Benny the Giant Rabbit

And I don’t mean it’s slightly larger than your every day carrot-muncher, Benny is a regular bunny giant.

Two year-old Benny is a Flemish buck who’s about to receive the title of longest rabbit in the world. He probably also holds the record for the world’s heaviest bunny, but the Guinness Book of Records no longer certifies this title, due to problems with owners who overfed their animals.

Benny’s owners also set up a website for him on Facebook and use it to promote the Oxfordshire Animal Sanctuary, which faces serious financial difficulties. Benny already has 270 online friends.

The giant buck measures 85 centimeters in length and weighs over 10 kilograms. Benny is house-trained, knows how to ask for treats and spends a lot of time with the family dog. He kisses him often and the owners think Benny doesn’t know for sure if he’s a rabbit or a dog.

Photos by Caters News Agency Ltd

via Daily Mail

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Bous a la Mar Festival, in Denia, Spain

Spanish people really have a thing for bulls, don’t they. Bullfighting, the festival of Pamplona, they’re all centered around the bull.

During the Bous a la Mar Festival, in Denia, near the city of Alicante, people get chased by bulls through the streets and into the Mediterranean Sea. The brave participants plunge into the waters just before the bulls are about to catch them. The animals often fall into the sea as well, where they are taunted some more. Eventually, the bulls are caught with a lasso and towed back to shore by a boat.

via Telegraph.co.uk

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Woman Shares Her Home with Eleven Big Cats

Sharing your bed with common pets like cats or dogs is so last year. Right now it’s all about big cats, and lots of them.

Riana Van Nieuwenhuizen thought she should do her part in saving cheetahs from extinction, so she bought one back in 2006. The 46-year-old South African left her job at the department of justice and found some temporary employment on a game ranch, where she could raise Fiela.

Now, Riana runs Fiela Funds Cheetah Breeding Project, a non-profit that fights to ensure the survival of cheetahs in their own ecosystem. Along the way, she also took in another 10 big cats, with which she often shares her bed.

Her four cheetahs, five white lions and two tigers are a handful, but Riana loves every one of them and puts up with all their naughtiness. Her 2 dogs have also grown quite fond of the felines and don’t mind snuggling up to them.

Photos by John Liebenberg/BARCROFT MEDIA

via Daily Mail

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Life-Size Formula 1 Car Made Out of Styrofoam

From Michael Salter, the styrofoam master who also created the famous Styrobot, comes the styrofoam Formula 1 race-car.

Definitely the best styrofoam work of art I’ve ever seen, this race-car replica looks just like the real thing, without the engine. But hell, if I had these baby in my yard, I’d just place a speaker under it and just record the sound of a Formula 1 race-car.

The brilliant Michael Salter presented his styrofoam Formula 1 race-car and a few other styrofoam creations at the Portland John Ross Plaza Studio, so be sure to check them out if you’re in the neighborhood.

via Gizmo Watch

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Red-Deer Butchering in Russia

BEFORE YOU SCROLL DOWN TO THE PHOTOS, BE WARNED, THEY ARE NOT FOR THE FAINT-HEARTED!

Welcome to the village of Salba, 610 km southeast of the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk. This is where 600 Siberian Marals (a subspecies of Red-Deer) lose their antlers every year. These photos, taken June 15 2009, at a private ranch, in Salba, show the marals held in special devices, in order to have their antlers removed with a hand saw.

The antlers are sold to markets in Russia and East Asia, where antler velvet is used as a holistic medicine. Some people consume the antlers themselves, grinding and consuming them in small quantities.

Marals go through this brutal process every year and, even though some say it doesn’t cause them too much pain because they have no nerves in the antlers, I still call it animal cruelty.

Photos by REUTERS/Ilya Naymushin

via Drugoi

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Star-Wars Chipmunks

What do chipmunks and Star-Wars have in common? I have no idea, but Canadian illustrator Chris McVeigh though it would be funny to mix them together.

Using a lot of patience and a significant amount of almonds, McVeigh managed to convince these cute, furry rodents to pose with action-figures from the popular sci-fi series Star-Wars. It all started when he befriended a chipmunk trapped in his father’s garden shed. He got quite close to it after a while and realized he could get them to do practically anything.

Great photos by Chris McVeigh and amazing acting by the chipmunks.

Photos by Chris McVeigh/BARCROFT MEDIA

via Telegraph.co.uk

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Rottweiler Dad Adopts Wolf Cub

Another unusual animal love story shocks the world. An 18-months-old dog and an 8-weeks-old wolf cub become best friends.

Ulrok, a fully grown Rottweiler was more than happy to become the father figure in young Beldaran’s life, after the poor baby was rejected by her natural mother. Kahlani, the wolf who gave birth to this little furry treasure, was too young herself and her maternal instincts didn’t kick in.

Caretakers at the Krisma Preserve, in Mt. Desert, Maine, tried to find another surogate parent for Beldaran, but Ulrok was the only one who accepted the young cub, when she was just four days old. Now they spend all their time together, playing in the sun, howling at the full moon and even sleeping together.

It’s nice to see them getting along so well and, no matter how down you are, just one look at them will put a big smile on your face. But, once Beldaran is old enough to take care of herself, she will be introduced to a pack of wolves, to make sure she grows up to be a wolf and not something else.

