July 12, 2022 • 57 mins
Join Ben as he explores the deep end of the strange crypids in Australia. The bunyip was a real creature to the aboriginal tribes and early European settlers of Australia. It’s been described in many different forms.. extremely territorial and a deadly foe , if you stumble into its lair.. The Yara Ma Yha Who is a small red vampiric creature that legend says lived in fig trees, and preyed on passerby’s. Ben looks at the stories and the truths .. Where are these creatures today.. Let’s go to the marsh lands and find out!
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Episode Transcript
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Australia, the sixth largest country onEarth, an ancient, rugged and unforgiving
land with abundant animal life, bothbeautiful and deadly. Found within its all
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inspiring landscapes and natural beauty. Existsa d history of unexplained mysteries for anyone
with the courage to investigate them.Tonight we joined Ben on a journey across
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this vast island continent in search ofanswers to events that have reshaped the lives
of so many that have been exposedto Unexplained Phenomena Australia with your host Ben
Hurled Hi and welcome to episode ten. It's great to hit double digits and
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it's been Hi and welcome to episodeten. It's great to hit double digits
with Unexplained Phenomena Australia. We've alreadylooked at some incredible UFO encounters that have
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occurred here, from the famous KellyKelly Cahill case, Fred Valentis and the
Number Ball plane encounter, to thelesser known cases like the Jolly Farm at
West Turiff and the Milkman and theUFO. The strangeness, it seems is
unending, and we have many manymore exciting and intriguing cases to look at.
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I work full time and I wasn'treally sure that I would have the
time and energy to do a weeklyshow, and this was a real concern
of mine when Race asked me tocontribute a show to the UNX network.
But it's going okay, and eachweek come Hello high Water. I am
able to put together a show thatI hope you will find interesting. I
try to find encounters that are different. Well, I suppose they all are
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and unique, and we'll continue alongthat journey and it's almost never ending.
But for the tenth episode, Ithought we'd leave UFOs out in orbit for
the moment and take a look atsome of the strange cryptids that have been
recorded here in Australia, some ofwhich really are truly unique to this great
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southern land, and the two thatI got for discussion tonight certainly are that.
So first of all, I wouldlike to start off with the legend
of the Bunyip. The Bunyip isperhaps the most well known legend here in
Australia, and it's thoroughly ingrained intoAustralian culture and most Australians Aboriginal and certainly
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of European origin will be aware ofwhat a bunyip is from the children right
through to the The bunyip is featuredin stories and is believed in fully by
Aborigines who are still connected to countryand indigenous culture. It really is an
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amazing legend, the bunyip, andperhaps it has a basis in actual fact,
an actual creature that at some pointdid live. And it's been described
in many, many different ways.And I want to start off with just
perhaps showing some of the imagery ofwhat a bunyip actually looks like, because
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the descriptions have been just so variedover the years. So this is an
example of a bunyip. So there'sa very weird looking creature. Another image
that is certainly perhaps a bit morelike a walrus looking type of an animal.
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They are always associated with being nearwater. That's the first thing that
must be said about about a bunyip. They're always associated with water. And
we'll go into that a little bitmore. And the Aboriginals really had this
fear of them because they always thoughtthat they were if you went down to
the watering hole, then you couldbe attacked by a bunyip in that location.
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And I really like this particular image. This one certainly strikes me as
being something that might lurk down inthe waterways. And here's another image,
so a bit more artistic in theway that it's the way that it's presented.
But what is really clear is thefact that the bunya has come in
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so many different different forms over theyears, and so the origin of the
word bunya has been traced to theWember Wember language of the Aboriginal people of
Victoria in southeastern Australia. The wordbunyip is usually translated by Australian Aboriginals today
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as devil or evil spirit or evenwater spirit, so they're probably very loose
English translations, and it certainly maynot represent the entire number of ways that
it can be described. And thisis another image here that shows some other
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names for what is the same creaturein different different cultures. Because it was
over two hundred and fifty Aboriginal languagesaround Australia, so quite a few different
different names, some of them whichperhaps can become quite hard to pronounce.
So it certainly has had has hada lot of different names, and it
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means basically the same thing to differentpeople as being a creature that's really,
really quite quite terrifying. The wordbunyip or barnyip first appeared in the Sydney
Gazette in eighteen twelve. It wasused by James Ives to describe a large
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black animal like a seal, witha terrible voice, which creates terror among
the blacks. Is the terminology ofthe time. The bunyip has been described
as amphibious, almost entirely aquatic,inhabiting lakes, rivers, swamps, lagoons,
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billabongs, creeks, water holes,sometimes particular water holes in the river
bed, and the physical descriptions ofthem, as you saw in the images
that I just presented earlier, havevaried so much over the years. George
French Angus may have collected a descriptionof a bunyip in his account of a
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water spirit from the Murundi people ofthe Murray River before eighteen forty seven,
and he stated it as much dreadedby them. It inhabits the Murray River,
but they have some difficulty describing it. Its most usual form is said
to be that of an enormous starfish, so it's even been described as a
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starfish. The chalcomb bunya An outlinedimage of a bunyip carved by Aboriginal people
into the bank of Fiery Creek nearArarat, Victoria, was first recorded by
the Australasian newspaper in eighteen fifty one, and we'll discuss that a little bit
further later on. According to thereport, the bunyip had been speared after
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killing an Aboriginal man, and itwas claimed that until the mid eighteen fifties
Aboriginal people had made a habit ofvisiting the place annually and retracing the outlines
of the figure of the bunyip,which is about eleven paces long and four
paces in extreme breadth. The outlineimage no longer exists, and Robert brow
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Smith's Aborigines of Victoria book of eighteenseventy eight devotes ten pages to the bunyip,
but concludes, in truth little isknown among the Blacks respecting its forms,
covering or habits. They appear tohave been in such dread as to
have been unable to take notes ofits characteristics. So this creature, the
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bunyip, has been described as beingso terrifying that the descriptions of what it
looks like completely vary, and sometimesit's incredibly hard to describe it all,
and a lady called Eugene Louise McNeilrecalled from her childhood memory in eighteen nineties
that the bunyip supposedly had a snoutlike an owl and was probably a nocturnal
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creature by her estimation, so anamazing legend, perhaps a creature. Different
sorts of evidence came forward over theyears, so the bunyar, presumably seen
by witnesses. According to their descriptions, most commonly fit one of two categories.
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About sixty percent of sightings resembled thatof seals or swimming dogs, and
twenty percent of sightings are of longnecked creatures with small heads. The remaining
descriptions are ambiguous beyond categorization. Theseal dog variety is almost often described as
being between four and six feet longwith a shaggy, shaggy black or brown
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coat. According to reports, thesebunyips have round heads resembling a bulldog,
prominent ears, no tail, andwhiskers like seals or an otter. The
long necked variety is allegedly between fiveand fifteen feet long and is said to
have and is said to have blackor brown fur, large ears, small
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tusks, and the head like ahorse or an anu, an elongated maned
neck about three feet long and withmany folds of skin and a horselike tail.
The bunyip has been described often asamphibious, nocturnal, inhabiting lakes,
rivers and swamps, and bunyips,according to abriiginal mythology, can swim swiftly
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with fins or flippers, have aloud roaring call, and feed on crayfish,
though some legends portray them as bloodthirstypredators of humans, particularly women and
children. Bunyip eggs are allegedly laidalso potentially in platypus nests. Interesting the
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bunyip appears in Narindari dreaming as awater spirit called the Mulla Wonk, which
would get anyone who took more thantheir fair share of fish from the waterway,
or take children if they got tooclose to the water. The story
is taught practical means of ensuring longterm survival for people. So I think
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a lot of these stories really werelike that about encouraging survival survival in population.
But there's certainly something there that isbeyond just mere stories. So I'm
going to show you some other earlyillustrations now from this time period. So
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this is an eighteen eighty two illustrationof an Aboriginal man explaining the legend of
the or the legend or perhaps tohim, the reality of the bunya to
two young children near a watering holein eighteen eighty two. And this is
an old newspaper report saying hunting thebunyip, with another strange image replicating what
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it actually is. And this particularimage I do like because it sort of
has that seal or perhaps dog likequality representing what the bunyip actually looked like.
And this is also a classic imageof what just sort of encapsulates that
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fear that the local population of Aboriginalsmust have felt when they were either scaring
themselves or they were actually being chasedby a creature of unknown origin. And
this particular artwork from nineteen thirty five, I think is an absolutely beautiful piece
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of art and that shows a creaturethat is certainly very very strange. And
it's the one that I used atthe start of the show because it was
an image that I just really appreciatedthe artwork in it and I thought it
looked absolutely amazing. That's another anothergreat image of what they look like.
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And during the early settlement of Australiaby Europeans, the notion became commonly held
that the bunyip was an unknown animalthat awaited discovery, unfamiliar with the sights
and sound of Australia's peculiar fauna earlier. Earlier Europeans believe that the bunyip described
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to them was one more strange Australiananimal, and they sometimes even attributed unfamiliar
animal calls and cries to being abunyip. Ah, there's a bunyan.
