Pictured: The giant 11-month old baby who is already the size of an eight-year-old

This bundle of blubber may only be 11 months old, but he is already the size of an eight-year-old.

The giant baby tips the scales at a whopping 61lbs 12oz (28kg) and stands four and a half stone larger than his older brother. Due to his hefty frame the toddler also has to wear huge nappies.

His mother, Milena Orosco de Agudelo, said her son started ballooning at just two months old.

The baby has had undergone a number of medical examinations which suggest he may have a problem with his endocrine system.

Ms Orosco said: 'He had some tests done and the results show that he has a thyroid malfunction.

'Then, he had a cardiogram test done and that test shows that he has the bones of an eight-year-old boy, but they have not told me where that came from.'

The normal weight for a boy his age is between 13lbs 4oz and 15lbs 7oz (6-7kg) and now baffled doctors in Colombia are trying to work out how he became so big.

Doctor David Dias, of the Barranquilla Pediatric Hospital, said: 'The baby will undergo more tests to see if he's obese or we're dealing with hyperthyroidism.'

Pictured: The curious young cow who got into a spin after getting her head stuck in an old washing machine drum

Curiosity may have killed the cat, but fortunately for this inquisitive cow it only brought embarrassment.

The unlucky heifer was exploring the drum of a fly-tipped washing machine when its head became trapped.

The young cow was unable to free herself and it wasn't until a member of the public informed the RSPCA, who sent officers to free her, that she emerged unscathed from her ordeal.

The incident has prompted the animal charity to issue warnings about the dangers fly-tipping can cause.

'It is one of the more unusual things we had had to rescue an animal from,' said RSPCA spokeswoman Jo Barr.

'Young cows are quite curious, and she probably thought there was some food inside the drum.'

RSPCA inspector David Hobbs eventually freed the frustrated cow and she joined the rest of her herd near Higher Fraddon, St Columb, Cornwall.

Mr Hobbs said: 'Most people hate to see fly-tipping as it is an ugly blight on the landscape, but incidents like these highlight that as well as the visual impact the rubbish can also endanger animals.

'The heifer was probably curious to see a new item dumped in the field and curiosity would have turned to panic once she got her head stuck in the drum and was unable to get it out.

'If people disposed of their rubbish properly many animals would be saved from injury and death.'

He added that a large proportion of the injuries the Society's inspectors, animal collection officers, vets and wildlife hospitals dealt with are usually caused by people who carelessly discarded rubbish.

British journalism student gang-raped by asylum seekers in Calais squatter camp they call 'The Jungle'

More than a hundred asylum seekers are being held tonight after a British student was gang-raped by illegal immigrants in Calais.

The woman was writing a story on asylum seekers for her journalism course when she was attacked, police said.

Up to 100 men have been rounded up as potential witnesses to the crime, which is alleged to have taken place in a notorious squatter camp nicknamed 'The Jungle'.

Police said the attack was of a particularly 'brutal nature'. The victim is still in Calais.

The victim, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was described as 'a London student who had travelled to France to highlight problems surrounding clandestine immigration'.

Police confirmed tonight she was born in Vancouver and also carried a Canadian passport.

A police spokesman added: 'She appeared to be working alone, which was clearly a very dangerous thing to do.

'We fear that the men she was reporting on attacked her in the wood where they were staying.'

The woman, who is thought to be in her twenties or early thirties, told locals she wanted to spend time with would-be illegal immigrants who were attempting to reach Britain by stowing away on lorries.

The squatter camp is in a disused industrial zone called 'The Dunes' and is a short walk from the ferry port.

Up to 500 men live there, supported by local charities.

Father Jean-Pierre Boutoille, of the refugee charity C’Sur, said: 'There are lots of journalists, including students, who come here to get to the heart of what’s going on, to write reports and produce films.
'When reporters contact us, we always ask to accompany them. We know the refugees as we see them every day.

'We would never allow a young female adventurer in this wood, especially not at night.

'On Tuesday we did not receive any requests for assistance, and nor did any other charities.

Yesterday, some 100 would-be immigrants to Britain were rounded up by a force of French riot police.

Most of the men claimed to be from Iraq, Afghanistan or the Middle East, although police believe many were from eastern Europe and the Balkans.

One, who asked not to be named, said: 'Yes, I saw a young journalist with a camera. Lots come this way.

'I don’t know who she was exactly, but she was young, perhaps 30, and a student from London.

'The word is that something happened to her in the woods.'

In 2005 a gang of immigrants was implicated in the rape of a resident of Oye-Plage, near Calais.

Calais became a magnet for immigrants in the late 90s following the opening of the Sangatte Cross Centre, which housed 67,000 immigrants over three years.

Before its closure in 2002 following an agreement between the French and British governments, many tried to jump on to slow-moving trains at the entrance to the Channel Tunnel, or hide inside lorries crossing to Britain on ferries.

The election of a new Right Wing council in Calais saw plans to open a Sangatte II abandoned, but would-be immigrants to Britain still arrive by the day.

The Home Office said the number of refugees caught entering Britain illegally from Calais has fallen to around 1,500 a year from 10,000 in 2002, when Sangatte closed.

Pictured: The 'cut-and-shut' cruise ship that was sliced in half to add more rooms

It sounds like an unforgettable magic trick - sawing a cruise ship in half.

