500 ft tall turd monster

The 500 ft tall turd monster (common name 500 ft Turd), also known as Africa, was a species of turds that lived during the Pleistocene epoch approximately 600 hundred to 400 hundred thousand years ago. It was one of the last of the giant turds that lived before they all went the way of the dodo (more like doodoo). With its easily recognisable uniform brown colour and huge girth it is one of the most famous of all Turds.
The only complete 500 ft Turd fossil was discovered in northern India (as is most shit), however several incomplete remains have also been discovered in Burma and Vietnam as well as isolated locations in Indonesia. Numerous pointless useless little trinkets have been made attempting to cash in on the fame of the turds. One company even attempted to market a "World Famous Turd Museum". However, when a news crew went to Kenya to ask the locals there if they had heard of this 'World Famous' site, they discovered that nobody in Kenya knew about it.
The name 500 ft tall turd monster is a misnomer, as early paleontologists incorrectly assumed it walked upright with the upper part of its body in the air. It was in fact a 500 ft long turd monster and scientists attempted to have the name changed, but the name had already stuck. Numerous contestants on Who Wants to be a Millionaire have been caught out by this.
== Description ==
Strangely 500 ft Turds were as their name suggested actually 500 ft long, though some experts claim they can grow up to 501 ft. This stands in stark contrast to naming conventions from alternative mediums such as television. In the world of Power Rangers for instance, Woolly mammoths and Sabre tooth tigers were apparently dinosaurs (despite the well known fact that they are clearly mammals that didn't exist until 60 million years after the death of the dinosaurs).
They weighed around 100-200 tonnes (210,000-420,000 lb) and their most distinctive feature was the large round body. Several years ago it was considered the second longest object that could be seen from space. When this was disproved there was a great sadness, before people began to ignore the evidence and continue spouting the rumour, much like the Chinese and the Great Wall. Colours generally ranged from a light brown to a darker brown, although if they ate too many beetroot then they would turn red, and they would turn green if they drank too much Mountain Dew.
== Classification ==
The 500 ft Turd is a member of the family of Odoria, an order that includes all foul smelling fecal creatures including the Crapia and Poohia. Some debate has been made over whether the genus of Turdia and Crapia should be merged, as the two share a large number of similar characteristics including a long cylinder shape, a solid backbone, similar muscle structure, and closely related organic compounds. Normal people don't care.
Due to occupying the position of the largest of the giant turds, it is the most popular and well known of the giant turd species. The giant turds were part of a biological group of creatures that are similar in appearance and size. Among the closest relatives of the 500 ft Turd are the much smaller 100 ft Turd and the recently discovered 200 ft Turd abomination from southern China. Ayers Rock in Australia is commonly misidentified as a 500 ft Turd, it is in fact a rock.
== Discovery ==
The first discovery of a 500 ft Turd was a foot print found in India in the autumn of 1906. It was left by the 500 ft Turd as it travelled along a river bed. As parts of the creature dropped off they created what have been dubbed foot prints, although the creature didn't actually have a foot (or feet for that matter). Nonetheless calling it a 'stomach print' doesn't sound as scientific.
At the time of its discovery there had not been any turd foot prints of such a size found before, although people didn't exactly go out looking for these as "found a giant turd foot print" doesn't sound particularly impressive on a CV. There was no verifiable proof that it was a new species as they couldn't find any links from Wikipedia, so no new species was announced.
That didn't stop rumours of a "Big Pooh" roaming the jungles of Burma from spreading. Within weeks fame and money grubbers were reporting sightings and setting up hoaxes which they used to claim as proof of having witnessed an imaginary creature. People then wasted thousands of dollars chasing these false claims up when they could have donated that money to something actually useful, like flushing it down the toilet and then sticking their head in after.
15 years later in 1921, parts of a 500 ft Turd fossil were discovered by a British paleontologist at the foot of a cliff in Burma. The Poms initially planned for the specimen to be transported to the Nation Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C as payback for the American Revolution, however it was ruined when the sailors refused to load the specimen onboard their ship after learning that it belonged to a 500 ft Turd. The Poms later apologised for even considering such a pathetic toilet humour based joke, as they prefer to laugh at actual humour, not crude potty jokes set to a laugh track.
== Paleobiology ==
The 500 ft Turd was a solitary and territorial creature because they had a slightly unpleasant smell and so none of them wanted to be around the others. The 500 ft Turd was among the last of the monster Turds to appear and at the time of its existence may have made up the bulk of all fecal creatures, certainly in mass if not in numbers.
=== Paleoecology ===
Since 500 ft Turds were so picky they only chose to live in areas with a high market value. The largest concentrations were found in southern, western and north eastern India. Interestingly it seems that the holy Ganges River (the one that thousands of people bathe in) runs right through where the heaviest concentrations of giant turds used to live. Other areas with high numbers included large tracts of Burma, and smaller areas of Vietnam. For some reason even the giant turds didn't want to live in Bangladesh...
Individual fossils have also been found in some locations in Malaysia and Indonesia, although this might have just been because they got lost and floated out to sea.
