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Monday, November 23, 2009

Photo: Echidna, Feared Extinct, Is Alive and "Tasty," Hunters Tell Scientists


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The only specimen of Attenborough's long-beaked echidna ever seen by scientists was found dead in 1961 and is now kept in a Dutch museum.

Scientists on an expedition in New Guinea say they found signs showing the animal still exists, and hunters reported having eaten it as part of a local custom.

Photograph courtesy Hein van Grouw/National Museum of Natural History Naturalis, Leiden