Thomas Grünfeld's anomalous creations are some of the strangest and most surreal of contemporary taxidermy. The creatures from his appropriately titled Misfit series are composed of bits and pieces of animals, all flawlessly sewn together to create entirely new species: a doberman pincher with a calf's head, a beast combining monkey and parrot, another creature, part mule, part giraffe, part ostrich.

The sixteenth-century mathematician Girolamo Cardono claimed that the only way to tell a genuine mermaid from a fake was examine its joints: a fake would inevitably have a seam between the monkey top and fish bottom. But there are no visible seams on Grünfeld’s misfits. The beasts are as incredible and implausible as mermaids, and their most implausible attribute is their organicism – the sense that these wildly mismatched animal parts coalesce with an organic harmony. The Misfits could have seemed jerry-rigged together. They could have looked piecemeal and man-made (which of course they are) but instead the structural integrity of their parts convey a sense that these beasts are anatomically plausible, that they could actually exist, that they could actually function.

The Misfits are reminiscent of early natural histories in which strange and unfamiliar animals were described according to the bits and pieces of well known creatures. For example, the camelopard, now known as the giraffe, was described having the height and neck of a camel, the head of a stag although somewhat smaller, the teeth and feet of an ox, and a leopard’s spots. The armadillo was a pig with a turtle’s shell, and the sloth, part bear, part ape. The platypus displayed complete anatomical confusion, seeming to “possess a three fold nature, that of a fish, a bird, and a quadraped” as Thomas Bewick wrote in 1824. On inspecting the skin of a platypus for the first time in 1802, George Shaw, director of the British Museum, observed that it appeared to have “the beak of a Duck engrafted on the head of a quadruped.” Such a hybrid animal seemed too strange to be true, and Shaw claimed that “it is impossible not to entertain some doubts as to the genuine nature of the animal, and to surmise that there might have been some arts of deception in its structure.” In fact the specimen Shaw examined still bears the marks from his efforts to prise the beak off. As Shaw highlights, it is only a small step from describing animals as if they were composite to actually making a new species.

copyright Sarina BrewerAccording to Homer, the Chimera from ancient Greek legend had the head of a lion, the body of a goat, and a serpent for a tail. The fire-breathing monster was said to have terrorized the Lycians of Asia Minor before being slain by Bellerophon.

In contemporary usage, the word chimera has lost its ferocity and refers to a mere illusion, an unrealistic fancy, a wild fabrication of the mind. The scientific meaning, however, highlights the ancient beast’s genetic fusion: a chimera incorporates the genomes of more than one organism. For example, a bough from a peach tree graphed onto the stalk of a plum tree could be termed a chimera if both peaches and plums flourished on their separate limbs.

Sarina Brewer’s North Woods Chimera is rather more provocative: three vulture heads sprouting from the body of a cat. Using only roadkill, donations from veterinarians, discarded livestock, and other already deceased animals, Brewer views her work as a form of resurrection by endowing carcasses and animal remains with a new life and a disturbing beauty. Co-founder of the Minnesota Association of Rogue Taxidermists along with Scott Bibus and Robert Marbury, Brewer aims to expand the imaginative possibilities of taxidermy by manipulating and transgressing the limits of the natural world. "I call it art,” Brewer states, “you can call it whatever you want."  go to Brewer's website +

The furry-bearing trout has a long Canadian history.  It was apparently first sighted by Scottish immigrants to Eastern Canada in the seventeenth century.  With further research, the geography of the furry fish was extended to include Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana.  As Alex Boese notes, a few theories have been suggested to explain the rare phenomena: evolution or human-made disaster. 

On the natural side, some say that the chilly lake fish spontaneously developed its luxurious coat to cope with the severe northern winters.  On the more cataclysmic side, the fish hair is said to have resulted from the accidental spillage of four jugs of hair tonic in the Arkansas River in Colorado at some point in the 1870s.  http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/tall-tales/trout-fish.html. 

image: fur bearing trout made from rabbit fur and trout from
the National Museums of Scotland. 

The National Museum of Scotland has a rather fine example of the elusive fur-bearing trout.  According to Dr. Geoff Swinney - curator of lower vertebrates, fish, amphibians, and reptiles - a woman arrived at the museum with a furry fish she'd bought in Canada as a souvenir of her trip.  Whether her vacation had been during the winter or summer months is lost to time, but the rather gullible Scottish traveller had been told that indeed Canadian winters were so impossibly cold that even fish needed fur to survive.  The story seems far fetched: indeed Canadian winters are painfully cold, but Scottish winters aren't exactly balmy either. When the museum's staff poo-pooed her creature, she left it behind, and the poor hybrid soul was eventually tossed.

 

However, when Peter Dance's book was published on animal fakes, visitors began asking for the fish.  And so, in a strange turn of events, the museum's taxidermist made a new one - pictured above. 

Image taken from an article posted on Scotsman.com.

Prof. Burnaby Q. Orbax's virtual Museum of Natural and Unnatural Curiosities displays a fearsome array of goulish oddities of which this fur-bearing trout is among the most palatable.  For those with stronger sensibilities, Orbax offers cyclope kitten fetus, the skeleton of alligator boy (what are those holes in its skull?), and an assortment of human remains.  Orbax's motto - "fixing god's mistakes since 2003" - says it all. 

According to his website, the fur-bearing trout "is native only to the most Northern parts of Canada and the United States, where the cold water currents require the fish to grow a peach-like fuzz around areas of their body with little blood circulation. These furry coats 'molt' prior to the spring thaw, and therefore spotting a furred trout is a rare occurence. This specimen was caught by an ice fisherman in Gaspe."

http://www.fiendishcuriosities.com/index.php