High vis jackets developed … for chickens

Posted on October 23, 2013 by Extraordinary

Why did the chicken cross the road?

Proving that the British take their pets extremely seriously, one firm has designed a high-vis jacket to be worn by chickens, so as to ensure that they will be able to cross roads safely over the dark winter months.

The ‘High-vis Chicken Jackets’ have been created by chicken coop and accessory firm Omlet, aimed at the increasing number of people who keep chickens as pets, especially in urban areas. The jackets are designed to allow motorists to see them as they cross roads, and to allow their owners to find them and install them safely in their hen houses during the dark winter evenings.

Omlet’s director, Johannes Paul, told The Telegraph: “We had people inquiring about this kind of thing so decided to look into it. Most people who have chickens as pets will have them out and about and we do hear about chickens who do cross the road.

“If you imagine you are in a built-up area and your chicken gets under the fence, they don’t care if there is a road there. They just go straight across it.”

Each high-vis jacket costs £12 and they are already proving to be extremely popular with chicken owners, with the company selling 200 of the items in just ten days. The breathable, showerproof jackets come in both pink and yellow, with the pink version currently proving twice as popular than the yellow for the fashion-conscious birds.

The jackets are fastened over the chicken’s wings with an adjustable Velcro fastening at the front, and also boast a quilted lining to keep the birds comfortable and warm.

Sussex-based single apple tree boasts 250 species of apple

Posted on October 3, 2013 by Extraordinary

An overachieving apple tree growing in Sussex is now producing 250 different varieties of apple, all from its own branches.

The 20 foot-high tree in Chidham, West Sussex, has been tended to by owner Paul Barnett for more than 20 years and is now capable of producing as many types of apple as a large orchard.

Mr Barnett, 40, has grafted 250 varieties of apple tree onto the trunk of this garden marvel, and the tree now boasts everything from the rare cooking apples known as Withington Fillbasket, to Winter Gem apples.

The tree is now laden with so many different types of apple – including eating, cooking and cider apples – that Mr Barnett has been forced to label each of the branches so he knows what he is picking.

“I started working at a nursery with acres of land and around 90 varieties of apple trees in rows,” he told Metro.

“I wanted to grow my own trees but I didn’t have the area to plant that number so I started my ‘family tree’. I add to it each year by budding in the summer and grafting in the winter.”

The Winter Gem apple is Mr Barnett’s top pick – he describes it as “crunchy, crisp and sweet.”

Pay for parking using conkers

Posted on September 27, 2013 by Extraordinary

Conkers for all!

Perhaps the most unusual car parking scheme ever has been launched in Leeds and Manchester, allowing motorists to pay for their parking charges using conkers.

The scheme – which is running in three city centre car parks located in the cities, started on Monday and has already been proving popular with drivers. So far, 1,500 conkers have been received, which are worth around £300 in parking charges.

The idea is that motorists collect the conkers – which are ‘valued’ at 20 pence each – and exchange them for parking at the selected car parks up to a value of £10.

Town Centre Car Parks (TCCP) confirmed to the BBC that the environmentally-friendly scheme was thought up in an attempt to offset some of the emissions released by motorists. All conkers will be donated to Hetchell Wood Nature Reserve in Leeds during the scheme.

Ben Ziff from TCCP, told the news source: “I was looking at our figures on what we have taken on conkers and it seems to be quite high, a lot more than we were expecting. Initially we were only going to run it for a week, but we’re now definitely planning on extending the scheme.”

Yorkshire Wildlife Trust’s Jonathan Leadley, said: “This fantastic, but slightly bonkers idea will raise the profile of Yorkshire Wildlife Trust’s wonderful woodlands and hopefully raise a bit of cash to help us look after them.”

Britain’s biggest family expecting baby number 17

Posted on September 19, 2013 by Extraordinary

127404-0-large The largest family in Britain has announced that it is to swell by one more member, when the newest addition is born next April.