But this is no illusion, as the owners of this 916ft liner really did cut it open to extend its length by 73ft.

Such measures may seem extreme, but the £30million cost of the job is just a fraction of the £500million - and years of labour - needed to launch a new ship.

This remarkable extension to the giant cruise liner, called the Enchantment of the Seas, provided 151 more cabins.

The overhaul also added new facilities, such as suspension bridges over the pool deck, as well as trampolines and a 108-seater restaurant.

As the cruiser is 12 decks deep, construction crews had to work around the clock for six days to divide it in half.

They used blow torches and circular saws, and even cut a swimming pool in two along the way.

The painstaking process took place in a dry dock at the Keppel Verolme shipyard in Rotterdam, Holland.

There, the new 12-deck high, 3,000-ton mid-section was carefully moved into place with hydraulic jacks and 18-wheel lorries, using lasers to keep things exact.

The new piece of the ship was then welded securely into position - with 1,300 individual cables, pipes and ducts having to be reconnected.

Within six weeks, the Enchantment of the Seas was back in service again. It is currently in the western Caribbean after setting sail from Fort Lauderdale in Florida.

And the extra capacity - which came on top of the 3,000 passengers and crew it could previously hold - is certainly needed.

Cruise holidays are becoming increasingly popular in Britain, and across the Western world.

Not only that, but a younger generation of sailors are increasingly jostling for cabin space with the pensioners who have traditionally filled such ships.

The attacks on the World Trade Centre in 2001 and subsequent terrorism threats have made holidaying at sea increasingly attractive to those who are afraid to fly.

A spokesman for Royal Caribbean, which owns the ship, said: 'We've committed ourselves to providing innovative, exciting and unexpected experiences for our guests.

'We are willing to stretch ourselves and our ships - literally - to fulfil that promise.'

Eggstrordinary! The egg that is FOUR times the normal size

Teenage poultry farmer Dean Sambers was stunned when one of his hens laid a gigantic egg - weighing a staggering four times as much as a normal one.

The 16-year-old could hardly believe his eyes when he looked in the bird's nest and found the huge specimen resting among two ordinary sized eggs.


Measuring an astonishing 3.4in long and weighing 8oz, it dwarfs average sized chickens' eggs, which are about 2.75in and weigh in at just 2oz.

But the schoolboy, who took his GCSEs this summer, has been left baffled as to why the egg is so enormous.

And he was shocked that the free range hen had even managed to force out the eye-wateringly large egg.

Dean from Lymington in the New Forest, Hants, now plans to blow out the yolk of the egg so he can keep the shell as a souvenir.

The youngster, who breeds chickens as a hobby at his grandparents' farm in Sway, Hants, said he made the strange discovery while collecting eggs from his 50 hens.
He said: 'I let the chickens out of their coop as normal in the morning and a few hours later I went round collecting the eggs from their nests.

'Some of the hens nest in our straw barn and when I looked in one of them, I spotted this enormous egg.

'I could hardly believe what I was seeing - it was just so large.

'It was nestled in there with two other normal-sized eggs, so up against them it looked even bigger.
'I can't even begin to think why it's so gigantic and I was quite worried thinking how on earth my hen had managed to even lay such a massive egg.

'At first I thought it might have been two eggs stuck together but soon realised that couldn't be the case because it's perfectly shaped.

'I only breed chickens as a hobby and we share the eggs among family and friends - but if they make a habit of laying them this size, then maybe I should go into business.'

Dean, a keen horserider, immediately took the egg to show his grandparents Edward and Margaret Light, who have bred chickens at Little Acre Farm for decades.

He said the egg, although perfectly formed, is paler in colour and has a thicker shell with a rougher surface than most chickens' eggs.

He added: 'My grandparents were totally blown away as well. In all the years they have been poultry farming, they've never seen anything like it either.

'I got straight on the internet to try to find out why the egg is so large but I can't find any explanation.

'I'll make a hole in either end and try to blow out the yolk so I can keep the egg.

'I wouldn't even dream of eating it - as it's so unusual.

'Someone suggested that it could be a double-yolker, but it's far too big for that. I reckon it must be a five-yolker at that size.'

Dean said he hopes to find a career working with animals.

Two weeks that changed British sport forever

A London mayor who can post Eton, Oxford and The Spectator on his CV took the Olympic flag from a Chinese counterpart who was a Communist enforcer in Tibet and remains a major player in the totalitarian elite.

Boris Johnson receiving the five-ringed ensign from Guo Jinlong was the final culture shock of a Games that changed British sport for ever, turned London 2012 from a giant budget over-run into potentially the greatest carnival our capital has seen and exposed the best and worst of the Chinese system.

Deng Xiaoping decreed that 'China should hide its dazzling light'. Those days are long gone, comrade.

So now it falls to London to deliver on its ego by serving up an Olympic fiesta which will ace Beijing in one vital respect.

China welcomed the world but failed to invite its own people, which is why the last 17 days have lacked human engagement, passion, fervour, despite the dazzling highs of Michael Phelps's eight gold medals and Usain Bolt blasting a hole in the frontier of human speed by winning the 100m and 200m in world record time.

Apart from sporadic eruptions of Chinese patriotism in the country's favourite sports, the proletariat who built the sublime Bird's Nest Stadium and Water Cube aquatics centre had their noses pushed against the Olympic bubble.

