Surfing chickens, fungi assassins and other tall tales

Discover the strangest stories from the past seven days

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It's been another week of unlikely news, including: • A thirteen-year-old boy who camped out in a tent in his garden for three years finally heading back inside  • An "im-peck-able" flock of surfing Australian chickens becoming local celebrities • The US National Park Service advising hikers to "never push a slower friend down" during a grizzly bear encounter, "even if you feel the friendship has run its course", and  • A Pennsylvania woman presumed dead after disappearing more than 30 years ago being found alive and well in a Puerto Rico nursing home. After all those tall tales, calibrate your sense of the absurd by trying to work out which of the following two stories is real and which is fake: • King Charles is to be anointed at his coronation with holy oil containing wax from the intestines of sperm whales and secretions from the glands of civet cats, or • A Florida man ditched plans to make chowder from a huge clam found on a beach after discovering that the mollusc was more than 200 years old. Find out which tale is a little too tall at the end of this newsletter.

meanwhile... In odder news (Not so) Big Mac: A 238lbs(17st)  man has gone viral on TikTok after vowing to eat nothing but McDonald's for 100 days in a bid to lose weight – and he claims the unconventional diet is already working. Kevin Maginnis, from Nashville in Tennessee,  is eating three meals a day from the fast-food chain, but only eats half of what he orders and has swapped fizzy drinks for water. In an update to his more than 60k TikTok followers, Maginnis, also known as @bigmaccoaching, claimed to have lost 17lbs after only 15 days on the diet. The 56-year-old told NBC's Today show that he chose McDonald's after being nicknamed Big Mac due to his size and surname. "I figured, 'Why not embrace it?' And I like McDonald's," said Maginnis. Karens Unite: A new comedy show entitled The Unbearable Righteousness of Being Karen that is due to debut at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival next month is facing a backlash from Karens worldwide. Karens United, a global group of thousand of women who share the name, argue that jokes about Karens have "gone too far" and are "now harmful". The group is calling for an end to the internet meme that rose to prominence in the late 2010s. "We're sorry to hear that the Karen meme is still getting airplay," they told The Sunday Age. "While we were once able to laugh at what seemed like good-natured ribbing, it's turned into serious bullying." Birds of a feather: Flamingoes form small cliques of like-minded individuals within their flock, according to a new study. Previous research showed that flamingoes formed friendship groups, but the latest study, published in the journal Scientific Reports, investigated whether their feathered friendships are partly decided by the birds' individual personality traits. "The answer is yes – birds of a feather flock together," said study co-author and animal behavioural scientist Dr Paul Rose, from Exeter University. The scientists reached that conclusion after analysing the personalities and social behaviour of captive Caribbean and Chilean flamingos at the Slimbridge Wetland Centre in Gloucestershire. "For example, bolder birds had stronger, more consistent ties with other bold birds, while submissive birds tended to spend their time with fellow submissive flamingos," Rose added.

p h o t o   o f   t h e   w e e k Best in show A participant in the "Cats Who Look Like Cows" competition sports a cowboy hat backstage ahead of judging. More than 100 cats were assessed on how closely their fur patterns, colour, fur softness and personality resembled a cow during the contest, hosted by Thailand's Cat Fanciers' Club during a Cat Expo in Bangkok's Ladphro neighborhood. Lauren DeCicca/Getty Images See more

LETHAL LIPOPEPTIDES Fungi assassins Newly discovered chemical compounds are such effective killers that researchers have named them after Keanu Reeves, the actor famed for playing action heroes John Wick and Neo in The Matrix. Scientists at the Leibniz Institute in Germany found that certain bacteria naturally contained chemical compounds that are lethal to harmful fungi that affect plants and humans. Dubbed "keanumycins" by researchers, the compounds are a natural by-product of pseudomonas, bacteria commonly found in soil and water. With fungal infections becoming more resistant to known antifungals, the keanumycins could become a potential new treatment option in an area where they are "desperately needed", said study co-author Sebastian Götze in a statement. The lipopeptide compounds were named after Reeves because they "kill so efficiently", Götze added. Responding to the news during a Reddit question-and-answer session, Reeves said that having the newly discovered chemical compounds named after him was "pretty cool" and "surreal". But in a nod to his famed role as a professional assassin, the actor quipped that scientists "should've called it John Wick".