Photos by Bary Bland/ BARCROFT MEDIA

via Daily Mail

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India’s Two-Year-Old Snake Charmers

While other two-year-olds are just learning to walk and talk, the children of the nomad Vadi Tribe are introduced to the centuries-old art of snake charming.

All the children of the Vadi Tribe come face to face with a poisonous cobra at age two, and go through a ten-year ritual, in which they learn all the secrets of snake charming. Both boys and girls must learn to handle snakes. While men must be able to manipulate cobras by playing the flute, the women must know how to take care of the reptiles when their husbands or brothers are away.

The Vadi treat snakes like their own children, never keeping them away from their natural habitat for more than seven months. Any longer than that would be disrespectful to the snakes, according to Babanath Mithunath Madari, the 60-year-old Vadi chief-charmer. In fact, the only time a snake actually bit his charmer, was when he kept it for more than seven months.

Vadi snake-charmers don’t cut the fangs of their snakes, instead they feed them an herbal mixture which, they say,  makes their deadly poison harmless.

Unfortunately, in 1991, the thousand-year-old tradition of snake-charming was banned in India, and the Vadi tribe are stripped of their snakes whenever they are confronted by the police. They never spend more than six months in the same place.

Photos by BARCROFT MEDIA

via Telegraph.co.uk

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The Chinese Angel-Cat

This weird cat with wings was spotted in Chonqing, China.

Although you might think the angel-cat of Chonqing is unique, there have been other cats with wings in Russia and the United States. Her owner says she wasn’t born like this, her wings started growing when she was one year old.

A worker from the Chonqing Museum of Natural History says this kind of oddities are becoming quite common and are the results of pollution in the area. This particular angel cat will be adopted by the Chonqing Museum.

via China.org.cn

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The Blonde Black Bear

Well, it’s not exactly the blonde we’re used to, but it’s as blonde as a black bear can get.

Known as a Spirit Bear or Kermode Bear, this polar-bear look-alike was thought to exist only in Indian mythology. Brave photographer Steven Kazlowski took some photos of a Spirit Bear, an achievement considered impossible among wildlife photographers. 39-year-old Steven went through a one-one-one encounter with one of these great white beasts, but managed to escape with his life.

It’s important to mention that Spirit Bears are not albino animals, they’re what you can call a blonde black bear. They are extremely rare creatures and because of extensive logging around coastal temperate rainforests, their habitat has shrunk even more.

Photos by Steven Kazlowski, BARCROFT MEDIA

via Daily Mail

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Man Finds Alligator in His Pool

What would your reaction be if you woke-up one morning and found an alligator swimming in your pool?

That’s what happened to Larry Bland, from Texas, who found a 5-foot-alligator cooling-in his backyard pool. Apparently the burning sun was too much for this reptile and Bland’s pool was the perfect getaway.

The uninvited guest was removed by Gary Saurage, a very brave trapper who went into the pool, brought it up to the surface and then pushed it out. That takes some serious “cojones”, I’ll tell you…

Photos by [CFP]

via China.org.cn

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The Rare White Lions of South Africa

A pride of rare white lions was released into the South African wilds, in an attempt to re-establish the species in their natural habitat.

This was the second pride released in the last three years. The white lions were fitted with radio tracking devices, used to monitor their hunting behavior and growth. They may look like albinos, but their unusual color is the result of a unique gene. They are seen as the most sacred animals by many tribes, but, because of poaching, only three white lion prides roam free today.

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Photos by BARCROFT Media

via Telegraph.co.uk

Charlie the One-Winged Drake

Charlie is a lucky British drake who had one of his wings amputated, but managed to recover and is now looking forward to a peaceful life.

The drake was found near the Download Open Air Museum, in West Essex, after he had been shot while swimming peacefully on a pond. His injuries were to severe and one of his wings had to be amputated. If he were a wild drake he wouldn’t have been able to survive, but lucky Charlie has fuly recovered and will go on to live a happy life.

via Daily Mail

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The Giant Coconut Crab

I know what you’re thinking, but no, these are not stils from Starship Troopers, these giant crabs live right here, on Earth.

The Coconut Crab is the largest land-crab in the world, with a diameter of around three feet and weight of over nine lbs. As you might have guessed, this giant crustacean loves coconuts. It climbs coconut-trees, crushes their fruit with its powerful pinchers and scrap out the inside.

They are sold as pets in markets like Tokyo, but I find it hard to believe people would want such a creature in their houses. It’s not only their appearance and size, but also their strength. If you’re not careful, a Coconut Crab could easily crush one of your limbs. Just think, if it can crush a coconut, what could it do to your arm.

Coconut Crabs live on the islands of the Indo-Pacific region, but, unfortunately, their numbers are declining, due to loss of habitat and poaching. They are considered a delicacy by some people and it is said their flesh resembles the taste of lobsters.

via Scienceray

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Dirndl Dresses for Horses

Pet fashion really took off in recent years, so I wasn’t that surpised to see these horses dressed in traditional Bavarian dresses.

Dirndl dresses are famous all around the world for being Bavaria’s traditional outfits, thousands of Bavarian women wear them, and now, apparently even horses. German designer Hildegard Bergbauer used to create drindl dresses only for women, but has recenlty began taking orders for house pets and even horses.

The horses do look elegant in their brand-new drindl dresses, but I do believe the young Bavarian beauties holding them look even better.

Photos by Alexandra Beier/REUTERS

via Sina

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