They live under a regime which does not trust its own citizens with the narcotics of freedom and spontaneity. The authorities offer trickle-down prosperity but only if the workers keep their noses out of politics. If anyone in Victorian England had told him that a society would one day fuse rampant capitalism with communism, Karl Marx would have laughed his beard off.

The city where Marx studied is a hotbed of sporting obsession.

The British will besiege ticket kiosks, flood into venues, volunteer to stand around all day smiling at foreigners and roar their support for a newlyemboldened GB Team who helped us see beyond the mono-culture of Premier League football.

Ignore the glorified village fete of 1908. This was the most successful campaign in British Olympic history.

The team's Beijing adventure ended with Dan Robinson staggering home in brutal heat to finish 24th in the men's marathon, but by then the 2012 hosts had rattled up 19 gold, 13 silver and 15 bronze medals for a grand total of 47, which left them fourth in the table, behind the Olympic superpowers China, USA and Russia.

To beat Germany and Australia into fifth and sixth was the ultimate British fantasy.

Only 12 years ago in Atlanta, Britain finished 19th in the medals table and limped home with a single gold. In response, John Major's government unleashed a tsunami of lottery funding and sports such as cycling, rowing, sailing and swimming transformed themselves into elite fighting units to assuage the fear that London 2012 would be remembered as another infrastructure debacle.

Our sporting culture has changed for good and for the better.

The spending on the London Games could only ever be justified if it produces a revival in grass-roots sport, in participation, not just for elite athletes but for the obesity threatened young. That hope burns more brightly now, assuming politicians can comprehend the message.

It was gauche of our official literature to declare to the world last night: 'We demonstrate why London remains the coolest place on the planet.' If you have to say you're cool you're generally not.

Nor did the handover convey a coherent image of modern Britain: an X-Factor winner, an ancient rocker, lots of random dancing and a non-Olympian in David Beckham (or 'Blazing Flame' as they know him here) booting a ball into the crowd.

It was caught by a volunteer: a small but fitting reward for all their generosity and warmth.

Johnson, or Bo Jo, as we now know him, drew a laugh from royalty as he laboured to wave the Olympic flag six times in line with protocol and wore the look of a bashful Oxford fresher. The speech bubble, which the Princess Royal could read as well as the rest of us, probably ran: 'Golly gosh, how marvellous it all is!'

Never mind that Beckham's chariot looked more like Led Zeppelin's tour bus than the kind of vehicle Londoners might ride along the Strand. Or that the former England coach Steve McClaren was absent from the cast of those clutching brollies.

The Mayor's war on 'Olympo-sceptics' is going well. Ours will be the Self-Deprecation Games. More seriously, Johnson has declared his wish that London arenas should be packed, unlike those in Beijing, and that schoolchildren should fill the stands.

The London Olympics began as a ploy to regenerate London's East End, but they have morphed into something grander. For that we ought to thank the athletes, whose high funding levels tell only part of the tale. England's footballers are astonishingly well paid - but that hasn't helped them reach the final of a tournament, post-1966.

Britain's track and field squad were the only let-down. London is about to blow half a billion pounds on a main stadium which will house a team who won just four medals in Beijing, only one of them gold. But this feeble record is obscured, for now, by the landmark moments in better-run sports.

The cyclist Chris Hoy is the first Briton to win three golds at a single Games; Louis Smith is the first men's gymnastics medallist for 100 years; 19-year-old Rebecca Adlington is our best swimmer for a century; Rebecca Romero is Britain's first female Olympian to win medals in two separate disciplines.

The IOC president Jacques Rogge claimed: 'One fifth of the world's population was exposed to Olympic values in a way they had never experienced before.' He added: ' Placing sport at the service of mankind and leveraging Olympic values to promote better understanding between people, nations and religions stands at the core of our mission.'

Rogge did not explain how this squares with the IOC's reticence when it comes to political issues, such as the sentencing of two Chinese women in their Seventies to 'reeducation through labour' for having the temerity to apply to stage a legal protest.

For them - fear and humiliation. For us - great opportunities for London, starting in 1,432 days, when the GB team will expand from 312 to more than 600 athletes, and we will face a huge international test of our transport system, our competence, our friendliness and our humour.

The best news as darkness fell on the Beijing Games is that our athletes have set the tone and shown the way for London. But it needs to be more than a £9billion exercise in Cool Britannia. It needs to make British sport more than just good TV.

Mysterious 'ghost' appears in couple's wedding photographs

A schoolboy photographer is baffled after spotting a ghostly apparition hovering in the disco lights in a picture he had snapped of a newlywed couple.

Wedding guest Jordan Martin, 12, took a whole series of photographs at the wedding reception and at first thought they were quite unextraordinary.

But after examining them again he was flabbergasted to spot the haunting image of a woman's head and torso floating inches from the ground near the DJ booth.

Jordan said: 'I didn't see the ghost until a couple of days later when I was looking at the pictures on the computer.

'When I saw it I was like, "Wow," and couldn't believe what I was seeing. I thought it was really weird because it really looks like there's a ghost in the picture.'

The picture was taken as newlyweds Nigel and Helen Davis took to the floor for the first dance after their wedding at Gloucester Register Office on May 31.

Jordan was snapping away from the side of the dance floor when he unknowingly captured the image.

His mother Ann, of Northway, Glos, insists she does not believe in ghosts but admits she cannot unravel the mystery of the ghostly intruder.