And scholars suggested also that the nineteenthcentury bunyanp law was reinforced by imported European
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law, such as that of theIrish pooka puca google that when you get
a chance. So you've got Aboriginallegends and you've also got European bringing their
legend and law and superstitions and beliefsto Australia at the same time, which
creates a really interesting combination of Aboriginalculture and European culture. And I just
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wonder what sort of effect that hadover the years as well. And a
large number of bunyip sightings occurred duringthe eighteen forties and eighteen fifties, and
particularly in the southeastern colonies of Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia,
Victoria being my state. So we'regoing to look at some examples now of
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the European settlers coming into contact withbunyips and bunyip legends. So one of
the earliest accounts relating to a large, unknown freshwater animal was in eighteen eighteen
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when a gentleman called gentlemen called HamiltonHume and James Men found some large bones
at Lake Bathurst in New South Wales. And I do believe I've got a
picture of them here somewhere, Sothis is them, Hamilton Hume and James
Men, looking very much the gentlemanback in the day, back in eighteen
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eighteen. So they found some largebones at Lake Bathurst in New South Wales.
They did not call the animal abunya, but described the remains indicating
a creature as very much like ahippopotamus or a manatee. The Philosophical Society
of Australia later offered to reimburse Humefor any costs incurred in recovering a specimen
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of the unknown animal, but forthe numerous reasons, Hume did not return
to the lake. So ancient dipredonskeletons have also have sometimes been compared to
the hippopotamus, and they are aland animal but have sometimes been found in
a lake or a watercourse. Soof course at this time you've got ancient
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fossils and Australian megafauna that certainly ineighteen eighteen they may not have been aware
about what the megafauna was back atthat time. So it's a it's all
very interesting, and it's the onething I must say about the bunyip and
what we're going to discuss tonight.It is very it's hard to really put
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your finger on where truth and legendsort of converge. So these early European
encounters and presentations of evidence are reallyall that we have to go by.
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So we'll just talk about all ofthat a little bit later on. And
then more significant was the discovery offossilized bones of some quadruped much larger than
an ox or buffalo in the WellingtonCaves in the mid eighteen thirties by bushman
George Rankin and later by another mancalled Thomas Mitchell. Sydney's Reverend John Dunmore
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long announced the find as convincing proofof the deluge, referring to biblical accounts
of the flood, but British Britishanatomous anatomist Sir Richard Owen identified the fossils
as the gigantic marsupials, not theharium and tipiodon excuse my butchering of scientific
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names. At the same time,some settlers observed that all natives throughout these
districts have a tradition of a verylarge animal having at one time existed in
the large creeks and rivers, andby many at that time it is said
that the animal still exists. Sostill in eighteen thirty they're saying that this
Bunyan preacher, it still exists.It's still here in Australia, so that's
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it is what it is. InJuly eighteen forty five, in a Victorian
town called Geelong, which is actuallythe biggest town in Victoria outside of Melbourne,
and it's only just down the roadfrom Melbourne to the west, the
Geelong Advertiser announced the discovery of afossil found near Geelong under the headlines of
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wonderful discovery of new animal. Thisis in July eighteen forty five. This
was a continuation of a story onthe fossil remains from the previous issue.
The newspaper said that, and Iquote on the bone being shown to an
intelligent Aboriginal he at once recognized itas belonging to the bunya, which he
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declared he had seen. On beingrequested to make a drawing of it,
he did so without hesitation. AndI'm going to show you that drawing that
he did. This is the geelongbunya. So that's the illustration that the
that he drew without hesitation of beingwhat a bunyip looked like. And the
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account noted that a story of anAboriginal woman being killed by a bunya,
And the most direct evidence of allthat of a man named mum Baughan,
that's his Aboriginal name, who showedseveral deep wounds on his breast made by
the claws of the animal. Soanother man Aboriginal man came forward and showed
that he had been clawed by abunyip. So the account provides this description
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of the creature. The bunyip thenis represented as uniting the characteristics of a
bird and of an alligator. Ithas a head resembling an emu, with
a long bill at the extremity ofwhich is a transverse projection on each side
with serrated edges like the bone ofthe stingray. Its body and legs partake
of the nature of the alligator.The hind legs are remarkably thick and strong,
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and the fore legs are much longer, but still of great strength.
The extremities are furnished with long claws. But the average, you say,
its usual method of killing its preyis hugging it to death. When in
the water, it swims like afrog, and when on shore it walks
on its hind legs with its headerect, in which position it measures twelve
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or thirteen feet in height. Sothat's in the Geelong Advertiser in July eighteen
five, and shortly after this accountappeared it was repeated in other Australian newspapers.
And this appears to be the firstuse of the word bunyip in a
written publication. So interesting, it'sjust also long ago now it really is.
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In January eighteen forty six, apeculiar skull was taken by a settler
from the banks of the Murrambidgee Rivernear Belle Rannold in New South Wales,
so to the north of where Iam here. An initial report suggested that
it was the skull of something unknownto science. The squad who found it
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remarked all the natives who it's beenshown to called this skull found on the
banks of the Murrambidgee River to bea bunya, and by July eighteen forty
seven, several experts, including aWS McLay and a Professor Owen, had
identified the skull as the deformed fetalskull of a foal or a calf.
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At the same time, the reportedbunyip skull was put on display in the
Australian Museum in Sydney for two daysand visitors flocked to see it, and
as the Sydney Morning Herald reported thatmany people spoke about their own bunyip sightings.
Reports of this discovery used the phrasekin pratie as well as bunyap Explorer
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William Hovell, who examined the skull, also called it a cat and pie
for whatever reason. So that's somereally strange sort of terminology around it from
back in the day. But thisis the actual skull that they that was
found on the banks of the MurrambidgeeRiver, So it certainly is an unusual
skull. Whether it's a deformed horseor calf or something else is perhaps possible,
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but if you put it into thehistorical and cultural context of that time,
that certainly would have appeared to havebeen something extremely extremely unusual to the
people who saw it. In Marchof that year, a bunyip or an
immense platypuss described was also cited sunninghimself on the placid bosom of the Yarra,
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which is a river in Melbourne,just opposite the customs House. Immediately
a crowd gathered and three men setoff by boat to secure the stranger,
which disappeared when they were about ina yard from him. So around the
same time in eighteen forty six,near Melbourne on the Yarra River, they
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had seen this strange, large creaturesunning itself and had set out to try
and capture it. But of courseback then no one had mobile phones or
anything else like that, so reallyunusual. And another early account of bunyips
is from a convict called William Buckley, who was a rather strong looking character.
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And this is him here, sothat's how he looked, or at
least a representation of him. Sohe was an escaped convict, and he
wrote in his eighteen fifty two biographyof thirty years, because he escaped and
he was living with the Watharona peopleAboriginal people. He's eighteen fifty two accounts
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records in the Lake Mudawarai now likeModaware, as well as in most of
the other other areas, a veryextraordinary amphibious animal, which the natives called
bunyip. Buckley's account suggests he sawa creature such a creature on several occasions,
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and he adds, I could neverto see any part except the back,
which appears to be covered with feathersof a dusky gray color. It
seems to be about the size ofa full grown calf. And I could
never learn from any of the nativesthat they had seen either the head or
the tail. The creature only appearswhen the weather is very calm and the
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water is smooth now. Buckley alsoclaimed the creature was common in the Barwin
River, which is also Daniage alongand cites an example he heard of an
Aboriginal woman being killed by a bunyipon the Barwin River, and he emphasized
the bunyip was believed to have hadsupernatural powers. So I think it had
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some level of ability to affect youif you had affected it. So the
strangeness continues. So in an articletitled the Bunyip, a newspaper reported of
the drawings made by a gentleman calledEdwin Stockula, and this is him here.
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Edwin Stockula a lot of difficult topronounce words in this episode, So
that's him as he traveled on theMurray and the Golden Rivers. Amongst the
latter drawings, there was Amongst thesedrawings there was a likeness of a bunya,
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or rather a view of the neckand shoulders of the animal. Mister
stock Stockulatur informed us this is anewspaper that the buneep is a large freshwater
seal having two small padules or finsattached to the shoulders, a long swan
like neck, a head like adog, and a curious bag hanging under
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the jaw resembling the pouch of apelican. The animal is covered with hair
like the platter puss and the coloris a glossy black. Mister Stoculatur saw
no less than six of these curiousanimals at different times. His boat was
in thirty feet of one near McGuire'spunt on the Golden River, and he
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fired at the bunyip, but hedid not succeed in capturing him. The
smallest appeared to be about five feetin length, and the largest exceeded fifteen
feet. The head of the largestwas the size of a bullock's head and
three feet out of the water,so quite large. After taking a sketch
of the animal, mister Stockulteer showedit to several of the aborigines of the
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Golden tribe, who declared that thepicture was the bunyip's brother, meaning a
duplicate or likeness of the bunyip.The actual picture itself and the animals moved
against the current at the rate ofabout seven miles an hour, and mister
Stoculatur states that he could have approachedcloser to the specimen deserved, had he
not been deterred by the stories ofthe natives concerning the power and the fury
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of the bunyard, and by thefact that his gun had only a single
barrel, and his boat was ofa frail frail description his boat's obviously he
wasn't in a very strong boat.This is another image that is sort of,
I suppose, comes to mind forwhat a bunyip might actually look like.
