My dad mugged a dog.
Before I was born, my parents had just moved to a cottage in the Cambridgeshire countryside, surrounded by fields. They were both freelance academics, and desperately poor. They scraped by, but couldn't afford much of anything, especially meat to eat. They'd managed to train their cat to bring back any rabbits it caught, so supplemented their diet of lentils with that whenever possible.

One day, my dad happened to look out of the window, and saw one of the farm dogs in the process of catching a hare in the field opposite.

Quick as a flash, my dad legged into the field, called the dog over, and nicked the hare. My parents dined well that night.

My mum felt guilty about it afterwards, and made my dad go and apologise to the farmer for mugging his dog.
(The Empress it seems you CAN polish a turd!, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:39, Reply)

First Post. Woo!
My auntie had recently bought a new car. It was only a fiesta or something equally as nondescript, but it was brand new and she had bought it all on her own, so she was very proud of it. And the fact that she could go along the country roads by her house around 60mph (they were bendy).

Anyways, around a month or so after she bought said car it was a hot and sunny day, so rather than waste petrol on running the air-con, she rolled down her window, and the passenger window.

Being the countryside, there were all manner of birds about, and a rather cocky pheasant decided it was going to fly past the car, and missed.

It flew straight into the passenger side window. It bludgeoned itself on the side of my aunt, who drove the car into a field, screaming and crying as a dying bleeding pheasant flailed around the passenger seat spreading blood and feathers everywhere.

Phesant died, aunt went to hospital with the injuries, the car had to be valeted about five times by different people who could not get the smell of pheasant out of everything. She sold the car for a fraction of what she paid for it, and it had to have a whole new interior fitted. She hasn't driven since.
(snay, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:32, 2 replies)

School
I also nearly got suspended for putting iodine in the school fishtank when I was 9.

Would've got away with it too if Danny Barton hadn't grassed me up. Twat!
(Milo Minderbinder, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:31, Reply)

The mrs
Once ran over her childhood hamster with a remote control car. This caused a mild case of death.

She claims it was an accident.
(Monkeyofspong, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:29, Reply)

Maggots!!
In Year 8 I remember doing a respiration experiment involving maggots. Through careful use of a vacuum pump, which only the teacher was allowed to touch, as the maggots breathed out bubbles were sucked through the water and you had to count them (or something).



Before i get shouted down I know i've probably remembered this wrong and got it round the wrong way - I gave up science as quickly as possible and did History at uni so nyah.



Anyway this one lesson, the experiment was set up bubbling happily away in the corner. Until the teacher had to pop out for some reason and we were left on our own.

Ross then dared Ally to fiddle with the vacuum pump settings "to see what'd happen". Ally, nneeding little encouragement for stuff like this, started turning it up and down a few times. However this wasn't that exciting as all it seemed to do was change the speed of the bubbles.

So Ally then had the bright idea of switching the settings on the pump from 'suck' to 'blow' (fnar!)....



Watching maggots being shot across a room at 60 mph is not a sight you forget in a hurry. Neither was the squelching sound they made as they smacked into the wall.


There was a stunned silence promptly followed by Al running back to his seat. I think the marks were still there until they redecorated in my little brother's last year.


Length? They flew a good 7 or 8 feet.
(Milo Minderbinder, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:28, 2 replies)

Skinned pigeon
As an undergraduate, I used to cycle to and from lectures. Still cycle to and from work actually, though haven't encountered this situation again.

Bright summer morning, tourists out and about and a ton of pigeons all over the place. Over the road, the pavement, whatever. Now, pigeons are quick little buggers. Unless you're really making an active attempt to hit them, they dodge. Except the one incredibly stupid pigeon in front of me. When it saw a 14 stone bloke on a bike zooming towards it, did it fly off? No. Did it move to the side? No. Did it run straight ahead in the hopes of outrunning the bike? Of course it did, like something straight out of a cartoon. I braked, but pigeons aren't the quickest of creatures, and the poor little sod had a load of feathers skinned off its back before it finally got it into its head that it should fly.

