ShukerNature: TONGUE-TIED BY THE TWO-TONGUES!

Is that this what Malaya’s
mystifying two-tongued cryptids seemed like? (created by me utilizing Grok)

The times spanning
Christmas and the New Yr are historically ones crammed with thriller and
magic, a time of weirdness and surprise. So what higher day than at this time, New
Yr’s Eve, to current right here on ShukerNature in your leisure and enjoyument
throughout this time the next cryptozoological conundrum?

In 1997, I included the next account in my guide From
Flying Toads To Snakes With Wings, hoping that
somebody studying it’d have the ability to suggest an identification for the mysterious
creatures described, as I used to be completely perplexed by them – however no-one ever
did. Consequently, I can solely assume that these cryptids left them as
taxonomically tongue-tied as they’ve executed with me. Nor have I ever uncovered
any extra data regarding them. So, 26 years later, in 2023, I
reprinted my account in my common Alien Zoo column on thriller animals and
animal mysteries for the British journal Fortean
Instances as an enchanting crypto-riddle to ponder over in the course of the festive
season, simply in case it did elicit an answer from somebody that point. As soon as
once more, nonetheless, reply got here there none.

Consequently, one yr
on from its look in Alien Zoo, and within the hope that the acquainted phrase
“”third time fortunate” will certainly show true on this event,
right here but once more is the my account recalling the tangled story of the two-tongues,
in case ShukerNature’s redoubtable readers can present the long-sought key to
its locked field of beastly secrets and techniques:

On Might 27
1939, Fashionable Marvel documented some ‘ultra-mysterious’ mammals,
allegedly captured by a photographer within the Malayan jungles and later noticed
by bemused officers in Manila, within the Philippines. Every of the beasts (of
unrecorded quantity) was described as being quadrupedal, weighing about 200
kilos, coated in a furry, mole-like pelage (i.e. darkish, dense, and glossy?),
with a raccoon-like head [masked?], a pair of owl-like eyes (thus massive and
staring?), and odd dentition – a few of its enamel resembled a person’s, others have been
cat-like – plus a passion for bananas. Besides for his or her extraordinarily heavy weight
(an error on the a part of the unique report?), there would appear to be an opportunity
of figuring out them with some identified animal sort – till, that’s, their most
distinctive attribute is revealed.

For the
description additionally said that every of those beasts had two tongues! Moreover,
it alleged that they by no means drank, as a result of they absorbed all the moisture
that they required immediately via their skins. That is typically a characteristic of
sure animals dwelling in water or in moist habitats, however the animals involved
are usually amphibians, fishes, and decrease life kinds, not mammals. Conversely,
it’s true that many desert-dwelling rodents not often if ever drink water,
as a result of they acquire it from their meals (e.g. juicy plant tissues) or from
metabolic water launched as they digest the dry elements of their weight loss plan, however
they don’t take up water via their skins.

 

Basically
look (and excluding weight), they’re harking back to a number of the
lesser-known, mask-faced types of Malay civet and badger – elusive,
short-furred creatures of nocturnal life-style and keen on fruit inside their
largely omnivorous weight loss plan. Furthermore, the owl-like eyes recall to mind the tarsiers
– these orb-eyed, sucker-fingered, lemur-like primates indigenous to southeast
Asia (together with the Malay Archipelago), and sufficiently unusual in look
to these not conversant in these rarely-seen nocturnal creatures to draw
shock and newspaper consideration.

Sunda stink (=skunk) badger Mydaus javanensis, native to Indonesia and
Malaysia, photographed in Malaysia (© Thompson Hyggen – copyright-free)

Even so,
none of these identities can reconcile the thriller beasts’ two tongues and the
capacity to soak up moisture immediately via their skins. May these attributes
have been primarily based upon misunderstanding or mistranslation, somewhat than upon
actuality? As nothing extra is on report concerning the photographer’s mystifying
finds, there isn’t any means of understanding. 