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So that's interesting as well. Sothere were people out there at that
time encountering them and making record ofbunyips as well. The descriptions varied across
newspaper accounts. The great bunyip questionseems likely to be brought to a close
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as a mister Stoculator and artist anda gentleman who has come up the Murray
in a small boat states that hesaw one and was enabled to take a
drawing of this vexed question, butcould not succeed in capturing him. We
have seen the sketch and it putsus in mind of a hybrid between the
water mole and the great sea serpent. Mister Stockulatur and artist and his mother
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are on an expedition down the MurrayRiver for the purpose of making some faithful
sketches of the views of this finestream, as well as the creatures frequenting
it. I have seen some oftheir productions, and as they are as
they portray localities with which I amwell acquainted, can pronounce the drawings faithful
representations. Mother and son go downthe stream in a canoe. The lady
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paints flowers, and the son devoteshimself to choice views of the riverside.
One of the drawings represents a singularcreature which the artist is unable to classify.
It has the appearance in miniature ofthe famous sea serpent, as that
animal is described by navigators. Misterstock Leftur was about twenty five yards distant
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from it at first sight. Itape lay placidly on the water. On
being observed, the stranger set off, working his paddles briskly and rapidly disappeared.
A captain Cadell has tried to solvethe mystery, but is not yet
satisfied as to what the animal reallyis. Mister Stockulatur states that they were
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about two feet of it above thewater when he first saw it, and
he estimates its length from five tosix feet. The worthy captain says that
unless the creature is the musk drake, so called for giving off a very
strong odor of musk, he cannotaccount for the novelty and Stockulatur disputes the
newspaper description in a letter, statingthat he never called the animal a bunyan,
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it did not have a swan lightneck, and he never said anything
about the size of the animal ashe never saw the whole body. He
went on to write that all wouldbe revealed in his diorama, and it
took him four years to paint upto seventy individual pictures. And the diorama
has long since disappeared and made itmay no longer exist. So I was
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creating a lot of furlough also backin the day with controversy and disputes and
is this thing real or is itnot real? But one thing is for
sure is that back in the earlysettlement times of Australia, the buny it
was a hot topic for conversation,so it really really was. The first
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recorded European account of an alleged bunyipin what would become Queensland came in eighteen
fifty so Queensland being in the northof Australia, when a woman walking near
a waterhole on the Bromlington property nearthe Logan River claimed to have witnessed a
huge horn creature with eel like featuresand a platypus like bill. She estimated
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that the visible portion above the waterwas about ten meters in length, and
she left and returned with two witnesses, but they only saw the tail for
a short while before it disappeared belowwater. And she did, however,
provide the most detailed and fantastical descriptionof any bunyip sighting in Queensland history.
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And during that same year, thefishermen on the Condomine River became very wary
of a spot in the river abouttwenty kilometers from the town of Warwick.
Several had lost their lines there toan animal that was reportedly to resemble an
appearance a bunya. No further descriptionwas provided. It does not roam around
much, but confines itself to onevery deep hole in the river. Some
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people here believe it to be afreshwater seal. A very strange feature is
that where it habitates, no fishof any description are to be found.
Several people of late who tried tosneak up on it from behind trees while
basking in the sun, but cannever succeed. And that was the Warwick
Examiner and Times sixty of February eighteenninety two. So In a rare example
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of bunyip reports coming from the sameregion within a short time frame, fishermen
on the Condomine claimed to have seena bunyip near Darky Flats now known as
Pratton, northwest of Warwick, andthey described it as being about as large
as a medium sized dog, skincovered with fur, the color and appearance
of that of a platypus, legs, short head shaped like a pig's,
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and the ears pricked and inclining forward. That's the Warwick Argus fourteenth of January
eighteen ninety three. The reporter addedthat people unscientific are apt to class the
bunyip with those visionary snakes so oftenseen by those that love the bottle,
not wisely put too well. Sothat summed up attitudes towards the bunyip.
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But at the end of the nineteenthcentury people were thinking people were drinking and
not really being too taking it tooseriously. So perhaps earlier in time it
was taken seriously while they were learningand discovering about what Australian fauna was in
the early days. And as weget sort of through the next hundred years,
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the bunyip is becoming treated a bita bit more lightheartedly and not taken
too seriously. In the mid eighteenhundreds, bunyip sightings became increasingly common in
the Tasmanian Central Highlands Lake region inTasmania, and A Harvey J. Taylor
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wrote in the Tasmanian Bunyip Alive andWell as the beasts crashed through the water.
It became the first recorded sighting ofa Tasmanian bunyip by a white man.
The year was eighteen fifty two,midnight on a moonlit lake on Lake
Tiberius. By eighteen seventy there wasa sense of urgency around solving the mystery
of these repeated sightings, and thelaw became involved. Chief Constable Sergeant James
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Wilson wrote to his superiors on thematter, challenging the idea popular at the
time that the creatures seen in thelake was indeed a seal, having traveled
upstream from upstream from Hobart's Derwent River. I do not think it possible for
seals to make their way up fromthe sea to the Great Lake in a
consequence of a very considerable waterfall beingin the Shannon near its junction with the
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house, unless being amphibious, theycould escape the fall and reach the river
above land above by land. Itwas October twentieth, eighteen seventy. So
controversy rains around around the bunyip.That really really does, and we're just
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going to have I'll to show usa couple of other sort of images around
around bunyip story. So this onehere is of a woman going down by
the water, an Aboriginal woman,and the eyes of the bunyip are lurking,
and then she is attacked by thebunya and they can't find her,
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and basically all they find the nextday is a feather and some and some
blood. Another vision of the bunyipis of it roaming around. This one
almost looks like a cow or abullock and wandering around in the forests.
And another sort of urban style legendof the bunyip is of a of a
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ferryman taking pot shots as something that'sin the water like a bunyipple they look
though that illustration looks more like awerewolf, but he actually shot the bunya
and then a few weeks later hewas covered in these saws and he died
about two weeks later as a resultof his inflicting harm on the on the
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Bunya. And another image that Ifound is of a of a bunyip being
described as having two legs, arms, a fish type head with sticks on
top of its head. So thevariety is just unbelievable out there, It
really really is. So have agood think about all of that. It
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really is a varied and wide taleof the legend of the bunyip in here
in Australia. And I have gotmore to talk about in relation to the
Bunyip, but I want to moveon to the next strange creature that I
want to have a discussion about ontonight's episode, and it's another really interesting
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one and I find it completely fascinating. This is an aboriginal legend that it
really I just find that the imaginationof it is really quite incredible, and
who knows, perhaps on some levelthese creatures do exist or have existed at
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some point in time. And thislittle guy I find particularly interesting because he's
nothing like the bunyip. The bunyipis at one end of the of the
scale, can be described as beinga fairly large creature that lives in waterways
that if you encounter it, it'sgoing to behave like some sort of hippopotamus
(39:25):
and attack you and probably kill you. So but that's in a large creature
kind of a way, with lotsof people terrified of it, including the
early white European settlers at the timealso being terrified of the bunyip. But
this next one we're going to talkabout is completely different, and he doesn't
(39:49):
really appear or I haven't been ableto find any record of this particular creature
in early European records. But thisone is very interesting, nonetheless, and
it's called the yarrah Ma yah whovery interesting name and only took me a
week to remember it, the yarrahMa Yahoo. So also interestingly enough that
(40:14):
the Yahoe was also known as simplythe Yahoo, so that Yahoo has had
a strong connection to cryptoids in Australia. In this case, we're going to
talk about the yarrah Ma Yahoo.And I found several interesting descriptions of this
creature, and I'm going to readthrough some of these, and some of
(40:37):
it crosses over a little bit,but overall you get this this picture of
what this creature is actually like.And first of all, I'll put up
an image of what it looks likeor a representation of it. So this
is one representation of the yarrah Mayah who and that's spelled y m a
(41:05):
yha who quite quite difficult to saynow. The yarra ma Wahoo is the
vampire of Australian Aboriginal mythology. Itis red and frog like appearance, with
a large head, big toothless mouth, and suckers on its hands and feet.
(41:28):
The Yarrama Yahoo lives in fig treeswhere they wait for passers by to
lay down for a nap. Oncethey're unconscious, the Yarrama Yahoo drops down
on them and drinks their blood.When all the blood has been extracted from
the victim, the Yarrama Yahoo washesthe corpse down with a little water and
(41:52):
then funnily enough, has a napitself. When it wakes, it las
up the victim's skin and a littlewhile later that skin bag becomes another yarrah
mark Yahoo. Interesting and this isanother image of or drawing of one.
