Offbeat

Chilean police recover glacier theft

Police yesterday were investigating a criminal gang that allegedly stole blocks of ice from the Jorge Montt Glacier in southern Chile.
Agents with Chile’s National Forest Service (CONAF) filed a legal complaint claiming that ice was being stolen from the glacier, located in the Chilean Patagonia region some 1,700 kilometers (1,056 miles) south of Santiago.
Police in the southern city of Cochrane then swooped in on a truck loaded with five tons of ice and arrested the driver, the daily El Mercurio reported on its online edition.
The driver was arrested on charges of theft, but could also face charges of crimes against cultural heritage, said Cochrane prosecutor Jose Moris.
Police, who put the value of the stolen ice at USD 6,200, are on the lookout for the driver’s accomplices.
The 454-square-kilometer (175 sq mi) Jorge Montt glacier is melting at a rate of a kilometer (0.6 miles) per year, making it one of the world’s most visible milestones of global warming, researchers said in December. It is part of a 13,000-square-kilometer (5,020 square mile) Southern Ice Field, the third largest frozen landmass after Antarctica and Greenland, shared by Chile and Argentina.

New Zealander red hawk hoax

A New Zealand man who set bird-watchers a-twitter by faking a new species of red hawk was fined Tuesday and ordered to pay costs to the animal welfare group, which uncovered his hoax.
Ornithologists believed a previously undiscovered species of hawk had emerged when red-winged birds of prey were spotted around the North Island town of Dannevirk in 2009, Fairfax Media reported.
In fact, the birds where common harrier hawks which farmer Grant Michael Teahan had trapped, spray-painted red, then released as a prank, the Dennevirk District Court was told.
The ruse was uncovered when one of the mysterious hawks was hit by a car, revealing its colourful plumage came from an aerosol can, rather than a rare genetic mutation.
The New Zealand Society for the Protection of Animals (SPCA) launched a lengthy investigation, which eventually resulted in a raid on Teahan’s property, where computer files relating to the hoax were found.
Judge Geoff Rea said the 39-year-old revelled in the attention his prank received as experts debated whether a new type of hawk had been found.
Rea fined Teahan NZ$5,000 (USD 4,100) and ordered him to pay costs of up to NZ$15,000 to the SPCA after finding him guilty of two counts of ill-treating animals.