From Sauvignon Bark, the new wine for dogs, to the nuttiest of combat sports... Your weekly roundup of offbeat stories from around the world.

- They stoop to conker -

Shocking scenes at the World Conker Championships, the vicious sport that has sharpened the martial instincts of centuries of British schoolchildren.

The single combat involves swinging a conker -- a hardened horse chestnut -- on a string at your opponent's nut with murderous venom, until one is smashed to pieces.

Combatants try to get any edge they can in the contests, which can be painfully hard on the knuckles.

After last year's world champion was accused, and then cleared of using a steel conker (though one was found in his pocket), organisers took no chances this year, making competitors pass through an "airport-sty

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