No idea what happened to it after that, for I was late for my lecture. I doubt it survived though :S
(calamarain just invented dehydrated water, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:23, Reply)

When 1 pigeon becomes 2
Recounted by a mate of mine:

A flurry of noise in the kitchen, one morning prompted my mate and his brother to investigate. Seems their cat had acquired a pigeon, brought it in via the cat flap, only it was still alive, and understandably, pissed off.

After much chasing, the cat was shepherded towards a door and made to relinquish its impending meal, where it can hopefully fly away without needing assistance. Pigeon hits the floor, flutters, reorients itself, takes a run up, and takes to the air.

Now where is the cruelty in this tale ?

It seems the pigeon got a bit more damage than my mate realised when he allowed it to go on its merry way. For, after a brief period in the air, the unfortunate bird, well, broke in half (normally mimed with two fluttering hands that seperate with squishing noises), hit the floor and promptly died.
(ShiftyBastard won the World Cup on World Soccer Champs 2010!, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:21, 1 reply)

The worst taste in the world
As a young boy of 9 or 10, I used to get the bus to my local school, for local people, in deepest Essex.
My brother then started at the same place, so we used to wait for the bus together, and the usual child-fighting took place.

Being deep in the countryside, there were fields, trees and hedges all around, so twigs, berries and stones were all available as handy ammo. This was great, until one day I came across the WMD of rural items, a ladybird. The little shite that I was, I flicked it at his face, when he wasn't looking, and the poor insect ended up in his mouth.

Now, in an act of desperation the tiny beetle exuded a single drop of yellow fluid onto his tongue, the split second before he managed to spit it out, swiftly followed by a truely epic volume of vomit.

It turns out that ladybirds can produce this "defence fluid" when they get pecked up by a hungry bird, and the taste is so foul that said bird will never, ever try and eat anything that is small, red and round ever again.

It's just bad luck that the human tongue is about 30 times more sensitive than that of a bird.

As for length, it was about 5mm, blood red, with a black and white tip.
( Cawl, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:19, Reply)

Neurotic budgie
After my grandfather died, we got my grandmother a budgie as low-maintenance company. The bird's time on Earth was not good.

For one thing, my grandmother reasoned that birds fly, therefore the budgie ought to fly, too. Thus, if she ever caught it not flying, she would wave her stick at it until it took off. And when I say "ever", I mean EVER. It was never allowed not to be flying when she was in the room. It must have been exhausted. It certainly developed a fear of people.

Anyway, eventually my grandmother announded that she could no longer cope with the house, and that it was time for her to go into kennels. The bird couldn't go with her, and so it fell to me to become its surrogate parent.

I did my best to nurture the budgie back to some semblance of mental health. I was doing quite well, too. Noticing that the budgie would sing when he could hear other birds outside, I decided that it would be nice of me to go to the library and take out one of those sound-effects albums featuring birdsong.

I found what I thought would be perfect. Ninety-odd samples of all kinds of avian call. I put on the CD and felt a warm glow...




The budgie panicked. I don't know exactly how I could tell this - but he did. I'd pressed play without noticing that the first 15 minutes of the disc was comprised of recordings of birds of prey.

Length? Three weeks of wasted bird therapy. He escaped soon after.
( Enzyme is powered by sunlight, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:19, 2 replies)

OK, flies this time
Further to my cranefly freezing experiments below, I also once conducted a series of solvent-based tests on flies. We had quite a plague of bluebottles in the lab, so subjects for study were readily available, if not terribly easy to catch.

Anyway, the experimental procedure was to capture a fly, trap it under a suitably transparent vessel (a small evaporating dish was ideal) and then slide the enclosure onto a piece of filter paper dampened with a drop of solvent. The effect was noted.

I then tried to reawaken the dormant beasties.

The results, as I remember them, were that chloroform, dichloromethane and similar chlorinated solvents worked well to anaesthetise the flies, which would recover when exposed again to clean air.

Ehanol would also put them out, albeit more slowly, and I did apparently drown one in ethanol by using too much. Methanol was similar.

But acetone just caused them to go absolutely mental. They would buzz around violently and bounce off the sides of the glass. It didn't cause them to fall motionless like the other stuff. I think it must been a serious irritant because they seemed to be wiping their eyes too.