Sue Radford and husband Noel are already parents to 16 children and are now expecting baby number 17, just 11 months after their last child, son Caspar was born. They rose to fame when they were featured on the documentary ’15 Kids and Counting’ on Channel 4 in 2011.

The family lives in a former children’s home in Morecambe, Lancashire, and uses a minibus to get around. The children – Chris, 24, Sophie, 19, Chloe, 18, Jack, 16, Daniel, 14, Luke, 12, Millie, 12, Katie, 10, James, nine, Ellie, eight, Aimee, seven, Josh, five, Max, four, Tillie, three, Oscar, two and Casper, 11 months – are all said to be “absolutely thrilled” about their new sibling.

Mrs Radford announced the news on her Facebook page, with the Telegraph reporting her as saying: “We are so excited to announce Radford baby 17 will be joining this family in April. As you can imagine, the children are so excited. Little Tilly said to me: ‘Mummy you have a baby in your tummy’. It was so sweet.”

The Radfords are not the only large family in Britain – Derek and Debbie Simpson, from East Kilbride, have 13 children, while a family in Dundee has 12 children.

Avozilla hits British supermarket shelves

Posted on September 6, 2013 by Extraordinary

Fruit and veg. The bigger the better.

The world’s largest avocado is now available for British supermarket shoppers to heave into their trolleys.

The ‘Avozilla’ is five times the size of a regular avocado, weighing an average of 3lbs and measuring in at seven-and-a-half inches. The rare fruit comes from just four trees that are owned by one of the world’s largest suppliers of avocados, based in South Africa.

Emma Bonny, Tesco salad buyer, commented: “The Avozilla has a fantastic taste with a rich, juicy, buttery texture, and creamy flavour. The ripe fruit is an attractive vivid green colour – different from the darker-coloured smaller variety – and its thick skin can actually be used as a serving bowl for guacamole.
“We believe the Avozilla will appeal to shoppers who are looking for value for money, but especially large families,” added Ms Bonny.

Avocados are increasingly popular in Britain, with one major supermarket chain reporting a rise of 30 per cent in sales of the fruit this year alone.

The Avozillas will be priced at £3 each and will be initially available in Tesco, although other supermarkets may stock them in the future.

US family welcomes 12th son in a row

Posted on August 15, 2013 by Extraordinary

Lucky number 13?

A couple from Grand Rapids, Michigan, has welcomed their twelfth son, Tucker – yet again failing to break the gender streak that has made the family famous.

Jay and Kateri Schwandt believed that their twelfth child may be a girl, as Kateri went nine days over her due date, something that had not happened with any of their previous 11 boys. However, Kateri – known as Teri – gave birth to another boy, Tucker, who weighed in at 3.52kg, at a Grand Rapids hospital.

Teri, 38, told The Associated Press: “Of course. There was a chuckle in the whole room. I looked at my husband, and we exchanged a knowing smile. When they say it’s a boy, I think, OK, no problem. I’ve got this. We know what we’re doing.”

The family now has 12 boys aged between 21 and newborn. Devout Roman Catholics who don’t believe in using birth control, the Schwandts come from large families themselves – Teri has 13 siblings and has a sister who is mother to 10 children, all of whom are also boys.

Dr. Bob Barbieri, chairman of obstetrics and gynecology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, told the news source: “That’s amazing. This is a miracle. It appears there is some type of genetic determination in some families that have a lot of girls or a lot of boys. It’s not well understood. It’s more than a statistical oddity.”

Unidentified object ‘falls from sky’ in US

Posted on August 9, 2013 by Extraordinary

An illustration of the first flight by Professor Jacques Charles, December 1, 1783. His choice of travel must have looked quite mysterious to onlookers.

A “mystery object” fell from the sky in Norfolk, Virginia, last week, sparking much excitement among residents, the vast majority of whom do not believe police claims that the item was nothing more than a “weather balloon”.

The mystery object fell into a residential neighbourhood in the suburb last Tuesday night, after which time the immediate area was cordoned off and residents were evacuated from their homes.

Reportedly, military personnel, police officers and government operatives arrived in the area to carry out investigations into the object, and eyewitnesses were said to be reporting that it resembled a balloon or had a “structure similar to styrofoam”.

