No, Vladimir Putin was not the victim of a one-bird dirty protest

It's one of those stories that was just too good to be true.

It was, supposedly, at the moment Vladimir Putin got to the line in his speech where he warned of the importance of learning the lessons from World War One that Mother Nature decided enough was enough.

You can watch the unaltered footage here, from around nine minutes on, while photos filed by news agencies at last Friday's speech in Moscow show Putin with an unsullied suit before and after his address.

http:/image/27060-fgcvhq.jpg" style='width:100%;' border="0" alt="Vladimir Putin lays a wreath"

Here's a side-by-side comparison:

That said, even if it is fake, it's still pretty great.