In fact, acetone was also effective at quickly reviving insects which I'd made dormant using chloroform or the like.

I should say that at the end of the experimental period, all remaining flies were killed by various means, including rolled up newspapers, fly spray and setting fire to the solvents. Which definitely wasn't accidental!
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:16, 3 replies)

Disgruntled RAF Police Dog
Many years ago whilst I was employed as RAF Police Doghandler, one of my charges was a chap called Tyson.

One night on patrol a met up with a RAF patrol who were doing building checks. This building was a crew room of one of the flying squadrons and was equipped with all things for making cups o' tea etc.

Now, being a switched chap, I thought, can't bring in the dog to the crewroom, leave dog hairs everywhere, I get found out and bollockings ensue, so I tied him to a post round the side of the building.

Many brews were had, crewroom also had some videos (some even of the pr0n variety) and eventually I went back outside to retreive Tyson and go on my merry way.

Goes outside, to find Tyson, face like a smacked arse, ears down and looking throughly miserable...

It had been pissing down for seems like hours, he was absolutly piss wet through, he looked at me with utter contempt in his eyes.

Took me AGES to get back into his good books.

I never did it again...
(Skeksis 2nd place is 1st loser....., Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:06, Reply)

my cat arthur
no i didnt give him that silly name! bless him was a rescue cat, see im a sucker so when i walked into the rspca and the little rat looking thing mowed at me i went to him, he turned out to be obscenely friendly and so i decided i must have him in all his 4 toothed glory! anyway i digress.

ever since weve had him (about 5 years now - not bad they told me to expect him to last about 2) he has had skin problems, everymonth or so over the space of about 2 days he would scratch himself till he bled and all his hair had come out around his neck. so every month or so its off to the vet for another dose of steroids and antibiotics to make him all nice and well again. now as we all know trying to get a bloody great pink pill down the neck of a very small but very shap clawed cat is not a simple task. so eventually we resorted to wrapping them up in a piece of cheese and burying it in some other bits of cheese so he thought he was getting a treat.

cue a move of house a couple of years ago and a vet who decided that they wanted to get to the bottom of it once and for all. so after a £300 set of allergy tests it turns out he is alergic to pretty much anything relating to cows / goats. ooops. never mind he now gets to dine exclusively on fish, not fish cat food actual fish (turns out most catfood has beef fat in it) so whilst i may have unintentionally been making him poorly he is now reaping the rewards

lenght too long and not very funny, oh well it beats my earlier post
(pogo_it, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:06, 1 reply)

Happy Landings
In the bar of a gliding club which had better remain nameless, the talk turned, as it does, to parachuting cats. Being practical people, there was only one way to settle the matter. A small parachute and harness were made and the clubhouse cat lured out with a sardine.

Strapped in. Taken to the balcony of the WWII airfield control tower which served as clubhouse. Thrown off.

Wheeeee. The parachute worked perfectly and the cat didn't seem to mind the experience too much. In fact, he liked it so much that he came trotting back up the stairs, trailing the parachute and asked, as cats can, to be thrown off again.

This got to be quite a regular event, and the cat would eventually thrown itself off the balcony for the fun of floating to the ground.

Until the sad day when someone left the window open and the cat, siezing the chance, sneaked out and jumped. The parachute, alas, was still in the cupboard ...
(ubergeekian, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 15:02, 3 replies)

Cat with lactose allergy
My lovely, beautiful, dumb little mong of a cat (deceased, sadly missed) Camilla had a lactose allergy. So I was told, very firmly, not to give her any milk. Ever. Or she would be ill.

Of course, being a very youg girl, I simply had to see this for myself. A Saucer of milk later, she's staggering round the kitchen, vomiting every 30 secs, until she just has the dry heaves (and we all know how painful they can be). I saw she was in pain, and felt really guilty about that. I also had to clear up the pools of vomit that appeared for the next 14 hours.

"Right, no more milk for her then!" I told myself.

And, to say sorry for making her ill, I promptly gave her a chunk of butter, forgetting that was also made of lactose. Cue a lot more vomiting interspersed with pained kitty-cries.