(42:20):
So Yarramwaho is a blood sucking creaturefrom Aboriginal folklore that lurks in the treetops
until a person would walk underneath it. It would then leap from the tree
onto the person suck almost all itsblood and then swallow them whole. After
swallowing the poor soul, it wouldregurgitate the person up, take a drink
(42:45):
of water, and nap, thenwake up to puke the person out over
and over, and as it doesthis, he or she will become shorter
and redder each time, until theythemselves become a yarramwahu. It resembles a
(43:08):
little red frog like man or womanabout four feet tall, with red hair
and skin. It has an enlargedmouth with no teeth. It has suckers
on the tip of its fingers thatit uses to suck the blood out of
(43:28):
its victims, which are usually people, and it can unhinge its jaw like
that of a snake. And Ireally like this image here of it because
they sort of do have sort ofreptilian type heads with the little hands and
the little suckers that come out ofit. So it could be an unknown
(43:52):
variety of a tazia, a primatefrom Southeast Asia with fingers that have an
appearance resembling suction cups. There aresome problems with this theory is that the
Tazis are relatively harmless and far smallerthan the yarrama yahoo, and they also
don't live in Australia as far aswe know. But the yarrama waho's a
(44:15):
strange little man who stands four feethigh. The biggest part of him are
his head, his mouth, andhis stomach. He has no teeth in
his mouth, and he simply swallowshis food and can even swallow a grown
man. His head is like somethinglike a snake's, and he opens his
(44:37):
mouth just as a snake does.The point of his fingers and the tips
of his toes are cup shaped likethe suckers of an octopus. They live
mostly in thick leafy trees and preferthe wild fig tree. They do not
hunt for their food, but simplypounce upon a person and place their hands
(45:01):
and feet upon the victim, draininghis blood. The Yaruma yahoo does not
try to suck all the blood fromthe body, but leaves sufficient to keep
the victim alive while he walks aroundand gets an appetite. After he returns,
(45:22):
he lies down on the ground,facing the victim and crawling like a
goanna, and opens his mouth wideand sucks his prey into his mouth head
first. He then rises and standson his little legs and dances around until
the prey is well inside his stomach. Then he goes to a river or
(45:45):
pool of water and drinks copious amountsof water before falling asleep. When he
wakes, he vomits the remains ofhis recent meal. He will check several
times to see if is not feigningdeath by poking him with a stick or
tickling him. If he gets noresponse and goes to sleep, the victim
(46:08):
can use the opportunity to run away. Should the Yarramawaho fail to check his
victim, then the spirit of thewild fig tree would kill him by entering
into his head through his ear andcausing a mumbling noise ending with intense silence,
so that the spirit would leave therude body and become a cold fungus
(46:30):
that grows upon the trees and shedsa dull glow at night. A person
who is caught and swallowed by oneof the red men becomes shorter with each
capture, until at last he resemblesa yarram yahoo. And here's another image.
(46:52):
Here's one sitting in the trees inthe dark with his little little body,
big fat head, and little armsand legs. And another image that
he is also quite good. Theyarramawaho of Australia are restricted to the forests
(47:15):
of the Pacific coast, and theirabsence elsewhere should be considered a blessing.
They are primarily nursery bogies, dissuadingchildren from frequent dangerous areas. A yarramawaho
is a grotesque site and would beamusing were it not for its ghastly habits.
Not more than four feet tall,red and covered with fur, a
(47:37):
yarramawaho has a disproportionately large head.It can open its toothless mouth like a
snake, and a throat and bellyare similarly distendable. An adult man can
easily be swallowed by a yarramawaho withoutdiscomfort. Its fingers and toes are equipped
with suction cups. Yarramawahos are goodclimbers, but can only waddle like cockatoos
(48:00):
on the land like birds. Leavedfig trees are the yarramawaho's favorite haunt.
They can wait for days in thebranches until some hapless traveler, perhaps seeking
shelter from sun or rain, liesunder the tree. Lone children are their
favorite prey. When a Yarramawah whoattacks it attaches his hands and feet onto
(48:25):
the victim's body, using the suctioncups to drain the blood out of them.
It does not empty them entirely,but only enough to make them faint.
It then leaves its victim for awhile, eventually returning to swallow them
whole head first. A little dancelets the food slide down. The meal
is washed down with water, andthe Yarramayah, who takes a nap after
(48:50):
waking the Yarramawah, who vomits itsprey out. The human is almost always
alive and playing dead. There isno reason to fight back, as the
creature can overpower the strongest man.The Yarramawah, who takes five paces,
then returns and pokes his victims sidewith a stick. Then it walks away
ten paces before returning to tickle thehuman under the arm or neck. A
(49:13):
fifty yard stroll is followed up bymore tickling, then the Yarramawah, who
goes behind a bush and sleeps.This ritual is always repeated the Yarramawah,
who knows that if they fail tocarry out these actions, the spirit of
the fig tree will mumble in theirears, causing them to transform into glowing
tree mushrooms. For this reason,it is safest to play dead until this
(49:37):
point, when you get to yourfeet and run where have you gone?
My victim calls the yarramawah who ifit hears you escaping, but its awkward
gait makes it easy to outrun afterfailing to recapture, prey a spiteful yaramawah
who will drink up all the waterin nearby wells and water holes, leading
people to seek liquid from treesap andthus end exposed to the yarramawah who's attack.
(50:04):
And it's an important not to leta yeramawah who swallow you multiple times.
The second time you were swallowed andregurgitated, you become shorter and completely
hairless. For the third time youwere shorter still, and thick hair grows
over your body. Eventually, afterenough cycles was swallowing and vomiting, you
become a yarra mowah who yourself.So it's a rather outlandish creature, but
(50:35):
the legend of it and what it'scapable of doing, I don't think that
the creature shops could dream up with. And this is this is an Aboriginal
creature from Aboriginal culture, and theydescribed and believed in this little guy,
and he really is extremely outlandish.You could almost call it, call him
(51:00):
an alien, because that's really whathe sort of looks like. He kind
of looks like an alien. He'sfour foot tall with a large head,
and that's where the comparison ends towhat you would obviously call grays. But
the creature is certainly something strange andI don't know how you could dream up
(51:23):
that's the process that it goes throughto attach itself to a victim, as
in sleeping under a fig tree,landing on top of them, basically draining
them of blood, swallowing them,regurgitating them and having a nap and poking
and priding and all that sort ofstuff. It really is quite amazing,
(51:45):
so's and it brings in other themestoo, like vampirism comes to mind with
it. Obviously that the fact thatit's considered to be a vampire, even
though it doesn't use the traditional teethand it uses the suckers on its hands
and feet. It really is interesting. So you know, the chances that
(52:07):
a creature like this would exist isand prey on humans in a modern ERAa
is relatively relatively perhaps slim to thatchance. Um so, but what really
fascinates me is how where do theselegends and reality diverge, you know,
(52:29):
with legends of the Bunya and theYarramaahu as example, and there are only
two primary examples that I've sort ofwanted to discuss on this episode, you
know about that, And one ofthe interesting things about it is they say
that it might actually be based onthis creature. So this is a tree
(52:53):
frog from Australia. So this isa red eyed tree frog native to Australian
jungles and tropical rainforests, and itssports strikingly red eyes and large predominant throats
and mouths. So while the littleamphibians are only partially red bodied, it's
(53:17):
not far fetched comparison. Just imaginethe impression one might leave if it was
to drop on your face in themiddle of a quick nap. So that's
perhaps a good little indicator of youknow, maybe how some of these stories
do do originate. But you thinkthat, well, what if there's more
(53:43):
to it than that. What ifthat creature actually, at some point in
time did exist in some capacity itwas an actual creature living in the Australian
landscape. Perhaps not there now,maybe it still is there, who knows,
(54:04):
but the it's a very strange,very strange creature, and it instantly
attracted my attention when I sort offirst saw it, strangely enough, in
a totally unrelated field. I sawwhat would be considered our Automotive Club of
Australia, the RACV, had aarticle on their website about strange Australian mysteries
(54:29):
and one of the strange mysteries thatthey had on that website was the Yarramawahu.
And I thought, I've lived herefor fifty three years and I've never
ever heard of that of that creature, and it certainly is a very unusual
little guy. And I thought,I wanted to just introduce it to you
and have a and have a lookat it, and see, you know,
(54:52):
here's a strange little creature from Aboriginalmythology that is, you know,
really unusual in the way that itoperates, the way that it kills a
victim, the fear that they hadand the belief that they had in this
creature at that time. There's noreports of it that exists to my knowledge,
(55:16):
but this is only arm chair investigationat this point in time. This
is not getting out there and puttingmy boots on the ground to try and
go find one where they may havebeen purported to exist. But along with
the bunyip, they are both reallyvery very unusual examples of what could be
(55:39):
potential cryptids in the Australian landscape andcertainly in the Australian the Australian history.
So thank you so much for joiningme on my tenth episode here. I
hope you found that interesting looking atthe bunyip and the Yarramabahu. And there's
a lot more of these sort ofstrange creatures that I that I can bring
(56:02):
out. And there's another one thatI was going to cover today, but
I've sort of run out of timeon that, which was a bonus creature.