She said: 'It was a shock when I saw the picture. It looks pretty clear to me and it looks so real. Jordan is quite excited about it. It's a bit weird.'

Not so Dumbo: Scientist proves elephants can do maths

Elephants are known for their sharp memories, now a study has found that they are excellent at maths as well.

A researcher in Japan found an Asian elephant called Ashya was able to add small numbers together with almost 90 per cent accuracy.

Naoko Irie of the University of Tokyo in Japan found the matriarch was able to recognise which of two buckets contained more apples in an experiment.

A trainer dropped three apples into one bucket and one apple into a second, then four more apples in the first and five more in the second.

It was observed that the 31-year-old elephant recognised that three plus four was greater than one plus five, and snacked on the seven apples.
'I even get confused when I”m dropping the bait,' Irie tod New Scientist magazine.

Ms Irie was surprised to find the large mammals were as successful in telling between five and six apples as they were between five and one.

She told the International Society for Behavioral Ecology that she had tested four elephants and found they picked the bucket with the most fruit 74 per cent of the time.

'It really is tough to figure out why (elephants) would need to count,' ecologist Mya Thompson said about the research.

Watch Ashya count her apples...


She believes counting may be helpful for Asian elephants, which live in close-knit groups of six to eight, in ensuring that the entire herd stays together.

'You really don”t want to lose your group members,' she said.

World's oldest man dies at the age of 138

A great-grand father believed to be the world's oldest man has died at the age of 138.

Habib Mian passed away early yesterday morning after a brief illness at his home in the Alwar district, Rajasthan, India.
According to records Habib was born on May 28, 1870.

The grand old man was a witness to the life and times of two kings of Jaipur, the dominance of the British Raj and the decades after the Jaipur princely state of the erstwhile Rajputana merged into the Indian Union after Independence.

The Limca Book of World Records recognises him as the oldest living man in the world in its 2005 edition.

But the Guinness Book of Records did not give him this recognition because his pension papers say he was born on May 20, 1878 at Rajgarh in Alwar district.

Habib Mian also held the distinction of being the oldest Haj pilgrim having visited Mecca in 2004 and the longest beneficiary of old age pension which he has received since 1938.
Habib, who outlived his wife by 70 years, was buried at the Ghat Gate graveyard in the Alwar district, after the "Zuhar" (afternoon) prayers.

Though his birthday had become a public event ever his age came to people's notice, Habib Mian did not celebrate the day this year as he was distressed by the May 13 serial blasts in the city that claimed 68 lives.

Driver forgets to put handbrake on.. and watches helplessly as his car rolls 250ft down a hill

This is the moment a motorist forgot to apply his handbrake and watched in horror as his jeep rolled 250ft down a moorland slope.

The hapless driver stepped out of his Land Rover Freelander after parking at a beauty spot but forgot to put the handbrake on.

Seconds later, the vehicle rolled forward and coasted a whopping 250ft (76m) down a steep bank at Holne on Dartmoor in Devon.

The owner watched as the four-wheel drive bounced and bobbed its way through a collision course of rocks and scrub, coming to rest in a ditch.

His silver off-road jeep seemed to have escaped largely undamaged - until it began to sink in a muddy bog.

Eyewitness Nicholas Clegg, 52, an accountant from Yeovil, Somerset, saw the incident during a day trip with his son.

He said: 'The driver had left the handbrake off and the car had just rolled all the way down.

'I can't believe it managed to stay on all four wheels. At one point, the slope gets so steep that it's a miracle it didn't turn over.

'The only way would be to winch it all the way back up but it would require at least 200ft of cable and probably a helicopter.

'They would have had one heck of a job towing it out. It was a very wet valley and the car was well and truly stuck.

'The driver was devastated because it is a new car and although there was no superficial damage I dread to think what it's like underneath.

'It's every driver's nightmare. It's a good job it was an off-road vehicle otherwise it would have been completely written off.'

Rescuers were attempting to free the car.

Meet Yoda the cat with FOUR ears

When Valerie and Ted Rock came across a kitten with four-ears, they couldn't believe their eyes.

But the endearing feline was so adorable they decided he was destined to be a part of their family.

The couple were in a Chicago bar two years ago when they noticed a little grey bundle of fur being passed around to the amazement of fellow drinkers - and their parental instincts kicked in.

The couple immediately fell for the freaky feline and asked the owner if they could adopt him. He agreed and the couple named the cat Yoda, after the pointy-eared Jedi knight in Star Wars.

Valerie, 65, said: 'We were at a pub on the south side of Chicago with a group of friends when we noticed a small cage sitting on the bar and people passing around a kitten.

'He had been part of a large litter and the owners were looking to find a home for him.

'Ted and I had just lost a cat that was our pet for over 20 years, and we were sure we were done with cats.

'When he was passed around he reached for Ted, crawled up into the crook of his neck and fell asleep - Ted was a goner.

'It was a done deal when the kitten made himself at home on Ted's shoulder.

'We decided to name him Yoda. I understand the Star Wars character was based on George Lucas' cat.'

After adopting the eight-week-old kitten into their Illinois home, Valerie decided to have Yoda checked out with the local vet.

But the vet was mystified by his unique appearance.

'The vet had never seen anything like it before,' explains Valerie. 'He immediately went to the internet and found the four-eared cat in Germany.

