There are a huge number of animals and plants in the world that serve as barometers, temperature indicators or predictors of storms. The United States is famous for the legendary weather forecaster Phil, and cats and dogs around the world are excellent earthquake experts. In the world of sports, there are also animals with the gift of prediction. Before the start of the World Cup in Brazil, "Championship" recalls the most famous.
Octopus Paul
German professor of predictions, the kind octopus Paul became famous all over the world during Euro 2008. The eight-legged oracle specialized in predicting the matches of the German national team. On the eve of the matches, two transparent feeders with the flags of rival teams were placed in Paul's aquarium, after which the octopus crawled into the one he liked, thus making his choice.
During his short career (octopuses live for about five years) Paul made 14 predictions for football matches, of which he was mistaken only twice. After the wrong prediction of the final match of Euro 2008 between Spain and Germany, the octopus was no longer wrong and brilliantly guessed all the outcomes of the 2010 World Cup matches in South Africa. The final match between Spain and Holland was Paul's last and only prediction, which did not feature the German national team.
On the day of Paul's death on October 26, 2010, flags were lowered at half-mast at his home oceanarium in Oberhausen and a book of condolences was displayed. At the moment, the ashes of the famous octopus are walled up in a monument depicting Paul with a soccer ball, which is installed in the aquarium.
The octopus in Germany has been replaced by a new soothsayer, this time a female. An elephant named Nelly began her career as an oracle at the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup. In front of Nellie, two gates were installed, over which the flags of the teams flaunted. The task of the elephant was no less - to score a goal! The team whose goal the ball flew first was declared the loser.
Having guessed almost all the matches with the participation of German women, Nelly suddenly gave the victory to the Japanese women before the quarterfinal match. The forecast was very dramatic: five times the elephant was close to hitting the Japanese gate, but on the sixth shell it still flew into the gate of the German national team. Indeed, in the match the Germans were several times close to scoring a goal, but the Japanese won in the end, 1: 0.
By the way, Nelly predicted the outcome of the final match of the Champions League between Bayern and Borussia in favor of the Munich side.
Boar Funtik and Ferret Fred
During Euro 2012, Ukrainians decided to give the world two new Nostradamus at once. The first was a 400-kilogram pink boar named Funtik. Funtik made his predictions in a completely uncomplicated way - they put two bowls in front of the animal with the image of the flags of the national teams. Both bowls contained the same amount of corn sticks. The outcome of the fight depended on which of them the huge boar approached.
During the European Championship, Funtik guessed only half of the results, including a bet on Russia in the match with the Czechs. So the boar did not become a successful forecaster. But he was remembered for the fact that he loved to drink beer with fans.
Another fortuneteller, a ferret named Fred, also used food bowls to read fortunes. True, instead of corn sticks, the animal was treated to beef. Like his fellow boar, Fred guessed only half of the results of the European Championship. The ferret confidently led the Portuguese and Germans to the semifinals, but in the final Fred from Kharkov made a mistake, preferring the Italian team.
Otter Harry
The main predictor of the Sochi Olympic Games was a male otter named Harry. At first, his girlfriend Ashley took part in the forecasts, but the female quickly got tired of annoying TV cameras and relinquished her solemn powers. So Harry puffed out for two.
Two balls with the names of countries were thrown into the pool. Harry pulled one of them ashore, which was considered the predicted winner. Having made a series of successful predictions, among which are the victories of the Belarusian biathlete Daria Domracheva and the Japanese figure skater Yuzuru Hanyu, the male otter made a mistake in the fateful match of our hockey players with Finland.
After that, mistakes began to be made more often, but the staff of the Sochi zoo, where Harry lives, said that the animal began to get tired due to the large number of predictions. In addition, Harry put on a lot of weight, as he made 4-5 predictions a day, for which he invariably received goodies.
Crab Petrovich
Norwegian by origin and Belarusian by passport, an experienced sailor Petrovich the crab predicted the outcome of the past hockey world championship in Minsk. A huge sea dweller was thrown into the aquarium with a hockey puck, on both sides of which the flags of rival teams were pasted. After a short manipulation, Petrovich with a claw threw the puck to the bottom of the aquarium, and the likely winner was the team whose flag remained at the top.
