Every Friday at 1300 hours, Tally-Ho Corner’s cleverest clogs come together to solve a ‘foxer’ handcrafted by my sadistic chum and colleague, Roman. A complete ‘defoxing’ sometimes takes several days and usually involves the little grey cells of many readers. Don’t be shy. All are welcome to participate.
Below is a list of ‘33 Things Wot You Might Find in a Zoo’ (‘things’ is used in its broadest possible sense). Entries have been stripped of vowels and numbers and have had any inter-word spaces repositioned*. For example, if Guy the Gorilla was present he might appear as GYT HG RLL. Zebra would be ZBR.
*Hyphens are treated as spaces. Apostrophes are ignored.
1. KP
2. MNRL
3. GLD
4. BMBC RTR
5. TBN G
6. QGG
7. HM LYNTHR
8. DDLYDR SLY
9. BLWPP
10. LNDG NTPN D
11. LS SRHD GHGTNRC
12. TYR
13. LN GN SDPTR
14. GRLDDR RLL
15. SNB RFR ST
16. V NCNR
17. ZRSG T
18. LN CCRP RLSTP HNBRKS
19. BRBB RS
20. LD BRGNTT RTS
21. NKS
22. DSMR STSHT
23. HTZN
24. RG NTSCNL
25. BR DDSK
26. SCRM NGHRYR MDLL
27. BR HMLRKB
28. MP RRTMRN
29. NR THR NLZ NGNTCL DRT
30. CS TRNDPL LX
31. RYMN DHLLRN
32. B LTRMN TR
33. M
* * *
SOLUTIONS
Last week’s geofoxer theme: martins (defoxed by Nutfield)
a. Caravelle Lighthouse, Martinique (Phlebas)
b. Aston Martin Heritage Trust, Oxfordshire (Colonel_K)
c. Martin Street, Saginaw (Viscount)
d. Martin Richard statue, Boston (ylla, Nutfield)
e. St. Martin’s Rotunda, Prague (gusdownnup)
f. Martin Luther King mural, Chattanooga (Nutfield)
g. Martin’s Heron, Berkshire (ylla)
h. Martin Place, Sydney (ylla, Nutfield)
i. Église Saint-Martin des Champs, Paris (gusdownnup)
j. St. Martin-in-the-Field, London (gusdownnup)
k. Martin Marauder, Utah Beach (AFKAMC)
l. Combe Martin, Devon (ylla)
18 – Lance Corporal Stephen Brooks (link to wikipedia.org)
1. OKAPI
6. QUAGGA
13. LONG NOSED POTOROO
26. SCREAMING HAIRY ARMADILLO
11. LESSER HEDGEHOG TENREC
33. EMU? There are probably other possible answers!
30 – CASTOR AND POLLUX (link to wikipedia.org)
31. RAYMOND HALLORAN
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ueno_Zoo#World_War_II
24. REGENTS CANAL
28. EMPEROR TAMARIN
32. BLUE TREE MONITOR
No penguin parade or Nils Olav 🙁
I was very disappointed with the latter omission, too.
Roman has been court martialed.
By penguins? 😀
29. NORTHERN LUZON GIANT CLOUD RAT
7. HIMALAYAN TAHR
14. GERALD DURRELL
15. SUN BEAR FOREST
34. NT MGLM HV NTNF VD YS
Hah. I’ll have a crack at this one:
34. No Time, Gloomhaven Ate Five Days?
Damn, missing an N
‘out in five days’ would work, but doesn’t explain why there’s no time now!
Aha! Gloomhaven (the digital version) is indeed coming out of early access on the 20th. My guess is that Nutfield is on the dev team?
Edit, all is clear if you scroll to G: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-flare-path-a2z-2
And good luck and congratulations, Nutfield!
8. DUDLEY DURSLEY
10 looks like (LND) GIANT PANDA, but I thought pandas were just pandas…
10. LOANED GIANT PANDA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panda_diplomacy
Since 1984, the Chinese state has been loaning, rather than gifting, pandas; at a standard rate of a million dollars a year.
4. BOMB CRATER – https://www.scotsman.com/news/zoo-rocked-bomb-crater-find-895780
20. ALDABRA GIANT TORTOISE
9. BLOWPIPE, e.g. https://daninjectdartguns.com/product/blowpipe-125-model-zoo/
3. GOLDIE (the Golden Eagle)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldie_(eagle)
27. ABRAHAM ULRIKAB
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Ulrikab
12. TAYRA
16. VINCE NOIR (The Mighty Boosh)
and I was expecting Roman to have chosen someone from ‘Fierce Creatures’
17. AZARA’S AGOUTI
2. Monorail?
If the last letter was a typo, then it could be moonrat.
Other numbers remaining:
5. (Not either variety of Bongo)
19.
21.
22.
23.
25.
Abraham Ulrikab led to the Wikipedia page on Human Zoos, which in turn led to
5. OTA BENGA
23. Hotzone?
23 hails from South America.
23. HOATZIN (also known as the reptile bird, skunk bird, stinkbird, or Canje pheasant)
22. DESMAREST’S HUTIA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desmarest%27s_hutia
(after getting a bit led astray by all the Desmarestias)
19. BRBB RS
21. NKS
25. BR DDSK
(and 2. MNRL if not monorail)
2 is Monorail.
Roman could have included 21 in Friday Foxer #23 but didn’t.
25 hails from South America.
That would make 21 ANKUS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_goad)
25. BEARDED SAKI (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bearded_saki)
19 looks very beary, but since we’ve already got pandas and sun bears I’m going to guess something robbers? Tried Bee Robbers but couldn’t find anything. I mean apparently it is something, but it’s a bit of a stretch to connect it with zoos.