Initial contact with the object was carried out via robot, and following that, there was consultation with NASA experts, The Register reported. The object was then loaded onto a government vehicle and removed from the neighbourhood, and residents were allowed to return to their homes.

Official spokesman, Battalion Chief Julian Williamson, said at a press conference: “Investigators made contact with the package and determined it to be…a weather balloon.”

Mr Williamson also offered guidance on what to do if another such object fell to earth: “Do not investigate on your own. Just call the authorities,” he said.

Towns of Dull and Boring visited by residents of Bland Shire

Posted on August 2, 2013 by Extraordinary

Dullsville.

The mundane monikers of the Scottish village of Dull – twinned with the US town of Boring – and the Australian region of Bland Shire have been celebrated this week with a visit from residents of one area to another.

Residents of the Bland Shire district in New South Wales, Australia, Dot McCaskie and Gail Platz, paid a visit to Dull in the Perth and Kinross region of Scotland in an attempt to link the three towns with such mundane names.

According to the Central Scotland News Agency, the village of Dull and the Oregon town of Boring were twinned last year in a bid to lure in tourists and create links between the communities. Politicians in Oregon have also planned to create an official “Boring and Dull Day” every year on 9 August – the anniversary of the twinning of the towns – which would celebrate everything that is dull.

Bland Shire is now hoping to get in on the tourist action, thanks to its name – which honours the founder of the Australian Medical Association, William Bland.

The visiting pair were welcomed by Dull-based wildlife tour operators, Julie and Donald Riddell. Julie told the publication: “Their slogan goes ‘Bland by name but not by nature’ and if their friendly personalities are a taste of how things are back in their home town, then I would say they are totally right. Dot said Bland was just a bit tired of being made fun of and when someone spotted the Dull and Boring twinning they thought they’d make it a threesome.”

Tokyo women become ‘walking advertisements’

Posted on July 26, 2013 by Extraordinary

The thigh's the limit with this new advertising campaign. Image from HuffPo

The thigh’s the limit with this new advertising tactic. Image from HuffPo

Young women in Tokyo, Japan, are earning a little extra cash by taking part in the new trend for ‘body advertisement’, in which they become walking billboards for new products.

Public relations consultant Hidenori Atsumi “spotted the potential” in body advertisement and realised that adverts placed on people’s legs could attract a huge amount of attention as they walk around the city.

The women – who must be aged 18 and over to take part in the body advertisement concept – walk around central Tokyo for eight hours each day with images advertising products or promos for music groups painted onto their thighs.

Mr Atsumi encourages his walking advertisements to dress in short skirts and long socks so as to best display the images. “It’s an absolutely perfect place to put an advertisement as it is what guys are eager to look at and girls are okay to expose,” he told Metro newspaper.

As well as meeting the minimum age requirement, the models must also have “at least” 20 connections to other people on social networking sites in order to qualify to be one of the walking advertisements.

Man dies after cow crushes him in bed

Posted on July 19, 2013 by Extraordinary

Cow A Brazilian man has died after being crushed to death by a cow which fell through the roof of his home.

Joao Maria de Souza, 45, was asleep in bed next to his wife Leni at the home in Caratinga, southeast Brazil. A cow had escaped from a nearby farm and clambered onto the corrugated roof of the couple’s home, which sits on a steep hill.

The weight of the animal – which was estimated to be around one and a half tonnes – caused the roof to collapse and the cow fell eight feet onto the bed, crushing Mr de Souza.

He was taken to hospital suffering from a fractured leg, but had no other obvious injuries, and was said to be communicating normally. However, he later died from internal bleeding whilst waiting to be seen by doctors.

Maria de Souza, the victim’s mother, told Brazil’s SuperCanal TV channel: “I didn’t bring my son up to be killed by a falling cow.”

Police in Caratinga, Minas Gerais state, have confirmed that they have now launched an investigation into the death, and stated that the owner of the cow could be charged with involuntary manslaughter.