From the magazine Eaten crisp costs a packet A supermarket worker from Shropshire found a heart-shaped crisp that could have won her £100,000 – but then ate it. Dawn Sagar says she pulled the crisp out of a bag of ready salted Walkers while taking a break at work, and thought, "Oh, a heart, and I'll take a picture of it, because it was the day after Valentine's Day." She sent the photo to various loved ones, who informed her that Walkers was running a competition to find the most perfect heart-shaped crisp. But by then it was too late – she'd eaten it, so couldn't qualify. "I was gutted," Sagar admitted. "But it's just one of those things." For more stories from The Week's "It must be true… I read it in the tabloids" section, subscribe to the magazine. Read more

Contaminated canines Chernobyl's mutant dogs Despite living amid the fallout of the world's worst nuclear disaster, stray dogs living in Chernobyl's exclusion zone appear to be "thriving", The Telegraph reported. Scientists found that free-roaming strays living in the 1,000-mile exclusion zone around the site of the former Chernobyl nuclear power plant have developed DNA and behaviour that is distinct from other canines. Since the 1986 nuclear disaster, the area surrounding the nuclear power plant has been largely abandoned by humans, some of whom left pets behind. Officials tried to exterminate the pets following the disaster, to prevent the risk of the animals spreading disease or contaminating humans, but a population of dogs have survived. According to scientists, the strays live together in packs like those of wild dogs and wolves, "a behaviour not seen in undomesticated animals", said the paper. And blood samples taken from more than 300 feral dogs in the exclusion zone show that the animals are genetically distinct from purebred canines and also other groups of free-breeding dogs nearby.  The studies do not prove that radiation caused the genetic differences, but the data could help researchers better understand the long-term effects of radiation exposure. Scientists will now study the newly discovered genetic traits to see if the mutations may be helping the dogs to survive in the radiation zone.

quote unquote "I gathered." The withering response from former chancellor George Osborne to a since leaked WhatsApp message from Matt Hancock in April 2020 about Covid testing capacity, after the then-health secretary wrote: "I WANT TO HIT MY TARGET!"

this week in history Micro revolution When Volkswagen first released its VW Microbus, it "changed the way the world looked at cars", said Smithsonian magazine. After recognising the need for a bigger model than its Type 1 Beetle, the manufacturer kicked off production of the Type 2 in West Germany on 8 March 1950. The vehicles swiftly gained "cult status with fringe groups" after being exported the the US, becoming "a symbol for counterculture types, who wanted to stand out from the rest of the crowd", the magazine continued. The "versatile vehicle" earned a number of nicknames including the "hippie bus", and became a favoured mode of transportation for people heading to "rallies, polling stations, protests and more" during the 1960s. "Eventually the social revolution subsided", as did demand for the VW Bus. But Volkswagen has embraced electric vehicle technology to give the concept a new lease of life, to the delight of many van fans.

Too tall by half True or false? The first story is false. The holy "chrism oil" used to anoint King Charles at his coronation ceremony will be "animal-cruelty free", the BBC reported. Previous versions of the anointing oil have contained animal products from civets and sperm whales, but "reflecting modern animal-friendly sensitivities", the oil used during the ceremony in May will instead include "olive oil scented with a mix of essential oils, sesame, rose, jasmine, cinnamon, neroli and benzoin, with orange blossom also added". The second story is true. Blaine Parker thought he would be able to get at least two servings of chowder out of a giant Quahog clam that he found on a Florida beach while walking with his family, according to the Tallahassee Democrat. But after stopping to count the growth rings on the mollusc – which like the rings inside trees, indicate the clam's age – environmental studies graduate Parker realised it was around 214 years old, "which would mean it was likely born in 1809, the same year as Abraham Lincoln". The giant clam, nicknamed "Abrer-clam Lincoln", was handed over to the Gulf Specimen Marine Lab and later released back into the Gulf of Mexico.

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