The weekly weird

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German city seeks to evict big catfish

A German city is looking for a way to get rid of a giant catfish that is believed to have developed a taste for ducklings after eating all of its fellow fish in the municipal pond.

The roughly 1.5-meter (4.9-foot) fish has been making waves in Offenbach, near Frankfurt. According to news agencies, the city government said it had found a professional angler to catch the fish, first seen about a year ago, but a formal contract has yet to be signed.

The city plans to have its unwelcome guest caught alive and taken to a private pond somewhere, but officials will first have to be satisfied that it can’t escape into flowing water and that its new home is suitable for a catfish.


Koala gets stuck in a fence

A South Australia koala had to be saved by Fauna Rescue of South Australia volunteers for the third time when he was found stuck in a fence.

The “large male adult” koala got his head stuck in a fence at the Happy Valley substation. A Fauna Rescue volunteer told that it looked “like he’s crawled under the fence to go somewhere, as they do, and then sat up as he was under the fence and got his head caught. But he didn’t have the brains to bob back down again to get out.”

The koala was released back into the wild after a check-up.


A strawberry-stealing mailman

A Quebec family who set up a camera to catch a suspected squirrel stealing their tomatoes made a shocking discovery — the culprit was the mailman.

Rob Morin and Paula Habib said they noticed that produce was going missing from their tomato and strawberry plants outside their home in a Montreal suburb, and they suspected a squirrel was behind the vanishing fruits.

They started to think something else was happening when the suspected squirrels didn’t leave a mess.

When they checked their home security cameras, they made a startling discovery — their Canada Post delivery worker was pilfering the produce.

“For fun we check our security cameras and spotted, on many occasions, our postman helping himself to our tomatoes and strawberries,” Morin said.

The couple said they don’t want the postman fired, but they would like an apology for the rude behaviour because, Morin said, “But he took so many and did not notify us that there was pretty much nothing left for us to eat.”


Raccoon gets head stuck in mayo jar

Firefighters in upstate New York helped out a presumably hungry raccoon that got its head stuck inside a mayonnaise jar.

The Ithaca Fire Department says the raccoon was spotted in a tree during its recent predicament.

Both city firefighters and a state Department of Environmental Conservation officer got the animal down.

They placed the raccoon into a large plastic tub and freed its head.

Once the DEC officer determined the raccoon was not injured, it was let go.

The critter was last seen running toward a nearby creek.

Published in Dawn, Young World, July 28th, 2018

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