But we'll discuss that perhaps next week. So thank you very much for
joining me, and I look forwardto seeing you again next week. Have
a great night
Australia, the sixth largest country onEarth, an ancient, rugged and unforgiving
land with abundant animal life, bothbeautiful and deadly. Found within its all
(00:56):
inspiring landscapes and natural beauty. Existsa d history of unexplained mysteries for anyone
with the courage to investigate them.Tonight we joined Ben on a journey across
(01:18):
this vast island continent in search ofanswers to events that have reshaped the lives
of so many that have been exposedto Unexplained Phenomena Australia with your host Ben
Hurled Hi and welcome to episode ten. It's great to hit double digits and
(01:56):
it's been Hi and welcome to episodeten. It's great to hit double digits
with Unexplained Phenomena Australia. We've alreadylooked at some incredible UFO encounters that have
(02:17):
occurred here, from the famous KellyKelly Cahill case, Fred Valentis and the
Number Ball plane encounter, to thelesser known cases like the Jolly Farm at
West Turiff and the Milkman and theUFO. The strangeness, it seems is
unending, and we have many manymore exciting and intriguing cases to look at.
(02:42):
I work full time and I wasn'treally sure that I would have the
time and energy to do a weeklyshow, and this was a real concern
of mine when Race asked me tocontribute a show to the UNX network.
But it's going okay, and eachweek come Hello high Water. I am
able to put together a show thatI hope you will find interesting. I
try to find encounters that are different. Well, I suppose they all are
(03:07):
and unique, and we'll continue alongthat journey and it's almost never ending.
But for the tenth episode, Ithought we'd leave UFOs out in orbit for
the moment and take a look atsome of the strange cryptids that have been
recorded here in Australia, some ofwhich really are truly unique to this great
(03:27):
southern land, and the two thatI got for discussion tonight certainly are that.
So first of all, I wouldlike to start off with the legend
of the Bunyip. The Bunyip isperhaps the most well known legend here in
Australia, and it's thoroughly ingrained intoAustralian culture and most Australians Aboriginal and certainly
(03:52):
of European origin will be aware ofwhat a bunyip is from the children right
through to the The bunyip is featuredin stories and is believed in fully by
Aborigines who are still connected to countryand indigenous culture. It really is an
(04:12):
amazing legend, the bunyip, andperhaps it has a basis in actual fact,
an actual creature that at some pointdid live. And it's been described
in many, many different ways.And I want to start off with just
perhaps showing some of the imagery ofwhat a bunyip actually looks like, because
(04:38):
the descriptions have been just so variedover the years. So this is an
example of a bunyip. So there'sa very weird looking creature. Another image
that is certainly perhaps a bit morelike a walrus looking type of an animal.
(05:02):
They are always associated with being nearwater. That's the first thing that
must be said about about a bunyip. They're always associated with water. And
we'll go into that a little bitmore. And the Aboriginals really had this
fear of them because they always thoughtthat they were if you went down to
the watering hole, then you couldbe attacked by a bunyip in that location.
(05:29):
And I really like this particular image. This one certainly strikes me as
being something that might lurk down inthe waterways. And here's another image,
so a bit more artistic in theway that it's the way that it's presented.
But what is really clear is thefact that the bunya has come in
(05:50):
so many different different forms over theyears, and so the origin of the
word bunya has been traced to theWember Wember language of the Aboriginal people of
Victoria in southeastern Australia. The wordbunyip is usually translated by Australian Aboriginals today
(06:13):
as devil or evil spirit or evenwater spirit, so they're probably very loose
English translations, and it certainly maynot represent the entire number of ways that
it can be described. And thisis another image here that shows some other
(06:34):
names for what is the same creaturein different different cultures. Because it was
over two hundred and fifty Aboriginal languagesaround Australia, so quite a few different
different names, some of them whichperhaps can become quite hard to pronounce.
So it certainly has had has hada lot of different names, and it
(06:59):
means basically the same thing to differentpeople as being a creature that's really,
really quite quite terrifying. The wordbunyip or barnyip first appeared in the Sydney
Gazette in eighteen twelve. It wasused by James Ives to describe a large
(07:19):
black animal like a seal, witha terrible voice, which creates terror among
the blacks. Is the terminology ofthe time. The bunyip has been described
as amphibious, almost entirely aquatic,inhabiting lakes, rivers, swamps, lagoons,
(07:41):
billabongs, creeks, water holes,sometimes particular water holes in the river
bed, and the physical descriptions ofthem, as you saw in the images
that I just presented earlier, havevaried so much over the years. George
French Angus may have collected a descriptionof a bunyip in his account of a
(08:01):
water spirit from the Murundi people ofthe Murray River before eighteen forty seven,
and he stated it as much dreadedby them. It inhabits the Murray River,
but they have some difficulty describing it. Its most usual form is said
to be that of an enormous starfish, so it's even been described as a
(08:22):
starfish. The chalcomb bunya An outlinedimage of a bunyip carved by Aboriginal people
into the bank of Fiery Creek nearArarat, Victoria, was first recorded by
the Australasian newspaper in eighteen fifty one, and we'll discuss that a little bit
further later on. According to thereport, the bunyip had been speared after
(08:43):
killing an Aboriginal man, and itwas claimed that until the mid eighteen fifties
Aboriginal people had made a habit ofvisiting the place annually and retracing the outlines
of the figure of the bunyip,which is about eleven paces long and four
paces in extreme breadth. The outlineimage no longer exists, and Robert brow
(09:07):
Smith's Aborigines of Victoria book of eighteenseventy eight devotes ten pages to the bunyip,
but concludes, in truth little isknown among the Blacks respecting its forms,
covering or habits. They appear tohave been in such dread as to
have been unable to take notes ofits characteristics. So this creature, the
(09:28):
bunyip, has been described as beingso terrifying that the descriptions of what it
looks like completely vary, and sometimesit's incredibly hard to describe it all,
and a lady called Eugene Louise McNeilrecalled from her childhood memory in eighteen nineties
that the bunyip supposedly had a snoutlike an owl and was probably a nocturnal
(09:52):
creature by her estimation, so anamazing legend, perhaps a creature. Different
sorts of evidence came forward over theyears, so the bunyar, presumably seen
by witnesses. According to their descriptions, most commonly fit one of two categories.
(10:15):
About sixty percent of sightings resembled thatof seals or swimming dogs, and
twenty percent of sightings are of longnecked creatures with small heads. The remaining
descriptions are ambiguous beyond categorization. Theseal dog variety is almost often described as
being between four and six feet longwith a shaggy, shaggy black or brown
(10:39):
coat. According to reports, thesebunyips have round heads resembling a bulldog,
prominent ears, no tail, andwhiskers like seals or an otter. The
long necked variety is allegedly between fiveand fifteen feet long and is said to
have and is said to have blackor brown fur, large ears, small
(11:01):
tusks, and the head like ahorse or an anu, an elongated maned
neck about three feet long and withmany folds of skin and a horselike tail.
The bunyip has been described often asamphibious, nocturnal, inhabiting lakes,
rivers and swamps, and bunyips,according to abriiginal mythology, can swim swiftly
(11:26):
with fins or flippers, have aloud roaring call, and feed on crayfish,
though some legends portray them as bloodthirstypredators of humans, particularly women and
children. Bunyip eggs are allegedly laidalso potentially in platypus nests. Interesting the
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bunyip appears in Narindari dreaming as awater spirit called the Mulla Wonk, which
would get anyone who took more thantheir fair share of fish from the waterway,
or take children if they got tooclose to the water. The story
is taught practical means of ensuring longterm survival for people. So I think
(12:11):
a lot of these stories really werelike that about encouraging survival survival in population.
But there's certainly something there that isbeyond just mere stories. So I'm
going to show you some other earlyillustrations now from this time period. So
(12:35):
this is an eighteen eighty two illustrationof an Aboriginal man explaining the legend of
the or the legend or perhaps tohim, the reality of the bunya to
two young children near a watering holein eighteen eighty two. And this is
an old newspaper report saying hunting thebunyip, with another strange image replicating what
(13:01):
it actually is. And this particularimage I do like because it sort of
has that seal or perhaps dog likequality representing what the bunyip actually looked like.
And this is also a classic imageof what just sort of encapsulates that
(13:22):
fear that the local population of Aboriginalsmust have felt when they were either scaring
themselves or they were actually being chasedby a creature of unknown origin. And
this particular artwork from nineteen thirty five, I think is an absolutely beautiful piece
(13:43):
of art and that shows a creaturethat is certainly very very strange. And
it's the one that I used atthe start of the show because it was
an image that I just really appreciatedthe artwork in it and I thought it
looked absolutely amazing. That's another anothergreat image of what they look like.
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And during the early settlement of Australiaby Europeans, the notion became commonly held
that the bunyip was an unknown animalthat awaited discovery, unfamiliar with the sights
and sound of Australia's peculiar fauna earlier. Earlier Europeans believe that the bunyip described
(14:26):
to them was one more strange Australiananimal, and they sometimes even attributed unfamiliar
animal calls and cries to being abunyip. Ah, there's a bunyan.
