What is the Jackalope of North American Lore?
02-10-2010, 08:24 AM
The most comprehensive information about this antlered rodent is in âJackalope fans, take note: Your mythical beast really does exist!â by Chuck Holliday and Dan Japuntich.
The website, in addition to offering up humor, links, legends and the scientific reason why they exist, has excellent pictures of the animal known as the jackalope.
Jackalope Legends
Most people have seen jackalopes in pictures. Itâs usually a taxidermistâs creation fashioned by putting deersâ antlers or pronghorn antelopesâ horns on a jackrabbitâs body. There are jackalope postcards, hunting licenses, mounted heads of the creature and there is even a jackalope festival. Wyomingâs Governor proclaimed Douglas as the home of the jackalope in 1985. Former US President Ronald Reagan was photographed holding a mounted one.
While Wyoming native Douglas Herrick is given credit for creating the jackalope in 1939, local legend is that one was displayed in 1829 by LeRoy Ball, owner of a Douglas hotel. In reality, there are older reference to a horned hare. Dan Japuntich found an ancient reference to a horned rabbit in the Buddhist Dharmas a book of Buddhaâs teachings. Sixteenth to eighteenth century European naturalist literature has references to horned rabbits. Is it possible that Herrick heard about the jackalope from European immigrants?
What is the Jackalope?
The animal was known in Europe for centuries, although antelopes didnât exist then. Jackalopes are a natural phenomenon which have been photographed and examined by veterinarians and other experts.
The Science Museum of Minnesota in St. Paul has an archived biology exhibit featuring jars of cottontail rabbits with cranial tumors shaped like horns and has a reference to a jackalope legend. It might have been the raurackl, stag-hare, thatâs one of the most widespread legends.
The growth of tumors in the shaped-like horns or antlers is a rabbit disease, papillomatosis, caused by a Shope papillomavirus. These animals, when seen from a distance, appear to be horned. The same virus can cause warts in human.
American pathologist and virologist Richard Shope first described the disease in 1933. Since then, researchers have studied this as a viral cause of cancer. Goals of some researchers are to determine the contribution of the human virus to uterine cervical cancer and to develop effective methods to prevent and treat infections.
Jackalopes and Cryptozoology
Cryptids, also called hidden animals, are those science doesnât recognize, found outside their natural habitats or believed to be extinct. The most well-known of the first classification are hairy and humanoid bipeds like Big Foot. Alien Big Cats, ABCs, Phantom Panthers, have been sighted in the US, Australia and Europe, not their recognized habitats.
The thylacine, the Australian wolf/tiger is believed to have become extinct when Benjamin, the last one died in the Hobart Domain Zoo in Tasmania on September 7, 1936. The only photographs of thylacines are those taken when they were captive, probably because they avoid human contact when possible. What led to their âdemiseâ is when European settlers brought sheep to Australia and many were killed and thylacines were blamed for this, leading to the government paying bounties for killing the wolf/tigers.
Some people believe Jackalopes are cryptids because they could be in the category of a new species of animal that science doesnât recognize, so the critter is rarely mentioned in cryptozoological literature. The jackalope, like the winged cat, is an example of how strange looking animals are real and not a new species and how deformed members of a known species can be mistaken for a new one.
Articles Related to the Jackalope
What are Cryptozoology and Cryptids provides a synopsis of the speculative science and includes the three major categories of these Hidden Animals,
Incredible Winged Cats discusses felines who have a physical disease that create wings and Thylacine discusses the Tasmanian wolf/tiger believed to be extinct.
Sources:
Cryptozoology* A to Z, Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark (Fireside, 1999).
Unexplained! Second Edition, Jerome Clark, (Visible Ink Press, 2003).
Read more at Suite101: What is the Jackalope of North American Lore?: Is this Antlered Jackrabbit a Legend, Cryptid or Recognized Animal? http://paranormal.suite101.com/article.c...z0esPOjszS
The website, in addition to offering up humor, links, legends and the scientific reason why they exist, has excellent pictures of the animal known as the jackalope.
Jackalope Legends
Most people have seen jackalopes in pictures. Itâs usually a taxidermistâs creation fashioned by putting deersâ antlers or pronghorn antelopesâ horns on a jackrabbitâs body. There are jackalope postcards, hunting licenses, mounted heads of the creature and there is even a jackalope festival. Wyomingâs Governor proclaimed Douglas as the home of the jackalope in 1985. Former US President Ronald Reagan was photographed holding a mounted one.
While Wyoming native Douglas Herrick is given credit for creating the jackalope in 1939, local legend is that one was displayed in 1829 by LeRoy Ball, owner of a Douglas hotel. In reality, there are older reference to a horned hare. Dan Japuntich found an ancient reference to a horned rabbit in the Buddhist Dharmas a book of Buddhaâs teachings. Sixteenth to eighteenth century European naturalist literature has references to horned rabbits. Is it possible that Herrick heard about the jackalope from European immigrants?
What is the Jackalope?
The animal was known in Europe for centuries, although antelopes didnât exist then. Jackalopes are a natural phenomenon which have been photographed and examined by veterinarians and other experts.
The Science Museum of Minnesota in St. Paul has an archived biology exhibit featuring jars of cottontail rabbits with cranial tumors shaped like horns and has a reference to a jackalope legend. It might have been the raurackl, stag-hare, thatâs one of the most widespread legends.
The growth of tumors in the shaped-like horns or antlers is a rabbit disease, papillomatosis, caused by a Shope papillomavirus. These animals, when seen from a distance, appear to be horned. The same virus can cause warts in human.
American pathologist and virologist Richard Shope first described the disease in 1933. Since then, researchers have studied this as a viral cause of cancer. Goals of some researchers are to determine the contribution of the human virus to uterine cervical cancer and to develop effective methods to prevent and treat infections.
Jackalopes and Cryptozoology
Cryptids, also called hidden animals, are those science doesnât recognize, found outside their natural habitats or believed to be extinct. The most well-known of the first classification are hairy and humanoid bipeds like Big Foot. Alien Big Cats, ABCs, Phantom Panthers, have been sighted in the US, Australia and Europe, not their recognized habitats.
The thylacine, the Australian wolf/tiger is believed to have become extinct when Benjamin, the last one died in the Hobart Domain Zoo in Tasmania on September 7, 1936. The only photographs of thylacines are those taken when they were captive, probably because they avoid human contact when possible. What led to their âdemiseâ is when European settlers brought sheep to Australia and many were killed and thylacines were blamed for this, leading to the government paying bounties for killing the wolf/tigers.
Some people believe Jackalopes are cryptids because they could be in the category of a new species of animal that science doesnât recognize, so the critter is rarely mentioned in cryptozoological literature. The jackalope, like the winged cat, is an example of how strange looking animals are real and not a new species and how deformed members of a known species can be mistaken for a new one.
Articles Related to the Jackalope
What are Cryptozoology and Cryptids provides a synopsis of the speculative science and includes the three major categories of these Hidden Animals,
Incredible Winged Cats discusses felines who have a physical disease that create wings and Thylacine discusses the Tasmanian wolf/tiger believed to be extinct.
Sources:
Cryptozoology* A to Z, Loren Coleman and Jerome Clark (Fireside, 1999).
Unexplained! Second Edition, Jerome Clark, (Visible Ink Press, 2003).
Read more at Suite101: What is the Jackalope of North American Lore?: Is this Antlered Jackrabbit a Legend, Cryptid or Recognized Animal? http://paranormal.suite101.com/article.c...z0esPOjszS
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