'We have spoken with other vets in our acquaintance, and they likewise had never encountered anything like this.

'We began to realise that we had something very special.

'As a result, he has been an indoor cat and has a chip installed in case he gets lost. Yoda is so different that we were concerned that he might be catnapped.'

Yoda's extra 'flaps' are separate to the base of his skull, with one placed slightly behind the other.

Yet despite his unusual looks, Valerie is sure Yoda's behaviour - and hearing - are quite normal.

'Yoda's hearing is normal as far as we know,' says Valerie. 'People do a double take when they see him or his picture. It is great fun showing him off.

'We have actually had people ask if we had his ears cut to look this way.

'But he is a perfectly normal affectionate, curious cat and is a joy to have around.

'He is not afraid of anything and is very sociable unlike some of the other cats I have owned.

'But he does have an interesting obsession with bread - I can't leave bread on the counter for a moment.

'And when he purrs, it is not audible. The only way I know that he is purring is to put my finger on his throat to feel the vibration.

'He also is not very vocal. He meows, but only softly, and not very often which is a good thing.'

Pictured: The moment a giant Burmese python slithers up a weatherman's trousers live on TV

This is the moment a python slithers inside a weatherman's shorts on American television.

Meteorologist Kurtis Gertz looked terrified as the several-feet long snake made its way up his leg during a live broadcast at the Iowa State Fair last week.

The KCCI-TV presenter first appeared with the creature around his shoulders.
But the female snake, called Dawn, had other ideas.

First of all the snake's head inched towards Gertz's face and made to kiss him.

'Hey, that was a hot, wet kiss,' Gertz said. 'I got a hunch this is going to make [video sharing website] YouTube.'

As he continued to hold the giant Burmese python, people in the crowd started gasping and pointing as the snake's tail crawled up Gertz shorts and down the other leg.
'This is Dawn and she might have a crush on you,' said Nick, the snake's trainer.

'This is how it all comes to an end Steve, this is how it all comes to an end,' Gertz said. 'It's been a great 20 years in television, God bless.'

Then in a bid to get the editors to cut to another segment, the panicked Gertz said: 'OK, let's go to stupid human tricks. Let's see you top this one.'

The snake's trainer and co-anchor Steve Karlin helped unwind the snake and get the weatherman free.

The universality of a mother's grief: Gorilla cradles her dying baby

Hers is the inconsolable grief of all mothers who lose a child.Anyone who doubts the bond between the great apes and humans has only to look at these moving photos to see the emotions of love and loss that bind us together.Gorilla Gana, 11, was left shattered in her compound at the zoo in Muenster in northern Germany at the weekend when her three-month-old baby Claudio suddenly died.

Visitors wept as Gana held her lifeless child up in the air, vainly seeking to restore movement to his lolling head, his limp arms.She put the baby on her back and walked around, stopping to look at him after a few paces to see if he had recovered.
“Claudio died in his mother’s arms, with think from some heart defect,” said zoo director Joerg Adler.“On Wednesday he gave the impression to keepers that he wasn’t feeling too well. On Friday he wasn’t eating or drinking properly and seemed to be growing weaker. We were keeping a close eye on him but suddenly, on Saturday morning, he died.”The death of Claudio is a double tragedy for Gana; for reasons known only to the animal kingdom, she rejected her six week old daughter Mary Zwo last year. She was moved to a zoo in Stuttgart where she is healthy and one of the star attractions.By Monday morning the zoo keepers were still unable to get to the body of Claudio, so fiercely is Gana guarding him.“In the wild a gorilla mother can keep hold of a dead baby for weeks,” added Herr Adler. “We will carry out an autopsy on the body when we can.“Gana doesn’t know it, but the whole of Germany is mourning with her. She is so sad right now.”

Pictured: The crows that attacked a koala bear for straying too close to their nest

It appears that this koala has learned to fly. But under attack from two crows, angered that the cuddly marsupial was too close to their nest, it was forced into an extra-long leap between trees.

The koala had been sleeping in a eucalyptus tree on the outskirts of Adelaide, South Australia, when the crows swooped.

They pecked it hard on the head but it fought back, lashing out with his sharp claws.

Then it launched itself from its perch 80ft above ground, jumping up to 6ft from branch to branch. The crows were nothing if not persistent.

Their victim finally beat a retreat, climbing down a tree with the birds in pursuit.

Koala expert Dr Deb Kelly in Adelaide said: ‘Normally a koala can jump about 3ft but it depends on its size, how heavy it is, if it is jumping up or down and how badly it wants to escape.’

Though great climbers, koalas are not usually known for their athletic prowess. They sit motionless in the tree-tops for up to 18 hours a day, sleeping for most of that time.

They spend about half of their six active hours eating eucalyptus leaves, usually at night.

They are mostly placid but can be violent when disturbed, with teeth and claws that are capable of inflicting nasty injuries.

Photos: Animal Madness as Bigfoot Found Dead, Montauk Monster and a Lionfish Invasion

This is the summer of the wild animal stories. There have been reports of something that was dubbed the Montauk Monster in New York, there are photos that show what two hunters claims is Bigfoot found dead in Georgia and now there are claims that there is a Lionfish Invasion in the Caribbean prowling the waters and wreaking havoc.
Will the real animal story please
stand up? There is a Bigfoot press conference scheduled for Friday but most serious observers already believe that the wild animal is nothing more than a hoax. The hunters are promising DNA evidence to prove that the dead "thing" really is Bigfoot.
See photos linked here. The Montauk Monster was a very odd looking creature and washed ashore in New York and before Bigfoot came along, the little monster was the talk of the World Wide Web. See his photo here. Many have already opined that it is nothing more than a dead dog that washed ashore.