It is suggested that the 30 ft Pooh formed a mutual relationship with the 500 ft Turd. The 30 ft Pooh would clean away any plant matter that got caught around the crap-hole of the Turd. It is unlikely that the 30 ft Poohs would form unions and so the working conditions for them may not have been up to the standard as expected by modern-day toilet paper, but they would have been about equal with those of garbage collectors.
=== Breeding ===
Scientists have made some assumptions based upon scanty evidence obtained from fossils. In the lead up to mating season the males would roll on their backs in order to coat themselves in as many flowers as possible. They would travel as far afield as modern day Afghanistan in order to gain access to the plentiful poppy fields there. Poppies were highly prized for several reasons. Firstly because they helped to block out the smell of the male 500 ft Turd, because while you can't smell your own stink you can certainly smell someone else's, and that fact doesn't change for 500 ft Turds. Secondly the opium from the poppy seeds would seep into the male's skin, and so if they failed to mate at least they got on a drug high. Finally the word poppy sounds very similar to poopy, and 500 ft Turds could be surprisingly childish and immature with their sense of humour.
Once a male was ready to begin mating he would travel to the nearest female's territory and search her out from the stench she let off. Obviously it wasn't required for the female to disguise her smell with flowers, although woe betide any male who thought they could get away with it. When a male had finally convinced the female to copulate with him he would move to mount her from behind. The next part has been cut out as it was deemed inappropriate for young readers.
Once a female had fallen pregnant she would undertake a 3-year gestation period during which a large turd like baby would grow in her uterus. After 3 years the baby would be born. It was a painful time for the mother as they didn't have any drugs and the feeling was probably closest to what humans feel when they have constipation. Once born the baby 500 ft Turd was usually around 20 ft long and weighed 10 tonnes. It would stay with the mother for only a single week before the mother abandoned it the same way that early reptiles and some alcoholics abandoned their young. After that it would leave to find its own territory, although it probably just left because of the smell.
=== Diet ===
The 500 ft Turd was a herbivorous creature, due its bulk it would usually eat the tree whole and excrete the wood as droppings after it had finished digesting it. Since the 500 ft Turd would only defecate once every day any animals unfortunate enough to be sucked up into the turd would usually have to wait for several hours until it was ready to go. Once it did so, the animals along with any indigestible wood and plant matter, would be deposited in a single dropping. The animal could then proceed to climb their way out of the dropping and find their way to the nearest hops and barley farm to drink the memories away.
The 500 ft Turd was a glutton, so it would consume several tonnes of plant matter each day in order to keep a healthy sheen. Under normal circumstances deforesting a forest in that manner is highly unsustainable and leads to massive environmental degradation. Fortunately the 500 ft Turd didn't work for Gunns Limited, the largest logging company in Australia and biggest producer of wood chips in the southern hemisphere that also practically controls the Tasmanian state government, and so it was able to develop an environmentally sustainable feeding method. The turd was very nutriet rich, so wherever it slithered over it would leave a whole lot of manure, which is very good for growing plants as is commonly known.
== Extinction ==
Several hypotheses are given for the extinction of all the fecal creatures including the 500 ft Turd. The most easily dismissible of these was put forward by the Christian Lobby of America which stated that they were removed from the earth by god to make way for man, who would not have appreciated living alongside giant turds. This is easily disproved because if the world is only 7 thousand years old then there is no way a creature that lived 400 thousand years ago could have existed. Ergo there is no way it could have become extinct.
The most common and supported suggestion given for the extinction of the 500 ft Turd monster, along with all the other giant fecal creatures approximately 400 thousand years ago has been attributed to global warming. The methane given off by the large numbers of giant Turds, Craps, Poohs, Dungs, Diarrhea, and cows over the years that they lived caused the atmosphere to warm significantly due to the effect of the greenhouse gas. This warming in atmospheric temperature upset the weather conditions of the planet and brought on an ice age similar to the one seen in The Day After Tomorrow only much slower (because the one in The Day After Tomorrow was impossible to believe for everyone outside of Hollywood).
The last hypothesis states that the fecal creatures were overhunted to extinction by the only creature that preys upon them, the dung beetle. These ravenous carnivores savaged every kind of turd they came across. Spreading like a bubonic plague across the world they would have soon eaten the turds to death. Now that the turds are gone perhaps they will find a new source of prey. One that is now more readily available.
Most scientists believe that a mixture of the last two hypotheses may be the correct reason. Everyone except the Christian nuts agrees that the first one is just plain nonsense.
== Depiction in recent popular media ==
* An episode of the BBC series 'Walking With Beasts' was going to feature an episode on the creatures. However Americans complained after it was featured in an advertisement for the show that aired on the Discovery Channel and got it pulled before it aired.
* The 500 ft Turd was parodied on an episode of South Park where Randy attempted to grow a baby 500 ft Turd inside him just like a real 500 ft Turd. His was much smaller than the real thing though.
* Fox News regularly compares human beings to 500 ft Turds.http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2883.htm However this comparison is restricted to people of a certain political leaning.
== International Experts ==
J.M. Cachat (New Orleans, LA)
P.C. Hart (New Orleans, LA)
== References ==
Category:Natural History
Category:Monsters