Now I Know: The Revealing Stories Behind the World's Most Interesting Facts by Lewis Dan

Author:Lewis, Dan [Lewis, Dan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781440563638
Publisher: Adams Media
Published: 2013-09-18T00:00:00+00:00

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BONUS FACT

The military bases from the mid-1800s, now abandoned, have been combined and make up part of San Juan Island National Historic Park. The park is the only U.S. national park that commemorates a British base and the only one where a British flag flies.

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BACON OF THE SEA

WHERE PIGS SWIM

The Bahamas is made up of roughly 700 islands scattered southeast of Florida and north of Cuba. One of those islands, Staniel Cay, is a sand-covered reef in the center of the Bahama’s Exuma island chain; it is one of the few Exuma islands with a permanent population. Staniel Cay is most notable for two things: Part of the James Bond movie Thunderball was filmed there, and it is home to the Staniel Cay Yacht Club, which serves as the nautical center of the immediate vicinity.

That’s the only place you’ll get to see swimming pigs.

Nearby Staniel Cay is an uninhabited island called Big Majors Spot—uninhabited by people, that is. A bunch of feral cats and a few families of pigs live there. The pigs—being the voracious omnivores pigs are—will eat anything they can find. So when visitors come to the island and toss them apple cores and virtually anything else, the pigs feast.

But these pigs are a bit impatient. Over the years, they and their offspring have learned that the sound of motorboats means that there’s food to be had, so the pigs take the initiative—and take to sea. The pigs swim right up to the boats, doggy paddling away, in hopes of obtaining a tasty morsel or two. (You’ll find plenty of videos on YouTube if you need to see it to believe it.)

How did pigs get to a small tropical island far from the mainland? We don’t know, but there are three possibilities: The pigs ended up there after a shipwreck; farmers came to Big Majors Spot and abandoned their pigs there; or perhaps, residents of Staniel Cay and other inhabited islands put the pigs there as a somewhat underhanded way to fatten them up, on the cheap, before eating them.

In support of that final theory? Attend a celebration at Staniel Cay, and you’ll notice pig on the menu.

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