And scholars suggested also that the nineteenthcentury bunyanp law was reinforced by imported European
(14:48):
law, such as that of theIrish pooka puca google that when you get
a chance. So you've got Aboriginallegends and you've also got European bringing their
legend and law and superstitions and beliefsto Australia at the same time, which
creates a really interesting combination of Aboriginalculture and European culture. And I just
(15:18):
wonder what sort of effect that hadover the years as well. And a
large number of bunyip sightings occurred duringthe eighteen forties and eighteen fifties, and
particularly in the southeastern colonies of Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia,
Victoria being my state. So we'regoing to look at some examples now of
(15:41):
the European settlers coming into contact withbunyips and bunyip legends. So one of
the earliest accounts relating to a large, unknown freshwater animal was in eighteen eighteen
(16:02):
when a gentleman called gentlemen called HamiltonHume and James Men found some large bones
at Lake Bathurst in New South Wales. And I do believe I've got a
picture of them here somewhere, Sothis is them, Hamilton Hume and James
Men, looking very much the gentlemanback in the day, back in eighteen
(16:29):
eighteen. So they found some largebones at Lake Bathurst in New South Wales.
They did not call the animal abunya, but described the remains indicating
a creature as very much like ahippopotamus or a manatee. The Philosophical Society
of Australia later offered to reimburse Humefor any costs incurred in recovering a specimen
(16:56):
of the unknown animal, but forthe numerous reasons, Hume did not return
to the lake. So ancient dipredonskeletons have also have sometimes been compared to
the hippopotamus, and they are aland animal but have sometimes been found in
a lake or a watercourse. Soof course at this time you've got ancient
(17:19):
fossils and Australian megafauna that certainly ineighteen eighteen they may not have been aware
about what the megafauna was back atthat time. So it's a it's all
very interesting, and it's the onething I must say about the bunyip and
what we're going to discuss tonight.It is very it's hard to really put
(17:45):
your finger on where truth and legendsort of converge. So these early European
encounters and presentations of evidence are reallyall that we have to go by.
(18:07):
So we'll just talk about all ofthat a little bit later on. And
then more significant was the discovery offossilized bones of some quadruped much larger than
an ox or buffalo in the WellingtonCaves in the mid eighteen thirties by bushman
George Rankin and later by another mancalled Thomas Mitchell. Sydney's Reverend John Dunmore
(18:32):
long announced the find as convincing proofof the deluge, referring to biblical accounts
of the flood, but British Britishanatomous anatomist Sir Richard Owen identified the fossils
as the gigantic marsupials, not theharium and tipiodon excuse my butchering of scientific
(18:56):
names. At the same time,some settlers observed that all natives throughout these
districts have a tradition of a verylarge animal having at one time existed in
the large creeks and rivers, andby many at that time it is said
that the animal still exists. Sostill in eighteen thirty they're saying that this
Bunyan preacher, it still exists.It's still here in Australia, so that's
(19:23):
it is what it is. InJuly eighteen forty five, in a Victorian
town called Geelong, which is actuallythe biggest town in Victoria outside of Melbourne,
and it's only just down the roadfrom Melbourne to the west, the
Geelong Advertiser announced the discovery of afossil found near Geelong under the headlines of
(19:45):
wonderful discovery of new animal. Thisis in July eighteen forty five. This
was a continuation of a story onthe fossil remains from the previous issue.
The newspaper said that, and Iquote on the bone being shown to an
intelligent Aboriginal he at once recognized itas belonging to the bunya, which he
(20:07):
declared he had seen. On beingrequested to make a drawing of it,
he did so without hesitation. AndI'm going to show you that drawing that
he did. This is the geelongbunya. So that's the illustration that the
that he drew without hesitation of beingwhat a bunyip looked like. And the
(20:33):
account noted that a story of anAboriginal woman being killed by a bunya,
And the most direct evidence of allthat of a man named mum Baughan,
that's his Aboriginal name, who showedseveral deep wounds on his breast made by
the claws of the animal. Soanother man Aboriginal man came forward and showed
that he had been clawed by abunyip. So the account provides this description
(21:00):
of the creature. The bunyip thenis represented as uniting the characteristics of a
bird and of an alligator. Ithas a head resembling an emu, with
a long bill at the extremity ofwhich is a transverse projection on each side
with serrated edges like the bone ofthe stingray. Its body and legs partake
of the nature of the alligator.The hind legs are remarkably thick and strong,
(21:26):
and the fore legs are much longer, but still of great strength.
The extremities are furnished with long claws. But the average, you say,
its usual method of killing its preyis hugging it to death. When in
the water, it swims like afrog, and when on shore it walks
on its hind legs with its headerect, in which position it measures twelve
(21:51):
or thirteen feet in height. Sothat's in the Geelong Advertiser in July eighteen
five, and shortly after this accountappeared it was repeated in other Australian newspapers.
And this appears to be the firstuse of the word bunyip in a
written publication. So interesting, it'sjust also long ago now it really is.
(22:19):
In January eighteen forty six, apeculiar skull was taken by a settler
from the banks of the Murrambidgee Rivernear Belle Rannold in New South Wales,
so to the north of where Iam here. An initial report suggested that
it was the skull of something unknownto science. The squad who found it
(22:41):
remarked all the natives who it's beenshown to called this skull found on the
banks of the Murrambidgee River to bea bunya, and by July eighteen forty
seven, several experts, including aWS McLay and a Professor Owen, had
identified the skull as the deformed fetalskull of a foal or a calf.
(23:06):
At the same time, the reportedbunyip skull was put on display in the
Australian Museum in Sydney for two daysand visitors flocked to see it, and
as the Sydney Morning Herald reported thatmany people spoke about their own bunyip sightings.
Reports of this discovery used the phrasekin pratie as well as bunyap Explorer
(23:30):
William Hovell, who examined the skull, also called it a cat and pie
for whatever reason. So that's somereally strange sort of terminology around it from
back in the day. But thisis the actual skull that they that was
found on the banks of the MurrambidgeeRiver, So it certainly is an unusual
skull. Whether it's a deformed horseor calf or something else is perhaps possible,
(23:56):
but if you put it into thehistorical and cultural context of that time,
that certainly would have appeared to havebeen something extremely extremely unusual to the
people who saw it. In Marchof that year, a bunyip or an
immense platypuss described was also cited sunninghimself on the placid bosom of the Yarra,
(24:23):
which is a river in Melbourne,just opposite the customs House. Immediately
a crowd gathered and three men setoff by boat to secure the stranger,
which disappeared when they were about ina yard from him. So around the
same time in eighteen forty six,near Melbourne on the Yarra River, they
(24:45):
had seen this strange, large creaturesunning itself and had set out to try
and capture it. But of courseback then no one had mobile phones or
anything else like that, so reallyunusual. And another early account of bunyips
is from a convict called William Buckley, who was a rather strong looking character.
(25:11):
And this is him here, sothat's how he looked, or at
least a representation of him. Sohe was an escaped convict, and he
wrote in his eighteen fifty two biographyof thirty years, because he escaped and
he was living with the Watharona peopleAboriginal people. He's eighteen fifty two accounts
(25:37):
records in the Lake Mudawarai now likeModaware, as well as in most of
the other other areas, a veryextraordinary amphibious animal, which the natives called
bunyip. Buckley's account suggests he sawa creature such a creature on several occasions,
(25:59):
and he adds, I could neverto see any part except the back,
which appears to be covered with feathersof a dusky gray color. It
seems to be about the size ofa full grown calf. And I could
never learn from any of the nativesthat they had seen either the head or
the tail. The creature only appearswhen the weather is very calm and the
(26:21):
water is smooth now. Buckley alsoclaimed the creature was common in the Barwin
River, which is also Daniage alongand cites an example he heard of an
Aboriginal woman being killed by a bunyipon the Barwin River, and he emphasized
the bunyip was believed to have hadsupernatural powers. So I think it had
(26:45):
some level of ability to affect youif you had affected it. So the
strangeness continues. So in an articletitled the Bunyip, a newspaper reported of
the drawings made by a gentleman calledEdwin Stockula, and this is him here.
(27:08):
Edwin Stockula a lot of difficult topronounce words in this episode, So
that's him as he traveled on theMurray and the Golden Rivers. Amongst the
latter drawings, there was Amongst thesedrawings there was a likeness of a bunya,
(27:29):
or rather a view of the neckand shoulders of the animal. Mister
stock Stockulatur informed us this is anewspaper that the buneep is a large freshwater
seal having two small padules or finsattached to the shoulders, a long swan
like neck, a head like adog, and a curious bag hanging under
(27:52):
the jaw resembling the pouch of apelican. The animal is covered with hair
like the platter puss and the coloris a glossy black. Mister Stoculatur saw
no less than six of these curiousanimals at different times. His boat was
in thirty feet of one near McGuire'spunt on the Golden River, and he
(28:15):
fired at the bunyip, but hedid not succeed in capturing him. The
smallest appeared to be about five feetin length, and the largest exceeded fifteen
feet. The head of the largestwas the size of a bullock's head and
three feet out of the water,so quite large. After taking a sketch
of the animal, mister Stockulteer showedit to several of the aborigines of the
(28:40):
Golden tribe, who declared that thepicture was the bunyip's brother, meaning a
duplicate or likeness of the bunyip.The actual picture itself and the animals moved
against the current at the rate ofabout seven miles an hour, and mister
Stoculatur states that he could have approachedcloser to the specimen deserved, had he
not been deterred by the stories ofthe natives concerning the power and the fury
(29:04):
of the bunyard, and by thefact that his gun had only a single
barrel, and his boat was ofa frail frail description his boat's obviously he
wasn't in a very strong boat.This is another image that is sort of,
I suppose, comes to mind forwhat a bunyip might actually look like.