So there it’s, the
owl-eyed, twin-tongued, never-drinking plantain-eater – if nothing else (and confirming that I am simply happy!), it scans
satisfyingly just like the one-eyed, one-horned, flying purple folks eater
immortalised in a basic 1958 Sheb Wooley novelty tune and 30 years later in a
1988 household film immediately impressed by it!

In the meantime, any ideas or
solutions as to the two-tongues’ attainable identification, or any further experiences/data
concerning them, can be very gratefully obtained!

A two-tongue with a banquet of bananas awaiting
its pleasure! (created by me utilizing Grok)

By the way, as some
of , I have been experimenting with numerous AI image-generators, testing
their capabilities and limitations in order to be higher geared up to recognise
AI-generated pretend cryptozoologically-themed photos with which the Web appears to
be more and more awash of late. So, as no picture of the Malayan two-tongues has
ever been created to my information, I made a decision to place to the take a look at two totally different
AI image-generators that I have been exploring, Grok and MagicStudio, and see how
they carried out when prompted to provide photos of those weird beasts.

And, as I am certain that
these on the market who aren’t AI followers will likely be delighted to be taught, each packages
have been aptly rendered tongue-tied (or regardless of the AI equal state is!) by
the tortuous problem posed by the two-tongues. Not solely did they fail completely
to depict them because the very sizeable animals that something weighing 200 lb should
absolutely be (as an alternative presenting what look way more like diminutive cubs!), however
additionally, out of all of the quite a few photos that they generated, just one, produced by
Grok, truly featured creatures possessing two tongues apiece – and right here it
is:

A pair of two-tongues truly depicted
with two tongues! (created by me utilizing Grok)

General, Grok was the
superior creator with regard to this explicit pictorial process, because it additionally
created a lot of photos that includes creatures with a single however bilobed tongue
that my very own digital addition of a hand-drawn line separating the lobes into two
separate tongues was enough to engender some passable twin-tongued
entities that I’ve included on this article. Even so, they nonetheless didn’t overly
resemble the unique 1977 verbal description of those creatures, quoted by me
above.

As for MagicStudio:
normally a really correct depicter of animals (give or take some further or
deformed fingers/toes and the occasional extra leg, or two…): confronted with
offering an correct portrayal of the two-tongues, it threw a veritable
generative gasket, and yielded some illustrations of animals that bore no
resemblance in any respect to the two-tongues’ verbal description. It even garbled
my immediate for his or her tongues to be pink, bestowing upon its mixed-up mammals some
parts of pink fur as an alternative! Nonetheless, albeit wholly inaccurate zoologically talking,
aesthetically a number of the creatures thus created by MagicStudio have been so enticing, interesting, and downright cute that I could not bear to delete them. So here’s a choice of them, in all of
their pleasant dottiness:

 

All three photos created by me utilizing MagicStudio

If nothing else,
designers of potential new cuddly toys might do lots worse than be impressed
by a few of these ultra-cute beasties. You possibly can pay me my 10% creator’s
fee later!

Immediately would have been
the birthday of Nan, my maternal grandmother Gertrude Timmins (who as soon as
skilled a decidedly Fortean occasion of her personal – click on right here to learn all about it), who
handed away peacefully in her sleep on the grand outdated age of 99 again in 1994.
Identical to me, and likewise like her daughter, my mom Mary Shuker, Nan cherished wildlife
and Nature usually, so I am certain that she would have accredited of my writing
and presenting this fascinating fauna case right here at this time on her birthday. God
bless you Nan, and Mother, and all of my household, all of whom are lengthy gone now however
by no means forgotten by me. Ome day we will be again collectively, by no means to be separated
once more.

My late grandmother, Gertrude Timmins, with
Patch, my little wire-haired Jack Russell terrier (© Dr Karl Shuker)

Wishing all of my
ShukerNature weblog readers, and all of my Shuker In MovieLand weblog readers too, a Joyful New
Yr – might 2025 show to be a kindly, profitable yr for you.

And it is toodle-pip from the two-tongues too!
(created by me utilizing Grok)