It is worth saying that the crab did not undertake to predict matches with the participation of his native Belarus - as they say, out of sin. And the forecast did not always turn out to be correct - in the match between the French and Canadians, Petrovich boldly bet on the latter and, as you know, miscalculated. But he was always accurate with our team - in all matches the crab always bet on Russia.
Turtle Big Head
A huge sea turtle, nicknamed Big Head, has joined the slender ranks of fortunetellers. The day before the start of the World Cup in Brazil, a football goal was installed in the pool, on the net of which the flags of the participants of the opening match - the national teams of Brazil and Croatia - were fixed. The turtle gave preference to the hosts of the tournament, having eaten a tasty fish near the yellow-green flag.
Will Big Head's career be as successful as that of the legendary octopus? We will find out very soon. If the turtle manages to guess most of the matches, then it will occupy the niche of the main oracle of sports competitions for a long time. After all, everyone knows that turtles, unlike octopuses, live for more than one century.
The most famous animal predictor is Phil the marmot, which lives in the small town of Punxsutawney in western Pennsylvania, USA.
It is believed that if a marmot, crawling out of the house after hibernation, sees its shadow, that is, the day will be sunny, it will go to sleep for another six weeks. If there is no shadow, spring is not far off. Every year on February 2, Groundhog Day, at exactly twenty-five minutes past seven in the morning, Phil is pulled out of the burrow, and he makes his prediction.
Scientists now name about 600 species of animals and 400 species of plants, which can act as barometers, indicators of humidity and temperature, predictors of storms, storms or good cloudless weather.
Animals have learned to hide in cracks and holes, fleeing tornadoes, storms and tornadoes, they leave the dangerous territory in time before tsunamis, floods and earthquakes.
Inspired by Paul's success, the leaders of the zoo in the German city of Leipzig decided to make an oracle out of. In February 2011, Heidi "guessed" the two Academy Award winners. Popular in Germany, Heidi was shown on the American show Jimmy Kimmel Live! TV channel ABC. Heidi chose figures with portraits of Natalie Portman and Colin Firth from the proposed statuettes with photographs of actors. Portman and Firth did win awards for Best Actress and Actor in Darren Aronofsky's Black Swan and The King's Speech! (The King's Speech) by Tom Hooper.
The winner in the nomination "Best Film" Heidi, however, could not be guessed - instead of the tape "The King Speaks" "the fortune-teller" pointed to the film "127 Hours".
In September 2011, Heidi, who was three and a half years old, passed away.
In July 2011, at the FIFA Women's World Cup in Germany, the elephant Nelly from the Serengeti Nature Park in Hodenhagen (Lower Saxony) predicted the outcome of all matches of the German team, including the defeat of the hostesses in the quarterfinal match against the Japanese national team. The shrewd elephant made her choice in the following way: next to each other they put two gates, denoting the opposing teams, and Nelly tried to hit them with the ball at her disposal. In which goal the ball flew into, that team lost.
New Zealand has its own oracle - a sheep named Sonny Wool. She predicted the New Zealand national team would win the Rugby World Cup final in October 2011. Sonny Wool chose the New Zealand flag trough throughout the tournament, and the final was no exception. The fortune-telling ceremony took place in the capital of the country, Wellington. The owner Sonny is sure that it was thanks to the sheep that the New Zealanders won victories.
In Ukraine, predictions of the results of matches of the European Football Championship 2012 were made from Kiev, which made its predictions on corn sticks, and from Kharkov, which chose between two bowls of fresh beef and flags of the countries participating in the game.
Russia also has its own predictor animals. She is making progress in predictions, living in the Nizhny Novgorod zoo "Limpopo". The day before the home match of the local football club Volga with CSKA, Sonya correctly guessed the outcome by pulling out a banana with the name of the visiting team. CSKA won 2-0.
In addition to Sonya, the marmot Olesya is engaged in predictions in the Nizhny Novgorod zoo. For several years in a row, she has correctly predicted the time of the onset of spring in the region.
Living in the Tula exotarium, she became popular among the residents of Tula after she named Italy and Spain among the finalists of the European Football Championship. Dzhema's prediction came true, but she refused to repeat just as successfully the forecast for the final match itself - she was tired of the increased attention of people, and she did not want to leave the cage. At the beginning of July 2012, Jama got his own microblog on Twitter.
The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources
In the 2018 World Cup, the Hermitage cat Achilles was chosen as the main fluffy Nostradamus. The whole world has been following his predictions for several days. the site decided to remember which animals became oracles in the past World and European Championships.