The Lionfish is the real story. According to a report from Fox news the red lionfish, a tropical native of the Indian and Pacific oceans is wreaking havoc with its venomous spikes (see photo above and more at the link below) and is even striking human divers as it rapidly multiplies in the warm waters. According to the report the aggressive species is a predator that corners fish and crustaceans up to half its size with its billowy fins and then sucks them down in one violent gulp.

World's oldest mother, 70, is pleased at male heir but declares daughter 'a burden'

The world's oldest mum, who gave birth to twins at 70 after IVF, proudly showed off her son, then admitted: 'Now I've got another daughter to feed too.'

Omkari Panwar, and her husband Charan Singh Panwar, 77, underwent IVF all for the sake of producing a male heir to take over the family's smallholdings.

The elderly Indian couple, who already have two daughters in their thirties, and five grandchildren, are near destitute after mortgaging their land, selling their buffalo and taking out a loan for the £4,400 fertility treatment.

Now the pensioner parents will rely on family handouts and the charity of fellow villagers to bring up the little boy they so wanted, and the little girl they didn't.

But the Panwars, who live in a tiny community in Uttar Pradesh, North India, were delighted to finally see and hold their two babies, now weighing a healthy 4lbs, six weeks after they were born on June 27.

'We have not been able to see or hold them all this time," said frail Omkari. "They had to stay in the hospital because they were so small.

'We could not afford to stay there, so we had to leave them.' And she added: 'We paid all this money to the doctors for a son, but now we have the extra burden of another daughter as well.' Boys are cherished in India because daughters are not allowed to inherit property but leave to marry and become part of their new husband's family.

The twins were born at 34 weeks by emergency caesarian section at a hospital in the nearest town of Muzaffarnagar.

They weighed just 2lbs each and had to be rushed to the Jaswant Roy Speciality Hospital which has a neonatal intensive care unit.


Omkari, who saw her babies just once, a week after their birth, said: 'I could only just touch them lightly with my fingers.

'They were so tiny, they would have fit into the palm of my hand.' The Panwars had to scrape together a further £500 to pay for part of their children's medical care and are now almost penniless.

Their little boy is now likely to take over a tiny piece of land with a large mortgage still to pay on it.

But Charan insists the cost was worthwhile, after he became a laughing stock in his village because he had no son to carry on the family name.

'I've finally got what I wanted and I can die a happy man now,' said Charan.

'My wife will look after the babies when I am gone, and after she dies my other daughters will care for them.

'It will be an honour for them to raise their new brother.

'Now my daughters will have a family home to return to on religious days and special occasions.' It is tradition for sons to remain in the parental home with their wives. On festival days the daughters of the family come to visit with their own husbands and children.

Villagers welcomed the jubilant pair back to the village, which lies 20km from Muzaffarnagar, with numerous gifts for the new babies.

The twins will be named at a special Hindu ceremony next week when the whole community will celebrate their arrival into the world.

'It is customary to name the babies after two weeks," said Omkari, who does not have a birth certificate, but insists she is 70-years-old.

'We have not seen the babies all this time, so we haven't been able to hold the naming ceremony.

'Now, we can arrange one, but cannot reveal their names until that day.' Omkari suffered a personal heartbreak more than 40 years ago as a much younger woman, when she miscarried a baby boy.

'For more than 40 years I have thought God did not think I was fit to produce a boy,' she said. 'But fate works in funny ways. It must have been meant to be that I waited all this time.' The couple do not even understand the fertility procedures carried out to allow Omkari to give birth so long after going through the menopause.

It is likely donor eggs were used to allow her to carry a child, but the Panwars simply do not know what happened when they went to a fertility clinic in Meerut last year.

Omkari, who remembers being nine when India gained independence in 1947, said: 'We saw a doctor at the Baby Shastri Nursing Home and I was given treatment.

'Later we were told I was carrying twins, a boy and a girl.' Screening embryos to discover the sex of the baby is illegal in India, following the outlawing of female foeticide - the aborting of girls - more than 10 years ago.

The couple do not even know such medical techniques exist and they do not think anything was specifically done to ensure they would have a boy.

'We just count ourselves blessed that we have a boy. We prayed for it to happen,' said Charan.

'We don't know how. We're just glad the doctor was right, and we do have a son.' The world's previous oldest mothers were Romanian Adriana Iliescu, who gave birth to a daughter, aged 66 and 320 days in May 2005, and Spanish woman Carmela Bousada, who was 66 and 358 days old when her twins were born in December 2006.

Omkari does not care that she has broken the world record and said: 'If I am the world's oldest mother it means nothing to me.

'I just want to be with my new babies and care for them while I am still able.'

This is the world's hottest chilli, it's called the Dorset Naga ... and it's will be on sale at Tesco

Its lethal effects include burning eyes, streaming nose, uncontrollable hiccups and much, much worse.

And it is about to be sold at Tesco.

The world's hottest chilli pepper, the Dorset Naga, will be available in 10g sachets containing up to three tiny fruits, at a price of 89p.

