please tell me how does your so called employment at an unnamed natural history museum in an unnamed big city lend any credibility to your self assured assertion that cattle mutilations can be explained away by predators? i suspect that you will conveniently not answer this question in the same way that you conveniently failed to address the FACTS i put forth in my earlier post. it’s also noteworthy that these mutilations have been mysterious and inconclusive enough to warrant investigation by both the FBI and the ATF (both in 1979).

should i assume that your time spent at the natural history museum and in the woods has provided you with greater resources, understanding, and  insight than lifetime cattle hands AND the FBI and ATF?

did you read my post at all? because i never said that “creatures don’t do that to other creatures” nor did i deny the possibility that nature might be responsible, i only pointed out that the source article specifically and contextually indicated that nature/predators were probably NOT responsible for the mutilations. perhaps you didn’t read the article either.

then there was this unsubstantiated accusation,

“Do you believe, like your friend, that corpses bleed from tiny wounds of the mouth parts of insects, birds or even small mammals?”

when did i say that i believed this? please provide a quote. you might want to improve your reading comprehension before making such inferences. i don’t claim to be a zoologist or to have done all of the things that you claim, but i have never heard/read of a single instance where scavengers, be they insects, mammals, or otherwise, leave ZERO traces of blood after eating. if you know of such instances, please provide links!

i’d also be interested in any links you might have that show where a scavenger has “shot” its meal in the head. or maybe you’ve got links to scavengers using knives to cut up their food. and since the witnesses consistently describe the scenes as being devoid of tracks, perhaps you can introduce me to insect or bird species that have been shown to carefully remove udders and slice out cattle tongues and core out eyes all while being careful not to leave a single drop of blood. i’d even be open to your explanation of how a human could do this without leaving tracks or some other form of evidence.

which scavengers slice off cattle ears in “circular, surgical-like cuts?”

what predator/scavenger is able to cause “tongues [to be] sliced off in straight lines back behind the teeth.”Colorado cow mutilations baffle ranchers, cops, UFO believer – The Denver Post http://www.denverpost.com/ci_13956752#ixzz23ND5uoeM
please tell me, because i am dying to know. or maybe you could tell me what in nature could be responsible for causing the liver and heart of mutilated cattle to become white and have the consistency of peanut butter. (as reported by Officer Gabriel Valdez of the New Mexico Police on 3/24/78)better yet, you might explain to us “nutbars” how liver samples from mutilated cattle have been found to be completely devoid of copper in addition to having 4 times the normal amount of zinc, potassium, and phosphorous. (Section 4 or the FBI’s published document called Operation Cattle Mutilation)you’d also do well to read the National Institute of Discovery Science’s 2002 report entitled, “Three Reports of Unusual Killings and Mutilation of Calves.”i’ll stop here and end by pointing out that i haven’t made a single reference to aliens or crop circles as you suggest. you should be more careful in your reading and perhaps refrain from attempting to ridicule those who use facts to support their ideas. you might even benefit from learning how to use facts to support your own ideas. just a thought!

i hope you return to this thread because i would seriously like to hear your answers to the questions i’ve posed. hopefully you will have practiced some reading comprehension by then! cheers!

Really? You actually think that? Successful animal husbandry requires extensive knowledge and hands-on experience. Ranchers are outdoors dealing with their livestock every single day. You really think they’re unfamiliar with the most commonplace processes of nature? Because I had it figured out really early on, and that was just from bumming around farms on weekends as a little kid.

In the time I’ve spent living rurally or working with animals (dead and live) I’ve handled, killed, kept, saved, bred, skinned, stuffed, de-boned, dissected more animals than most people rural or citified.

As for logic, you are commending someone who thinks that pointing out that there were parts of the animal missing, then pointing out their mistaken belief that creatures don’t do that to other creatures as justification of their -belief- that it wasn’t nature taking it’s course. 

Do you believe that carrion eaters, scavengers, predators, insects, birds and and mammals, somehow eat of the corpse but leave everything there too? You believe in Schrödinger’s  Corpse, like your friend? Do you believe, like your friend, that corpses bleed from tiny wounds of the mouth parts of insects, birds or even small mammals? They don’t.

