouse from one of the cages which zoo breeds them for feeding Barn owls and Boa Constrictors.And put that mouse into the plastic case barely as big enough to put mid sized(but still about more than 20 cm)Goliath frog.
At first frog didn’t notice about mouse thrown into the case,but the mouse went CRAZY what kind of destiny awaits him and desperately tried to climb up the palstic wall.
As I watch,the movement of the mouse had informed the frog that his meal being thrown in and slowly starts to move it’s head toward to the poor mouse.
That moment,I had an eye to eye contact with the victim I threw in.
I still remembers it’s tiny red eyes seeking for mercy,almost saying”Not like this,not like this”.
The next moment the mouse was gone and there was thin chord like tail hanging from closed mouth of the Goliath frog.Then the frog closed it’s eyes and went back to sleep again.
That scene still gives me the creeps after 25 years…
http://img141.imageshack.us/img141/3033/goliathfrog7gw.jpg