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Found at http://www.truthorfiction.com

eRumor: Snowball-the 87 pound cat from Chalk River, Canada-Fiction!

Summary of the eRumor: This eRumor is accompanied by a picture of a man holding an enormous cat. The story says it belongs to Rodger Degagne, a former worker at a nuclear research facility near Ottawa Canada. He found two cats years earlier that had been hanging around some old research labs, brought them home, and among their offspring was a white cat the family fell in love with and named Snowball. Snowball snowballed as he grew older and ended up being a pet that weighs nearly 90 pounds.

The Truth: Nobody has revealed where the elaborate Chalk River story originated, but the picture of the alleged 87 pound cat is a hoax. TruthOrFiction.com has been in contact with Cordell Hauglie, who is the person who created the picture using Adobe Photoshop. He says it's actually a picture of his pet cat named Jumper and that he created it as something amusing to send to his daughter. That was a couple of years ago. At first, the picture alone started circulating on the Internet. Somewhere along the way, it picked up the "Snowball" tale, but Hauglie has no idea where. Ever since the eRumor started circulating on the Internet, the folks in the Chalk River area have been getting questions about the cat, but, of course, none of the locals has ever had first-hand knowledge of it. The AECL (Atomic Energy of Canada, Limited) facility says no one by the name of Rodger Degagne ever worked there and that their labs are still operating, not merely remnants from the 50's. There is a gentleman in the area with a similar name, Roger DeGagne, but he says he knows nothing of the Snowball story.

There are problems with the picture that made many people (including TruthOrFiction.com) believe it was a fake. We, and others, thought the cat did not look like it was being held, but Hauglie says 20-pound Jumper was being held in the original picture by his son Jason. It's actually Jason's hand that is seen under the cat and, knowing that, it's obvious that the hand was enlarged with the rest of the picture of the cat and looks out of proportion. Hauglie says one of the theories floating around about the picture is that he is a midget holding a normal-sized cat in a small house, which is not the case. Another problem was that if the man in the picture were really holding a cat that weighs nearly 90 pounds, he would not be doing it with such little apparent effort.

(Updated 7/23/01)

A real example of the eRumor as it has appeared on the Internet:

Rodger Degagne, a former employee with AECL in Chalk River, may be embarking on a new career as Feline Breeder.
Relaxing in his spacious home on the shores of the Ottawa River, Mr. Degagne recalls how 15 years ago he befriended two stray young cats on the old AECL research facility at Chalk River. The kittens had appeared in late summer and apparently had gotten under a security fence around the old labs abandoned since the late 50's. With the help of his tuna sandwich, Mr. Degagne was able to coax the kitties close enough so that he could pick them up.

A self described animal lover, he did not want to place the kittens in the local Human Society. In this largely rural area, cats of all stripes and ages largely go unwanted and are humanely disposed of after a few days.

Later that evening his wife Louise and their two children, Nicole and Kelly came to a family decision to keep the kittens which they named Lost and Found. Lost turned out to be female and Found a male. When nature finally took it's course, a litter of kittens was born 6 years later. One of the litter was a big white female with a unique black markings on her side and tail. Something about the kitten captured the hearts of the family and while her siblings eventually found homes elsewhere, Snowball stayed with the Degagne's. While Lost and Found are no longer with us, their progeny live on. In her 9 years Snowball's size has seemed to snowball.

Put simply, Snowball is no ordinary cat, she measures 69 inches from nose to tail and weighs in at 87Ibs. She started out a big kitty and she just seemed to keep growing. She always meowed for more food and would climb up on the counter to eat food which I forgot to cover. Chicken is her favorite. "Once I left a cooked chicken on the table that I was going to use for a boat picnic, an hour later the chicken was gone", Louise said. We knew that snowball wasn't your average cat when the neighbor's German Shepherd ran yelping away from his first encounter with her. She just isn't afraid of any animals. After we found a half eaten raccoon out by the garage, we decided that maybe Snowball should be kept fenced in. We soon discovered that while we can keep snowball in the yard, we couldn't keep raccoons from Snowball. At least it kept the food bills down Rodger laughed "Like all female cats she is very territorial, but with us she is just a big ole kitten" he said. So what does a 87 pound cat eat? Snowball goes through a about 3 lbs. of cat food a day, along with cooked chicken, supplemented with deer and moose that Rodger hunts in the fall. She likes Pike a lot, so I don't throw them back any more. Snowball often accompanies Rodger fishing on the Ottawa, eagerly peering over the side of the boat as soon as his line goes tight.

So what do the Degagne's attribute Snowball's size to? Rodger says "Well, the vet thinks it could be her thyroid, but she isn't fat, she's just a real big cat. I think maybe her parents got into something at Chalk River that they shouldn't have".