She didn't forgive me for a while for that one.
(The Empress it seems you CAN polish a turd!, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:58, Reply)

Instant Karma
My charming wife has a high tolerance threshold for the stupid animals we have housed in the past. However, we had a Westie that tried even her patience.

Not only was he thick as pigshit - he still looks behind the TV after natural history documentaries to try to find where all the animals have gone - but he would piss absolutely everywhere.

On finding a large puddle in the kitchen, Mrs Duck finally exploded.

"WHAT THE BLOODY HELL IS THIS?" she asked of him. He did his best to explain what the bloody hell it was by repeating the trick - in her carpet slippers.

"RIGHT! OUT!" she shouted, aiming a bare-footed kick at his rapidly retreating arse.

Alas, she missed, and scored a direct hit with a full-powered haymaker on our cast-iron West Highland Terrier-shaped doorstop, breaking her big toe.

That'll learn her.

Animal cruelty: IT DOES NOT PAY
( Scaryduck LIKES EGG, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:55, 2 replies)

George the stoned budgie
was fab, and even though this was a sad day of semi abuse (he did it to himself really...just helped along a bit..
Apologies for length already.
George was a lovely happy chirpy little blue budgie who shared a lounge with 11 or so of us students back in 1999 in worthing(shithole).
He loved being out of his cage and would talk and chirrup or whatever it is budgies do, all day long and NEVER crapped on anyone other than his mirror enemy.
What he did like to do was inhale large amounts of weed and then get so caned he couldnt flap and just walked around on the floor.
the next stage, ie pre flight but just about able to get a bit of lift, was to hop/flutter up and sit on your can/glass and sip daintily to get rid of desert head or dry beak as he used to call it.
This usually led to him having to be carried to his cage pissed/stoned.
One day i was in the lounge on my own and george was flapping around bleeping and furtling away happily. He tried to sit on my roll up so i shooed him off so i could light up and read my book.
George then disappeared from view. No worries thought I.
Next thing i heard was a muffled blubble bubble bubble noise. I didnt know what it was so looked around. Nothing. then it came again, from near my feet. I looked down and there, in my near empty pint pot was George, headfirst and upside down in my beer.
The little blue pisshead had tried to go for a drink and was upside down like a modern feathery Houdini.. except he was drowning
shitting it i pulled him out just as my mate Ade ran in.
George rattled his little lungs and smelt like a beer rag...

all we could thing to do was to try and save him the only way we knew how...Mouth to Beak!
I covered his nose holes and held him while Ade gently blew into his little body...unfortunately inflating him to about 3 times his normal size...for good measure (and nervously pissing ourselves) we flexed his wings to try and pump beer out.

to no avail.

Last thing we could do was to rely on the old ''well hamsters pretend to be dead, so maybe budgies do. Lets leave him in his cage and see what happens''...as rigor mortis ensued.

Not really cruelty i guess but hey!
(markov1723 Annoying Bavarians since, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:54, 2 replies)

Running up the stairs ..
.. I once stepped on a kitten. Less than a minute later it drew its last dying breath and its little heart stopped beating.

This was fifteen years ago but I still feel bad when I think about it.
(spinoza, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:45, 3 replies)

Absent-minded owner + Placid dog = Oops.
When I lived at my parents' place it used to be part of our evening routine that the last person to go to bed would open the door and hoof our gentle-natured dog out into the garden for a last piddle. One night I forgot to check that he was back inside before shutting the door. At 2am I wandered downstairs for a drink and found him lying in front of the front door. In the rain. With a look of hurt and puzzlement on his face.
For years afterwards I'd have midnight panic attacks and trot downstairs, switch on the light and peer into his basket to check he was in it.
So not only did I leave my dog out in the cold and wet but I messed up his beauty sleep too.
(Big D, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:36, 1 reply)

Pigeon Vs. Bottle
a few months back i was walking through bournemouth on my merry way to some wher with my good friend dean, we were talking about that evenings events
(we were off to see grindcore legends napalm death)

i started 'air drumming' with my oasis bottle when suddenly out of no where as i hit a particularly high 'cymbal '

a pigeon flew staright into my hand as i swung it back down. sending the poor bugger to the ground with a sickening thud.
i also heard its neck snap.
then to make matters worse, it convulsed and shat itself

we then did the honurary thing, and chucked it in a public bin.

length?
well, im a foot and a half dont you know?