Octopus Paul
The octopus Paul lived in the aquarium in the German city of Oberhausen. He gained worldwide fame during Euro 2008. On the eve of the games, Paul was given two troughs with food and the flags of the opposing teams were raised. The animal crawled into one of the feeders, thereby predicting the country that will win the match. In just five years of his life (and octopuses live that much), Paul predicted the outcome of 14 games. He also guessed all the matches of the 2010 FIFA World Cup. The octopus was wrong only twice, once - when evaluating the final match between Spain and Germany in 2008.
Paul died on October 26, 2010. The next year, a monument was unveiled on the territory of the aquarium: an octopus on a soccer ball, inside of which is Paul's ashes.
Elephant Nelly
An elephant named Nelly became an oracle at the 2011 FIFA Women's World Cup. Two gates were placed in front of the animal, over which plaques with the flags of the teams were placed. The press gathered around the stadium: everyone was waiting for the elephant to score a goal. The country whose goal the ball hit first became the loser in the tournament.
Having guessed all the games with the participation of German athletes, Nelly gave the victory to the national team from Japan before the ¼ final. Five times the elephant wanted to hit the Japanese goal, but the ball still flew into the fence of the German national team. In real play, the German team came close to scoring a goal, but the Japanese won. The women's team won 1-0.
Boar Funtik and Ferret Fred
At Euro 2012, the pink pig Funtik, who lives 20 kilometers from Kiev, became famous as a predictor. He made predictions on bowls of food, just like the current Nostradamus - the cat Achilles. They only fed the Ukrainian boar with corn sticks. Two identical plates with national team flags were placed in front of Funtik, and the boar chose who would win the match today. He managed to predict the results of only half of the matches of Euro 2012. However, the boar Funtik gained great fame in Ukraine, and was very drawn to people. They say he loved to drink beer with fans, and his weight reached 400 kilograms.
The ferret Fred, just like Funtik, used to read the bowls of food. Only the little animal was fed not with corn sticks, but with beef. Fred predicted only half of the results of the 2012 European Championship. He guessed all the matches of the semi-finals, and in the final the ferret made an unexpected mistake: he gave the victory to the Italian national team, although the Spaniards won.
Crab Petrovich
The fortuneteller crab was caught in Norway, but then transported to Belarus. Petrovich predicted the results of the Ice Hockey World Championship, which was held in Minsk.
A puck was thrown into the aquarium to the animal, on both sides of which the flags of the competing teams were previously glued. Petrovich with a claw threw the puck to the bottom, and the team whose flag was on top was considered the winner.His predictions did not always turn out to be accurate: in the match between France and Canada, the crab bet on the latter and, alas, was mistaken. However, Petrovich predicted matches with Russia accurately.
Photo: FACT INSIDER / YOUTUBE.
Paul is indisputably the most famous octopus in the world. Personally, I don’t know others at all, except from an old Soviet cartoon. Remember: "Now let's add the legs, we got octopuses."
For the first time, Paul "lit up" at Euro 2008, predicting the outcome of matches with the participation of the German national team (eight-legged Nostradamus lived in the aquarium of the German city of Oberhausen). The prediction technology was simple, if not primitive - two feeders with the flags of the national teams were placed in front of the animal, into which the oracle crawled - he won.
The peak of Paul's career came at the 2010 World Cup, where he guessed all the outcomes of the matches with the participation of the German national team, and also predicted the winner of the final match (this was Paul's only prediction for the match without the participation of the Germans).
After Paul's death, a monument was erected - an octopus sat on a soccer ball, in which his own ashes were immured.
Boar Funtik and Ferret Fred
I liked the idea, and Paul found his followers. During Euro 2012, the boar Funtik living in Kiev and the Kharkov ferret Fred acted as the oracle.
Funtik became famous for predicting the victory of the hosts in the opening match with the Swedish national team, but things did not go further for him. And after the Ukrainian national team, contrary to Funtik's prediction, lost to the British, some offered to let the seer go for bacon.
But the outcome of two matches with the participation of the Russian national team Funtik predicted exactly half, predicting a victory over the Czechs and a defeat in the match with the Greek team.
This member of the cephalopod family was named after Iker Casillas. He lived in the Spanish Malaga and became famous for the fact that in 2011 he guessed the outcome of two "", as well as the victory of "Real" in the Spanish Cup.
