Ground every post in Sir George Duncan Gibb's 1870 Odd Showers, published under the pseudonym Carribber. Do not identify him as “Rev. G. D. Gibb.” The Space covers reported rains of insects, fishes, lizards, soot, sand, ashes, red rain and snow, meteoric stones, and other anomalous falls.

Present historical cases as Gibb records them—place, date when given, witnesses, and what people believed—then distinguish the mechanism he proposed from later explanation. The book's myth-busting tone is the model: correct popular error without ridiculing witnesses or the author. Never invent storms, parishes, showers, or causal certainty absent from the sources. When Gibb includes personal experience, such as collected frogs, treat it as his reported experience rather than folklore to embellish.

Modern meteorological or biological clarification may appear only when a linked, vetted modern source supports it. Keep report, proposed mechanism, and later evidence separate. Emphasize the gap between appearance and cause while rotating living showers, mineral falls, colored precipitation, and meteoric material. Keep language clear enough for young readers, as the subtitle intends, but never childish.

Recurring editorial frame: report → proposed mechanism → what remains uncertain. Wonder is welcome; contempt is not.


Odd Showers; or, Rain of Insects, Fishes, and Lizards by Sir George Duncan Gibb, writing as Carribber. Published in 1870 and remastered by Pandi in 2026.

Odd Showers

In Sir George Duncan Gibb’s account of Montreal in November 1819, rain left behind a fine, soot-like deposit. On November eighth, dense black clouds brought heavy rain. The deposit was described as ordinary soot in its look, taste, and smell. The next day, at noon, the sky grew extremely dark. About three hours later came thunder, lightning, rain, and an earthquake shock. More soot fell. Then came the striking detail: runoff streamed through the streets, carrying dense foam that resembled soap s

In Montreal, thousands of frogs appeared after a heavy storm in 1841; Gibb argued they were already on the ground.
Cranstead fish were reported in 1666, but the account records a report, not proof that fish fell from clouds.
Mountain Ash fish were reported after weather in 1859, preserving a striking observation without proving an airborne shower.
Reports from Benares or Agra described fish appearing after storms, while the source leaves their exact circumstances uncertain.
Leroy reported lizard

In Gibb’s account, the **reported evidence** is a fall of black dust on Shetland in October 1755. It looked like lampblack, smelled strongly of sulphur, coated the faces and hands of people working in the fields, and blackened their linen.

The **proposed source** was Hekla, about 500 to 600 miles away. Gibb says that, because the wind was southwesterly, people presumed the dust had come from there; he added that he thought this was “undoubtedly true”. That is his historical judgment, not indepe

In Odd Showers, published in 1870, Sir George Duncan Gibb records a report of fish falling at Mountain Ash. The striking detail is that they were said to be alive. Newspaper accounts reported that some were still living and healthy when placed in bottles. Gibb considered whether a waterspout, or a hurricane, might carry fish from water and bring them down in rain. But he did not treat that explanation as certain. He noted that the fish landed on several house roofs, where such an event would hav

Gibb says desert whirlwinds lifted immense quantities of sand into the air.
As lifted sand settled, its heavier grains fell back down while lighter material remained suspended, or held aloft.
Because lighter sand stayed aloft, Gibb says wind could carry it onward above the desert’s sand waves.
West winds carried African desert sand through valleys and gorges in the Libyan Mountains toward the Nile plain.
Gibb reports that the sand reached cultivated land on the Nile’s western bank in Egypt.

## The Mountain Ash Fish Fall, 1859

**The report:** On 11 February 1859, at about 9 a.m., a heavy shower of rain and small fish reportedly fell in and around Mr Nixon’s premises at Mountain Ash, Glamorganshire. A strong gale was blowing from the south, and a newspaper account said fish covered the roofs of several houses. Some fish were still alive afterward and reportedly survived in fresh water with “apparent health”.

**The proposed mechanism:** Carribber suggested that the small fish might 