* i am actually missing some toes on one foot hence the foot an a half



(tweedleDUMB Giving Up Smoking, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:36, Reply)

Cant be trusted
Not really had many pets, but probably for the best looking at my families history.
First pet I had a hamster who went by the name of smokey who didnt really like us. Did enjoy going out in the garden in his ball though. Garden had just been re-paved and was uneven in some places. The ball had cost £2.50.Ball hits stone flag and breaks. Smokey escapes. Didnt even notice until my mum came home and asked where the hamster was. Sadly, we have many hawks around where i lived.
More recently my uncle was pulling out of a pub and ran over a cat. After feeling the 'thud', decided to turn back and check the poor thing was okay. Ran over it AGAIN.Aparently it just ran away though, so couldnt have been hurt bad.

Lenght? Probably about 2 inches longer after it was repeatedly crushed by a ford transit!
(violent pacifist ;now with 20% more paradox...., Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:26, 3 replies)

Frog Wars
When I was a young-un, there was this large-ish pond in the woods near our house. Each year, for some un-known reason, the pond used get full with hundreds of frogs. You could just plunge you hand in an almost always come out with a frog.

Being gentle, kind-hearted kids we came up with a great game "Frog Wars". Frog wars basically involved throwing frogs at each other whist running around the pond. There weren't really any rules, you just had to throw frogs at someone.

During one particular game, I hurled a frog right across thge pond at another kid. It was one of those perfect throws that you just knew was going to hit its mark. The world almost stood still as the frog-weapon arced above the water towards my target. Unfortunately for him, he happened to be shouting just at the point of impact and my aim was true. It wasn't just a head shot but a mouth shout. The frog landed right in his mouth. It was probably one of the funniest / most disgusting things I have ever seen. The poor kid screamed and vomited on the spot.

This was to be the end of Frog wars. I think that he went home and told his mum and we all got a bollocking.
(Tom Jones's Mojo Hasn't had any since, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:24, 4 replies)

Not exactly animal cruelty, nor exactly accidental...
But I am minded of a story that happened a few years ago.

My friend and I are walking through the streets of Bournemouth in the early hours of the morning.
It had been a good night and we were both slightly drunk.
On cutting down a sidestreet on the way home we notice a cat lying on it's side on the pavement. Despite no obvious injuries it was clear the poor tabby had skipped away to kitty heaven - a sombre sight indeed.
After a quick nudge of the foot to confirm it's lifelessness we continue on our way.

At which point I start giggling to myself.

"What is it?" Asks Conor, knowing I'm not given to spontaneous chuckling.
"Wouldn't it be evil," I confide "To nudge the cat's body under the wheel of that big SUV parked next to it. When the car owner wakes up in the morning he probably won't spot it because the edge of the pavement will hide it. But he'll notice when he runs it over! Imagine if the cat belongs to the family next door - we could start a feud!"

I shake my head at the ingenious darkness of the thought and carry on walking. Then I notice Conor is no longer beside me.

He's back down the street, carefully nudging the cat's body under the wheel of the SUV.
( chenobble rocking his explorer beard on, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:17, 3 replies)

Ooh does this count?

Really early childhood memory…

Once, my dad, when pissed as a shagsack in the pitch black of night (and this was when I was too young to know what ‘pissed’ meant), climbed into several bin liners and lay star-shaped in the back garden, after covering himself with chunks of bread and staying as still as a rat-arsed bell-end can be...all because he’d suddenly decided that it was his lifetime ambition to ‘have birds feed off him’.

Suffice to say…bugger all happened. Birds might have brains the size of maggot-bollocks but they’re not THAT thick.

So I suppose this doesn’t count as accidental cruelty to animals…but it sure as shit left me mentally scarred.
( Pooflake braces for an onslaught..., Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:15, 2 replies)

Suspended animation
I read once* that it was possible for insects to go into a form of suspended animation when they are exposed to cold. They freeze, but on thawing, can survive OK.