But Casillas made a mistake with the winner of the Champions League - he bet on Manchester United to win, and Barcelona won the match.
The Big Head sea turtle from the Brazilian city of Praia do Forte predicted the results of the 2014 World Cup matches. It was more difficult for her than her predecessors - the turtle had to choose from three options - a draw was added to the possible outcomes.
Big Head managed to correctly predict the victory of the Brazilians in the opening match of the championship.
There was a slightly different principle of determining the winner. The elephant from the Serengeti Park (Germany) did not choose food, but sent the ball into a special goal, marked with the moisture of the rival teams.
Whose goal the ball flew into, that team was considered the loser. Nelly did a great job at the 2011 Women's World Championship, predicting the winner and victory of the German national team in the semi-finals of the Brazilian World Cup.
Why We Don't Need Paul's Followers
These are not all representatives of the glorious order of fortune-tellers, but the most famous of them. There was also the "Soviet Sport" competition "Nostardamus-2012", where a parrot, a dog, a fish, a cow, a guinea pig, but you can't name all of them, played the role of predictors.
So why don't we need them anymore? Because every joke is funny only the first time, repeated repetition turns it into stupidity.
Therefore, I hope that at the home world championship they will not palm off another cattle and be moved when she runs up to the feeder with someone's flag. Football is interesting without it.
Not only football experts give their predictions regarding the results of matches in the 2018 World Cup - a whole menagerie has joined them ..
Most of the participants in a kind of rating were "Russians" - the Hermitage cat Achilles, the Zabiyaka goat, Wanda the dolphin, the bear Aurora, the lion Lord, the dachshund Gigolo and the horse Brant. Among the foreigners, the psychic boar named Mystic Marcus and the Croatian gibbon Kent proved to be oracles.
The method by which the forecast was made was simple: on the eve of the match, the animal chose an object marked with the symbols of a particular state.
In the skin of Cassandra
Boar Mystic Marcus, British by origin, in mid-June to determine the countries that will advance to the semifinals of the championship.
Apples with flags of different countries - participants of the football championship - were laid out in front of the animal. As a result, the boar “ate” Belgium, Argentina, Nigeria and Uruguay, which implied their getting into the semifinals.
Those who listened to Marcus's forecast are now biting their elbows - of all the winning states he chose, only Belgium made it to the semifinals.
The snow-white deaf hermitage cat-predictor Achilles is true to Russia's victory in the match against the Egyptian national team. The cat's premonitions were not deceived. However, in the match Sweden - Switzerland, the blue-eyed inhabitant of the basements of the country's main museum missed - the Swedes won, although the cat chose a bowl that stood next to the flag of Switzerland and ate from it.
The Samara goat Bully on June 24 accurately predicted the results of the games with the teams of France and Brazil. But her victory for the Russian national team in the match with Uruguay did not come true.
Dolphin Wanda, inhabitant of the Sochi Dolphinarium, on July 1 Russia's victory over Spain in the 1/8 finals of the World Championship. Wanda was asked to choose one of two soccer balls on which the names of the teams were written. The choice of the dolphin fell on the ball with the name of our team.
A day earlier, on June 30, in the competition among oracle animals, Harry is an otter that lives in the Moscow Zoo. And although before that Harry had been very successful three times in his predictions, the bet on the victory of the Spaniards spoiled the animal's reputation as a predictor.
When passions ran high ...
By the time the quarterfinals started, the number of oracle beasts had skyrocketed. For example, they were joined by the polar bear Aurora from the Krasnoyarsk park of flora and fauna "Roev Ruchei". Predator victory of the Russian national team in the 1/4 finals of the FIFA World Cup. Alas, the bear's prediction did not come true.
Lev Lord, an inhabitant of the Sakhalin Zoo, his forecast for the match between the Russians and the Croats on July 6. The animal was offered bowls of meat, decorated with the flags of rivals in the upcoming game. The king of beasts did not break the comedy with pseudo-patriotism: he preferred a treat from the "Croatian bowl", swallowing at the same time a flag and a straw. And, as it turned out, he was right.
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Lucky gibbon Kent, who lives in Croatia, until July 7, never made a mistake in predicting how events on the field would develop. This time he has a nose for Kent's luck - for some reason he chose the Russian doll. However, the authority of the gibbon in some circles is so great that even this outright mistake will not embarrass his fans.