(29:27):
So that's interesting as well. Sothere were people out there at that
time encountering them and making record ofbunyips as well. The descriptions varied across
newspaper accounts. The great bunyip questionseems likely to be brought to a close
(29:48):
as a mister Stoculator and artist anda gentleman who has come up the Murray
in a small boat states that hesaw one and was enabled to take a
drawing of this vexed question, butcould not succeed in capturing him. We
have seen the sketch and it putsus in mind of a hybrid between the
water mole and the great sea serpent. Mister Stockulatur and artist and his mother
(30:11):
are on an expedition down the MurrayRiver for the purpose of making some faithful
sketches of the views of this finestream, as well as the creatures frequenting
it. I have seen some oftheir productions, and as they are as
they portray localities with which I amwell acquainted, can pronounce the drawings faithful
representations. Mother and son go downthe stream in a canoe. The lady
(30:36):
paints flowers, and the son devoteshimself to choice views of the riverside.
One of the drawings represents a singularcreature which the artist is unable to classify.
It has the appearance in miniature ofthe famous sea serpent, as that
animal is described by navigators. Misterstock Leftur was about twenty five yards distant
(30:57):
from it at first sight. Itape lay placidly on the water. On
being observed, the stranger set off, working his paddles briskly and rapidly disappeared.
A captain Cadell has tried to solvethe mystery, but is not yet
satisfied as to what the animal reallyis. Mister Stockulatur states that they were
(31:18):
about two feet of it above thewater when he first saw it, and
he estimates its length from five tosix feet. The worthy captain says that
unless the creature is the musk drake, so called for giving off a very
strong odor of musk, he cannotaccount for the novelty and Stockulatur disputes the
newspaper description in a letter, statingthat he never called the animal a bunyan,
(31:41):
it did not have a swan lightneck, and he never said anything
about the size of the animal ashe never saw the whole body. He
went on to write that all wouldbe revealed in his diorama, and it
took him four years to paint upto seventy individual pictures. And the diorama
has long since disappeared and made itmay no longer exist. So I was
(32:02):
creating a lot of furlough also backin the day with controversy and disputes and
is this thing real or is itnot real? But one thing is for
sure is that back in the earlysettlement times of Australia, the buny it
was a hot topic for conversation,so it really really was. The first
(32:30):
recorded European account of an alleged bunyipin what would become Queensland came in eighteen
fifty so Queensland being in the northof Australia, when a woman walking near
a waterhole on the Bromlington property nearthe Logan River claimed to have witnessed a
huge horn creature with eel like featuresand a platypus like bill. She estimated
(32:52):
that the visible portion above the waterwas about ten meters in length, and
she left and returned with two witnesses, but they only saw the tail for
a short while before it disappeared belowwater. And she did, however,
provide the most detailed and fantastical descriptionof any bunyip sighting in Queensland history.
(33:13):
And during that same year, thefishermen on the Condomine River became very wary
of a spot in the river abouttwenty kilometers from the town of Warwick.
Several had lost their lines there toan animal that was reportedly to resemble an
appearance a bunya. No further descriptionwas provided. It does not roam around
much, but confines itself to onevery deep hole in the river. Some
(33:38):
people here believe it to be afreshwater seal. A very strange feature is
that where it habitates, no fishof any description are to be found.
Several people of late who tried tosneak up on it from behind trees while
basking in the sun, but cannever succeed. And that was the Warwick
Examiner and Times sixty of February eighteenninety two. So In a rare example
(34:07):
of bunyip reports coming from the sameregion within a short time frame, fishermen
on the Condomine claimed to have seena bunyip near Darky Flats now known as
Pratton, northwest of Warwick, andthey described it as being about as large
as a medium sized dog, skincovered with fur, the color and appearance
of that of a platypus, legs, short head shaped like a pig's,
(34:29):
and the ears pricked and inclining forward. That's the Warwick Argus fourteenth of January
eighteen ninety three. The reporter addedthat people unscientific are apt to class the
bunyip with those visionary snakes so oftenseen by those that love the bottle,
not wisely put too well. Sothat summed up attitudes towards the bunyip.
(34:52):
But at the end of the nineteenthcentury people were thinking people were drinking and
not really being too taking it tooseriously. So perhaps earlier in time it
was taken seriously while they were learningand discovering about what Australian fauna was in
the early days. And as weget sort of through the next hundred years,
(35:15):
the bunyip is becoming treated a bita bit more lightheartedly and not taken
too seriously. In the mid eighteenhundreds, bunyip sightings became increasingly common in
the Tasmanian Central Highlands Lake region inTasmania, and A Harvey J. Taylor
(35:36):
wrote in the Tasmanian Bunyip Alive andWell as the beasts crashed through the water.
It became the first recorded sighting ofa Tasmanian bunyip by a white man.
The year was eighteen fifty two,midnight on a moonlit lake on Lake
Tiberius. By eighteen seventy there wasa sense of urgency around solving the mystery
of these repeated sightings, and thelaw became involved. Chief Constable Sergeant James
(36:00):
Wilson wrote to his superiors on thematter, challenging the idea popular at the
time that the creatures seen in thelake was indeed a seal, having traveled
upstream from upstream from Hobart's Derwent River. I do not think it possible for
seals to make their way up fromthe sea to the Great Lake in a
consequence of a very considerable waterfall beingin the Shannon near its junction with the
(36:22):
house, unless being amphibious, theycould escape the fall and reach the river
above land above by land. Itwas October twentieth, eighteen seventy. So
controversy rains around around the bunyip.That really really does, and we're just
(36:43):
going to have I'll to show usa couple of other sort of images around
around bunyip story. So this onehere is of a woman going down by
the water, an Aboriginal woman,and the eyes of the bunyip are lurking,
and then she is attacked by thebunya and they can't find her,
(37:06):
and basically all they find the nextday is a feather and some and some
blood. Another vision of the bunyipis of it roaming around. This one
almost looks like a cow or abullock and wandering around in the forests.
And another sort of urban style legendof the bunyip is of a of a
(37:28):
ferryman taking pot shots as something that'sin the water like a bunyipple they look
though that illustration looks more like awerewolf, but he actually shot the bunya
and then a few weeks later hewas covered in these saws and he died
about two weeks later as a resultof his inflicting harm on the on the
(37:49):
Bunya. And another image that Ifound is of a of a bunyip being
described as having two legs, arms, a fish type head with sticks on
top of its head. So thevariety is just unbelievable out there, It
really really is. So have agood think about all of that. It
(38:14):
really is a varied and wide taleof the legend of the bunyip in here
in Australia. And I have gotmore to talk about in relation to the
Bunyip, but I want to moveon to the next strange creature that I
want to have a discussion about ontonight's episode, and it's another really interesting
(38:43):
one and I find it completely fascinating. This is an aboriginal legend that it
really I just find that the imaginationof it is really quite incredible, and
who knows, perhaps on some levelthese creatures do exist or have existed at
(39:05):
some point in time. And thislittle guy I find particularly interesting because he's
nothing like the bunyip. The bunyipis at one end of the of the
scale, can be described as beinga fairly large creature that lives in waterways
that if you encounter it, it'sgoing to behave like some sort of hippopotamus
(39:25):
and attack you and probably kill you. So but that's in a large creature
kind of a way, with lotsof people terrified of it, including the
early white European settlers at the timealso being terrified of the bunyip. But
this next one we're going to talkabout is completely different, and he doesn't
(39:49):
really appear or I haven't been ableto find any record of this particular creature
in early European records. But thisone is very interesting, nonetheless, and
it's called the yarrah Ma yah whovery interesting name and only took me a
week to remember it, the yarrahMa Yahoo. So also interestingly enough that
(40:14):
the Yahoe was also known as simplythe Yahoo, so that Yahoo has had
a strong connection to cryptoids in Australia. In this case, we're going to
talk about the yarrah Ma Yahoo.And I found several interesting descriptions of this
creature, and I'm going to readthrough some of these, and some of
(40:37):
it crosses over a little bit,but overall you get this this picture of
what this creature is actually like.And first of all, I'll put up
an image of what it looks likeor a representation of it. So this
is one representation of the yarrah Mayah who and that's spelled y m a
(41:05):
yha who quite quite difficult to saynow. The yarra ma Wahoo is the
vampire of Australian Aboriginal mythology. Itis red and frog like appearance, with
a large head, big toothless mouth, and suckers on its hands and feet.
(41:28):
The Yarrama Yahoo lives in fig treeswhere they wait for passers by to
lay down for a nap. Oncethey're unconscious, the Yarrama Yahoo drops down
on them and drinks their blood.When all the blood has been extracted from
the victim, the Yarrama Yahoo washesthe corpse down with a little water and
(41:52):
then funnily enough, has a napitself. When it wakes, it las
up the victim's skin and a littlewhile later that skin bag becomes another yarrah
mark Yahoo. Interesting and this isanother image of or drawing of one.