So, being of a scientific mind, I tried it, using a convenient cranefly, and some liquid nitrogen.

I trapped the beastie in a little box, and poured in some liquid N₂.

The experiment was entirely successful until I tried to reanimate it, when despite my best coaxing attempts, I could not discern any form of life in the insect.

A subsequent repeat of the experiment with a second cranefly was even less successful, when I managed to break off all of its limbs, which become remarkably brittle at -196°C.

Actually, I'm not really sure this falls under 'accidental' cruelty...

*I don't think this was exactly New Scientist or Nature material - any tame b3tard biologists care to elaborate on the possibility of this being true?
( K2k6 has a proper job these days, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:15, 7 replies)

Not even me!
I've got two lovely Golden Retrievers - one we've had since she was a puppy, who is absolutely beautiful and fairly smart; and the other whom we adopted, who has an incredibly saggy face, and could well be described as a 'bit slow'. Both are lovely and friendly and like nothing more than being with you.

In short, I could never be cruel to them, accidentally or otherwise.

However, one day whilst on a walk with them, I was met with this hilarious sight bounding towards me:



I'm sure they didn't do it on purpose!
(Merrep, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:07, 2 replies)

Frogs Leg.
My garden when I was little had a pond, and every year we'd get tons of frog spawn. This obviously turned into tadpoles, then weird little tadpoles with legs, and then they'd evolve into these tiny little teenage frogs the size of a thumb nail. Being the tom boy I was I had a whale of a time playing with these magic little frogs, until..

One day I was holding a little frog in my hand, it went to jump away and I tried to catch it. I grabbed it's little leg.. and it came off. I'll never forget the horror of seeing a tiny frog limb in my hand, and the little frog landing in the pond and bobbing away.. God knows how but the frog survived, and grew to be a freaky one legged frog that was crap at swimming.

Length? teeny weeny.
( fannycradock, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:05, Reply)

Nearly flying dog
Took our dog Hamish ('90-'05) for a day out at Ravenscraig Park in Kirkcaldy which is just next to a beach. There's a couple of old ruin-like things along a coastal path a few metres above the shoreline.

www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/kirkcaldy/ravenscraigcastle/images/dovecote.jpg

After walking on the path for a bit, Hamish was happily exploring the Dovecot and Castle (pictured above) we'd walked safely gone down to the beach.

After failing to notice where we were for a few moments, Hamish starts to panic. He sees us from his high up vantage point at the ruined castle platform. Our family laughs in amusement at our poor dog who thought he was being abandoned.

We felt very guilty as he decided that jumping down two storys was his only was to avoid being left forever on his own.

He yelped loudly as he landed gracelessly and limped for several weeks afterwards.

Damn I miss that dog.
( djtrialprice, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:01, 1 reply)

the cat
when I lived in my old flat there used to be a cat that hung around and would always try and get into my flat.

it drove me insane

I normally don't mind cats. I'm a dog person, but if a cat has a good personality then I'll take to it.

This cat however had the most stupid expression on its face that you could imagine on an animal.

it was a unique grey colour; an expensive and fancy looking cat, but so retarded and stupid looking that, together with its flat entering antics, it would make my blood boil just to see this thing walking towards me as I went to open the front door.

(people used to just let it in to the inner hall of my flats as well, so it would be stuck in there all day sometimes. morons)

on one occasion as I approached the front door, said creature began its customary stroll towards me, hoping to sneak in to the building through my legs.

as it approached I swung my leg in the fake kick "gerroutofityoubugger" way.

unfortunately the cat saw this, instantly changing speed and direction into the path of my foot.

I profess to this day that I didn't mean to kick the cat, but it must have flown about 5 feet, and yowled pretty loud.

no witnesses fortunately, otherwise my protestations would have been subjected to severe scrutiny.

Didn't stop the bastard from continuing to get into my flat until the girl from next door stole it from its council house owners when she moved out!
( Vipros. clever got me this far, then tricky got me in, Thu 6 Dec 2007, 14:00, Reply)