Bioparanoria

 The archipelagos of Oceania have been an epicenter of the sixth mass extinction, with many unique species unequipped to handle the arrival of mankind. Flightless birds in particular were vulnerable to invasive species, deforestation, and human overhunting. Few of these ecological losses have been more tragic than that of the many moas that once thrived on Aotearoa. There were at least nine species of these large ratites, the largest of which stood at over eleven feet high at its tallest. The moas were long gone by the time of European contact, having been slaughtered by the Māori. Because of their recent demise, along with the unique climate of New Zealand, Moa fossils are rather abundant helping ornithologists best understand these forest behemoths. Some remains have been naturally mummified by dry cold conditions, allowing great detail including skin and flesh to be excellently preserved, such as this eerie head. As with many other recently extinct species, sightings did n...

 Note that some of this text is adapted from an earlier writing of mine, published elsewhere on the internet. The 70s and 80s were a golden age of cryptozoology, something that is unlikely to be ever replicated again. The notion that these animals of folklore could still be existing in some remote tropical forest or mountain range was actually getting a fair amount of press, not just from the mainstream media but from a few academics as well. The superstars of the art of researching “hidden animals”, Tim Dinsdale, John Green, Bernard Heuvelmans, Grover Krantz, Roy Mackal, and John R. Napier were all active, bitten by that wonderful and childlike belief that monsters do exist not just in our imaginations. “Yes Virginia, there is a Loch Ness Monster and we’ll find him any day now!” Those hopeful days are long gone. The cryptids were all no-shows, so society had no choice other than to stop daydreaming and face the unfantastic reality of it all. But it’s certainly worth it to look bac...