(42:20):
So Yarramwaho is a blood sucking creaturefrom Aboriginal folklore that lurks in the treetops
until a person would walk underneath it. It would then leap from the tree
onto the person suck almost all itsblood and then swallow them whole. After
swallowing the poor soul, it wouldregurgitate the person up, take a drink
(42:45):
of water, and nap, thenwake up to puke the person out over
and over, and as it doesthis, he or she will become shorter
and redder each time, until theythemselves become a yarramwahu. It resembles a
(43:08):
little red frog like man or womanabout four feet tall, with red hair
and skin. It has an enlargedmouth with no teeth. It has suckers
on the tip of its fingers thatit uses to suck the blood out of
(43:28):
its victims, which are usually people, and it can unhinge its jaw like
that of a snake. And Ireally like this image here of it because
they sort of do have sort ofreptilian type heads with the little hands and
the little suckers that come out ofit. So it could be an unknown
(43:52):
variety of a tazia, a primatefrom Southeast Asia with fingers that have an
appearance resembling suction cups. There aresome problems with this theory is that the
Tazis are relatively harmless and far smallerthan the yarrama yahoo, and they also
don't live in Australia as far aswe know. But the yarrama waho's a
(44:15):
strange little man who stands four feethigh. The biggest part of him are
his head, his mouth, andhis stomach. He has no teeth in
his mouth, and he simply swallowshis food and can even swallow a grown
man. His head is like somethinglike a snake's, and he opens his
(44:37):
mouth just as a snake does.The point of his fingers and the tips
of his toes are cup shaped likethe suckers of an octopus. They live
mostly in thick leafy trees and preferthe wild fig tree. They do not
hunt for their food, but simplypounce upon a person and place their hands
(45:01):
and feet upon the victim, draininghis blood. The Yaruma yahoo does not
try to suck all the blood fromthe body, but leaves sufficient to keep
the victim alive while he walks aroundand gets an appetite. After he returns,
(45:22):
he lies down on the ground,facing the victim and crawling like a
goanna, and opens his mouth wideand sucks his prey into his mouth head
first. He then rises and standson his little legs and dances around until
the prey is well inside his stomach. Then he goes to a river or
(45:45):
pool of water and drinks copious amountsof water before falling asleep. When he
wakes, he vomits the remains ofhis recent meal. He will check several
times to see if is not feigningdeath by poking him with a stick or
tickling him. If he gets noresponse and goes to sleep, the victim
(46:08):
can use the opportunity to run away. Should the Yarramawaho fail to check his
victim, then the spirit of thewild fig tree would kill him by entering
into his head through his ear andcausing a mumbling noise ending with intense silence,
so that the spirit would leave therude body and become a cold fungus
(46:30):
that grows upon the trees and shedsa dull glow at night. A person
who is caught and swallowed by oneof the red men becomes shorter with each
capture, until at last he resemblesa yarram yahoo. And here's another image.
(46:52):
Here's one sitting in the trees inthe dark with his little little body,
big fat head, and little armsand legs. And another image that
he is also quite good. Theyarramawaho of Australia are restricted to the forests
(47:15):
of the Pacific coast, and theirabsence elsewhere should be considered a blessing.
They are primarily nursery bogies, dissuadingchildren from frequent dangerous areas. A yarramawaho
is a grotesque site and would beamusing were it not for its ghastly habits.
Not more than four feet tall,red and covered with fur, a
(47:37):
yarramawaho has a disproportionately large head.It can open its toothless mouth like a
snake, and a throat and bellyare similarly distendable. An adult man can
easily be swallowed by a yarramawaho withoutdiscomfort. Its fingers and toes are equipped
with suction cups. Yarramawahos are goodclimbers, but can only waddle like cockatoos
(48:00):
on the land like birds. Leavedfig trees are the yarramawaho's favorite haunt.
They can wait for days in thebranches until some hapless traveler, perhaps seeking
shelter from sun or rain, liesunder the tree. Lone children are their
favorite prey. When a Yarramawah whoattacks it attaches his hands and feet onto
(48:25):
the victim's body, using the suctioncups to drain the blood out of them.
It does not empty them entirely,but only enough to make them faint.
It then leaves its victim for awhile, eventually returning to swallow them
whole head first. A little dancelets the food slide down. The meal
is washed down with water, andthe Yarramayah, who takes a nap after
(48:50):
waking the Yarramawah, who vomits itsprey out. The human is almost always
alive and playing dead. There isno reason to fight back, as the
creature can overpower the strongest man.The Yarramawah, who takes five paces,
then returns and pokes his victims sidewith a stick. Then it walks away
ten paces before returning to tickle thehuman under the arm or neck. A
(49:13):
fifty yard stroll is followed up bymore tickling, then the Yarramawah, who
goes behind a bush and sleeps.This ritual is always repeated the Yarramawah,
who knows that if they fail tocarry out these actions, the spirit of
the fig tree will mumble in theirears, causing them to transform into glowing
tree mushrooms. For this reason,it is safest to play dead until this
(49:37):
point, when you get to yourfeet and run where have you gone?
My victim calls the yarramawah who ifit hears you escaping, but its awkward
gait makes it easy to outrun afterfailing to recapture, prey a spiteful yaramawah
who will drink up all the waterin nearby wells and water holes, leading
people to seek liquid from treesap andthus end exposed to the yarramawah who's attack.
(50:04):
And it's an important not to leta yeramawah who swallow you multiple times.
The second time you were swallowed andregurgitated, you become shorter and completely
hairless. For the third time youwere shorter still, and thick hair grows
over your body. Eventually, afterenough cycles was swallowing and vomiting, you
become a yarra mowah who yourself.So it's a rather outlandish creature, but
(50:35):
the legend of it and what it'scapable of doing, I don't think that
the creature shops could dream up with. And this is this is an Aboriginal
creature from Aboriginal culture, and theydescribed and believed in this little guy,
and he really is extremely outlandish.You could almost call it, call him
(51:00):
an alien, because that's really whathe sort of looks like. He kind
of looks like an alien. He'sfour foot tall with a large head,
and that's where the comparison ends towhat you would obviously call grays. But
the creature is certainly something strange andI don't know how you could dream up
(51:23):
that's the process that it goes throughto attach itself to a victim, as
in sleeping under a fig tree,landing on top of them, basically draining
them of blood, swallowing them,regurgitating them and having a nap and poking
and priding and all that sort ofstuff. It really is quite amazing,
(51:45):
so's and it brings in other themestoo, like vampirism comes to mind with
it. Obviously that the fact thatit's considered to be a vampire, even
though it doesn't use the traditional teethand it uses the suckers on its hands
and feet. It really is interesting. So you know, the chances that
(52:07):
a creature like this would exist isand prey on humans in a modern ERAa
is relatively relatively perhaps slim to thatchance. Um so, but what really
fascinates me is how where do theselegends and reality diverge, you know,
(52:29):
with legends of the Bunya and theYarramaahu as example, and there are only
two primary examples that I've sort ofwanted to discuss on this episode, you
know about that, And one ofthe interesting things about it is they say
that it might actually be based onthis creature. So this is a tree
(52:53):
frog from Australia. So this isa red eyed tree frog native to Australian
jungles and tropical rainforests, and itssports strikingly red eyes and large predominant throats
and mouths. So while the littleamphibians are only partially red bodied, it's
(53:17):
not far fetched comparison. Just imaginethe impression one might leave if it was
to drop on your face in themiddle of a quick nap. So that's
perhaps a good little indicator of youknow, maybe how some of these stories
do do originate. But you thinkthat, well, what if there's more
(53:43):
to it than that. What ifthat creature actually, at some point in
time did exist in some capacity itwas an actual creature living in the Australian
landscape. Perhaps not there now,maybe it still is there, who knows,
(54:04):
but the it's a very strange,very strange creature, and it instantly
attracted my attention when I sort offirst saw it, strangely enough, in
a totally unrelated field. I sawwhat would be considered our Automotive Club of
Australia, the RACV, had aarticle on their website about strange Australian mysteries
(54:29):
and one of the strange mysteries thatthey had on that website was the Yarramawahu.
And I thought, I've lived herefor fifty three years and I've never
ever heard of that of that creature, and it certainly is a very unusual
little guy. And I thought,I wanted to just introduce it to you
and have a and have a lookat it, and see, you know,
(54:52):
here's a strange little creature from Aboriginalmythology that is, you know,
really unusual in the way that itoperates, the way that it kills a
victim, the fear that they hadand the belief that they had in this
creature at that time. There's noreports of it that exists to my knowledge,
(55:16):
but this is only arm chair investigationat this point in time. This
is not getting out there and puttingmy boots on the ground to try and
go find one where they may havebeen purported to exist. But along with
the bunyip, they are both reallyvery very unusual examples of what could be
(55:39):
potential cryptids in the Australian landscape andcertainly in the Australian the Australian history.
So thank you so much for joiningme on my tenth episode here. I
hope you found that interesting looking atthe bunyip and the Yarramabahu. And there's
a lot more of these sort ofstrange creatures that I that I can bring
(56:02):
out. And there's another one thatI was going to cover today, but
I've sort of run out of timeon that, which was a bonus creature.
But we'll discuss that perhaps next week. So thank you very much for
joining me, and I look forwardto seeing you again next week. Have
a great night
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