› added 6 years ago

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TIL in the 1990s, the Galapagos Conservancy launched Project Isabela, an all out war against 250,000 goats in the Galapagos Islands to save the dwindling population of Galapagos tortoises, and involved snipers picking goats off from helicopters. It ended up restoring the population of the tortoises.

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xVZ81 TIL that US Presidential candidates get intelligence briefings. Harry Truman began this practice in 1952 as a reaction to his own experience at the beginning of his Presidency - he knew next to nothing about the U.S.’s intelligence apparatus, including the Manhattan Project.
X0kLX TIL Of pancake syndrome, an illness derived from eating contaminated pancakes. Illness comes from having an allergic reaction to eating flour containing dust mites.
dr6Q TIL lobster used to be “poor people’s food”. A can of lobster was cheaper than a can of baked beans.
a8A6L TIL that Lord Byron kept a bear with him during his time at Trinity College, in defiance of the college's rule of not allowing students to keep dogs
R5DAa TIL of Walter M. Gibson, a 19th century adventurer who was a gunrunner in the Caribbean and imprisoned in the East Indies for fomenting rebellion, but while awaiting execution, had a vision of creating an island empire and escaped -- then tried to create that empire as Prime Minister of Hawaii.