‘The Dorset Chilli is something only absolute connoisseurs of very hot food and those with asbestos lined stomachs should even consider trying.

‘However, that said, there are an increasing number of chilli heads as they are officially known, that not only savour but endorse these tiny vegetables as being beneficial in helping sweat out the body’s toxins.

‘We trialled them in our test kitchens and even the hardest blokes in our team were brought to their knees.

‘Anyone brave enough to try the Dorset Chilli will definitely be yelling "Ooh argh".’

The tiny ingredient was recently used to make the world’s hottest curry, a Bollywood Burner in a London restaurant.

In the last year, brave Brits have splashed out £9 million on chillies, ranging from the fiery Scotch Bonnet and Bird’s Eye to the milder green, red and Orange Topaz varieties.

Mr Corbett added: ‘Chilli pepper culture in the UK has really come on in the last few years and they are no longer thought of as a culinary novelty.

‘In the past we used to primarily stock chilli peppers in areas where there was a large Afro-Caribbean or Asian community but nowadays we sell them in stores right across Britain.’ The Dorset Naga will be sold in 10g sachets which contain up to three chillis.

They cost 89p per sachet.

Is this Bigfoot? Hunters set to provide DNA evidence after releasing amazing photo

For years the Bigfoot has remained an elusive enigma, capturing the imagination in the same way as the Loch Ness Monster or the Yeti.

But today, two professional Bigfoot hunters claim to have found the body of the mythical creature - and say they are storing it in their freezer.

According to a press release posted online, Matthew Whitton and Rick Dyer claim to have found the animal in the woods of northern Georgia, in the southern United States.

The pair say that the male creature is over seven feet tall, weigh more than 35 stone, and has reddish hair and black-grey eyes.

The creature is also said to have flat feet and a footprint that spans over 40cm.

However, doubt has been cast on the pair's claims as the body will not be unveiled at the press conference.
Instead, a grainy photo has been released which has sparked massive interest - as well a fair amount of scepticism - across the internet.

The link to the press release has seen such huge amounts of internet traffic it is no longer accessible.

Expert Bigfoot tracker Tom Biscardi has been hunting the creature since 1971 and has told the Sydney Morning Herald that he is convinced the find is genuine.

'It's a huge situation for me after 35 years, because I've wanted to bring one back,' Mr Biscardi said.

'They showed me the body. They took me to the area where they found it - it took a day and a half to get there.'

'I got to be honest, when I first saw it I hated to see it in that state it was in. I wanted to capture one so the world could see it walking.

'I guess this is the next best thing for the time being,' he said.

Mr Biscardi said that a video filmed by the two men the day they found the body showed at least 'three others walking upright like a man'.

He is now co-operating with the two men in trying to capture another Bigfoot alive.

'We trekked in for a day a half - what kind of lunatic would be out here in a monkey suit? I saw the thing, I touched it,' Mr Biscardi said.

'They're fine guys, one works for the police department in Georgia, and the other was a correctional officer. They're pretty credible guys.'

The Bigfoot, also known as a Sasquatch, is said to roam the forests of north-west America and some suggest that it may be related to the Asian Yeti, or Abominable Snowman.

The Bigfoot first came to prominence in popular culture in 1967 when filmmakers Roger Patterson and Robert Gimlin released a video which contained what they claimed was a genuine video of the mythical creature.

Since then many have sought to debunk the myth saying the film clip simply shows a man in ape suit.

To this day, no Bigfoot , living or dead, has ever been found.

How many arms does an octopus have? Only six - the other two are legs, say scientists

Ask anyone how many arms an octopus has and the usual answer will be eight. But scientists now insist these nautical animals only have six.

In a new study they found that the creatures used six of their tentacles as arms and two as legs.

Marine experts at 20 Sea Life centres across Europe gathered data from over 2,000 separate observations.

They found common octopuses moved over the ground using their back two limbs, leaving the remaining six for eating.

Claire Little, a marine expert from the Weymouth Sea Life Centre in Dorset, said: 'We've found that octopuses effectively have six arms and two legs.

'It had been thought they used four tentacles for movement and the other four for feeding and manipulating objects.

'But observations showed that they use the rearmost two to get around over rocks and the seabed.

'They also use these two legs to push off when they wish to swim, and then other tentacles are used to propel them.'


The results came out of a study designed to show if octopuses favoured one side or the other.

The study had involved giving them jam jars and Rubik's Cubes to play with in a bid to see if the creatures favour a particular tentacle for handling objects.

While there is no obvious difference between any of the tentacles, experts were surprised to note how often the octopuses' third tentacle from the front was employed for eating.

They also concluded the creatures favour no side and are ambidextrous.

Yew must be kidding! Lord spends £5,000 to trim his hedge...which is 40ft high

Even the most ardent gardener can find trimming the hedge a bit of a chore. But next time you pick up the shears with a heavy heart, count yourself lucky you don't have this giant to contend with.

Towering 40ft into the sky, it is the tallest yew hedge in Britain. And however unkempt your borders look, tidying them up is a doddle in comparison with the mammoth job involved in maintaining it.

For it takes no less than a pair of workers, a cherry-picker and two days of solid hard work, costing more than £5,000, to give the 300 year old hedge on Lord Allen Apsley's Bathurst Estate in the Cotswolds its annual trim.