Take it from someone who has actually handled a skinning knife on fresh and long dead corpses -and- seen a lot of corpses of different ages in natural settings. IF this was done by humans, it was to provoke media and the nutbars like above who have their news aggregators set to “crazy”.

Oh, and yahoo-longnumbername, no, I’m not respectful to people who think scavengers don’t scavenge and that natural processes are less likely than humans acting stupid or aliens, sorry, and I’ve seen too many dead things decaying to trust a ranch hand to know the difference between a knife cut and skin tightening over bone after being nibbled at.

This stuff is about as mysterious as crop circles. Yes, i said that to poke fun at your ridiculous beliefs over crop circles. It’s also as mysterious as books were to the illiterate people through the ages. Very, very, mysterious, until you teach them to read.

http://ticker.mesonet.org/archive/20100621/Cow_vs._Lightning.jpg

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1136542/Pictured-The-cow-zapped-lightning–survived.html

But that’s somewhat rare.  Common, non-hot lightning lasts for mSec and barely leaves a mark.

Yes, we saw “purple column” lightning occasionally with Dr. VandeGraaff’s huge machine at MOS Boston.  No “pistol shot,” just a thud sound.  I also saw it with classroom VandeGraaffs.  When you hear a VDG machine going SNAP, SNAP, fbump, SNAP, that “fbump” would appear as a dim, 3cm-wide purple column only visible in complete darkness.   If leaping to a metal plate, sometimes it would show a ‘flower head’ of multiple branches.  The “fbump” noise suggests lack of supersonic air motions and long dwell time: a high-resistance channel when compared to the usual bright discharges.  But I have no idea whether it scales up past 3M.

If we imagine what you’d experience if struck by such an odd storm discharge  …we get trademark “cattle mutilation.”

Wouldn’t it be simpler to go around with a trailer and just buy a few cows? 

Then you could skip the theft, trespass, and angry men with shotguns part entirely.

http://www.denverpost.com/ci_13956752

i’m interested in what folks will have to say about this.

Fear! Fear!

Braised Tongue
Traditional Desert-Style Poached Eyeball
Andouillette with Real Anus

To my palate, it’s a bit hot for those autumnal/wintery braised dishes. But, then again, it’s Summer Session at the University, and one frequently has to compromise when one is taking Summer Session courses. 

Competitive students who want to make sure their menus won’t inadvertently ape their classmates’ Cartes du Jour should be looking at nearby herb plants that have been ransacked. And don’t forget, wildflowers make excellent garnis, frequently bringing flavor and color to the plate.

the source article also mentions a similar 2009 incident that describes livestock tongues as being “SLICED out, udders REMOVED, eyes CORED, and faces SKINNED.” i would like to note that slicing, removing, coring, and skinning are not typically understood as being natural processes.

also, there is no mention of the word gun in the source article however it does say that the horse in question “APPEARED to be shot.” interestingly enough, the article provides no additional info about the shooting other than to say that no bullet was found. and i would like to, again, note the absence of blood and or footprints or tracks!

lastly and most importantly is this quote,

“Clarke’s ranch foreman, Allen Roper, told the Gunnison Country Times that the mutilated animals appeared to be shot, but no bullets were found and that the mutilations were done WITH KNIVES and WERE NOT A RESULT OF PREDATORS.”

so with that, i ask Eddie Perkins, Jerril (who apparently believes that guns are the only mechanisms capable of shooting), FunkDaddy, electronicnonsense, Cody Ference, lord byte, and all others who seem so eager to dismiss (through speculation, i might add) this as nature taking its course, to address the facts outlined in my comments and the source article. i suspect that the lot of you will either have to revise your comments, ignore mine, or come up with more speculation that disregards the stated facts. 

and for the record, i have no idea what caused these mutilations and i care not to speculate, however i do become quite annoyed when folks seem to willfully ignore the facts (no matter how scarce or disparate they may be) in order to explain away events  that seem to defy our conventional understanding of the world and the things in it! i look forward to your (hopefully logical and respectful) responses.