All the graft does not just result in an immaculate looking garden, either. The cutting back of six inches of new growth this year produced more than a ton of clippings, which are then used to produce a life-saving cancer drug.

Yews produce compounds called taxanes which can stop the creation of new cells, and are thus invaluable to halt the growth of tumours.

The Bathurst clippings are collected by an agency which then sells them on to pharmaceutical companies who chemically extract the taxane from the clippings, purify it, and convert it into the chemotherapy drug docetaxel.

The drug has helped thousands of women in Britain overcome breast and ovarian cancer, and is also used to treat cancers of the lung and head.

The hedge is 33ft wide and stretches for 150 yards along the side of Lord Apsley's historic mansion near Cirencester.

As this year's trim was under way, he said: 'It runs right along the front of the house. You can actually see it from the town as it's taller than the wall.

'It's difficult to know exactly how old it is, but we think it was planted in about 1710.'

The 47-year-old father-of-two described how the hedge has pride of place in his garden, running in a semi-circle around the house.

He said: 'Cutting it isn't too dangerous but you do have to be careful. Luckily a man called Tim Day has been cutting it for 35 years so I think he knows what he's doing.'

Before cherry pickers were used in recent years, teams of staff at the estate used to climb up onto rickety ladders leaned together in an A-shape to trim the bush with garden shears.

Lord Apsley said: 'It must have been a very dangerous operation which took many people a long time to complete.'

The Apsley family have been on the estate since 1695 and use most of its 14,500 acres to grow crops.

According to the Guinness Book of Records, the world's tallest hedge of any type is the beech hedge at Meikleour in Perthshire, which ranges from 80ft to 120ft.

Pictured: The orphan deer adopted by a pack of bloodthirsty fox hounds

The heaving mass of fox hounds would intimidate even the biggest stag.

But tiny orphan deer Bam Bam isn't scared.

Like his namesake Bambi the 10-week-old is a friendly creature and trots along with huntsman Adrian Thompson, 42, and his pack of 60 hounds.

The pack immediately accepted the lost fallow deer when they found him shivering by the Thompsons' front gate just an hour after he had been born.

Rather than being overwhelmed by the attention of such a large pack of dogs, from the Chiddingfold, Leconfield and Cowdray hunt, the confused little fawn thought he'd found his family.

A surprised Mr Thompson said: 'Now Bam Bam thinks he's a Fox Hound because they all treat him like one of their own.

'He won't be going on any hunts though - he doesn't have the stamina for it. It's a fantastic sight to see although we know it's a strange one and Bam Bam certainly gets a lot of funny looks from passers-by.

'People shake their heads in astonishment when they spot Bam Bam in among all the hounds as if they can't believe what they're seeing.'

The friendly fawn is happiest among his fellow hounds on their daily walk.

Mr Thompson's wife, Karen, 41, said: 'Bam Bam seems most content when he's ambling along with the hounds. He's about the same size as them now so he fits in perfectly and walks along with the pack like they're his brothers and sisters.'

Although the Fox Hounds have come to accept Bam Bam as one of their own, Mr Thompson's other dogs are rather less tolerant.

He said: 'A pack of domestic dogs would most certainly kill a deer that came across it's path - I also have two terriers and they would certainly kill anything that came into the garden. They're only just starting to accept little Bam Bam but I still wouldn't leave them alone with him.

'My Fox Hounds are very different though - the image of them as savage killers is completely wrong. They can be very placid animals and are very accepting of other animals - especially deer.'

After Bam Bam was discovered by the dogs earlier this summer he was brought into the family home in Petworth Park, West Sussex by Mr Thompson's 12-year-old son, Tommy.

When Karen came down for breakfast that morning she was stunned to see the pair sitting happily on the living room floor.

She said: 'It was such a surprise, the deer wasn't afraid at all. He seemed to think that Tommy was his mum because he followed him around the room, and would hide behind the furniture if Tommy ever left.'

It was uncertain whether Bam Bam would survive without the care and attention of his mother who had deserted him just yards from the Thompsons' home, possibly scared off by the dogs.

Karen said: 'It was touch and go for the first few days. We had to feed him half an ounce of lamb's milk every hour - this had to be done 24 hours a day and was quite draining.'

Bam Bam is now regarded by the Thompsons as a member of the family.

Karen said: 'He wanders around the garden and comes to play with us. We've had a few garden parties and he is such a favourite with the guests - he's so friendly and is adored by everyone who meets him.'

Bam Bam, who will grow into a 177 pound adult, will stay with the family until they feel he can be safely released into the wild.

Karen said: 'We can't release him into the park here because there are too many people about. Bam Bam is not afraid of humans and we're worried that this may make him dangerous.

'He already gives us a nudge when he wants to eat and it's not so bad because he's only little but imagine what a nudge could do when he's got a fine pair of antlers.'

The Thompsons will be sad to lose such a treasured member of the family but they know they can't keep him forever and plan to set him free once he's fully grown.

Next year they intend to rehome Bam Bam in a private park where he will be able to join a herd and finally learn how to be a deer.

Traditionally, deer hunting involves chasing the animal with a pack of dogs until it surrenders to exhaustion and can be shot.

This practice was banned under the Hunting Act 2004.

Deer stalking, where the hunter is close enough to kill the animal with a clean shot, is still permitted but with no more than two dogs.