The Best Bigfoot Photographic and Video Evidence

Where are the pictures?

This is a common question asked of bigfoot researchers and those who claim to have caught a glimpse of these elusive animals. It is often pointed out that there are thousands of trail cameras out in the woods and, surely, if bigfoot were real, one of them would have captured an image by now. In addition, every phone is now a camera so, basically, there is no one in the woods without the means to capture a photo or shoot video if they are fortunate enough to encounter a sasquatch. This, it is said, has not happened; therefore, bigfoot must not be real.

The questioning of the dearth of photographic evidence is a legitimate one. I understand it. I could take some time here to refute some of the more common assumptions about game cameras and how wildlife reacts to their presence as well as the phone/camera argument but will save that for another time. What I would like to refute is the notion that there is no convincing photographic/video evidence that supports the hypothesis that the sasquatch is a real animal.

I believe there is compelling photographic/video evidence to support the position these animals do exist. Admittedly, there are only a few examples that I believe are likely legitimate. What makes me believe these photos/videos might just be the real deal? Simply, the subjects featured in them share physical characteristics and mannerisms that are far more subtle than what we see in the typical “guy in an ape suit” hoax video on YouTube. The subjects match descriptions given by witnesses for decades but also are very similar to one another. The way they move, head position, reaction to being seen, physical stature and build all are very similar. The subjects in these photos/videos look convincing but also look like they could be brothers (or sisters). The four pieces of evidence that are most convincing to me are the Patterson-Gimlin footage, the Harlan Ford Honey Island Swamp footage, the Freeman footage and two photographs taken in central Oklahoma in 2000.

Anyone with even a passing interest in the sasquatch phenomenon is familiar with the Patterson-Gimlin footage. Shot in October of 1967, the footage shows a large, upright, hair-covered figure walking across a debris-strewn sandbar along Bluff Creek in northern California. The backstory of this footage is well known and I will not spend a lot of time rehashing things that have been stated by others hundreds of times. Instead, I will just point out a few things present in this footage that I have also noticed in the photos/videos I will mention shortly. The creature is clearly large. I am not really talking about the height of the figure (this is one of those details that has been debated ad nauseum); rather, it is the sheer thickness of the creature that impresses me. The creature in the footage is clearly female and many who have attempted to analyze its physical characteristics have become infatuated by the large breasts that are clearly visible (Freud would have a field day with that, I am sure), however, I tend to focus more on the depth of the chest and torso in general. The figure is amazingly robust with very little, if any, taper from the chest to the waist. This thickness and lack of tapering is something that all of the images in this post have in common.

Another characteristic of the Patterson-Gimlin subject that seems to be present in the other photos/videos is the position of the head while walking. The most famous image of the subject is, of course, the infamous frame 352. This is the moment when the creature turns its upper body to face Patterson. The image captures the long swinging arms and odd bent knee gait of the creature perfectly. I am less interested in this image, however, than I am in the rest of the footage where the creature is walking away and not looking back at its pursuers. The head of the subject seems to be looking down at a spot just in front of its feet. It is almost as if it is watching where it will be placing its next step. This downward tilt of the head is something I have noticed in the other photos/videos I find compelling.

The final characteristic that these pieces of evidence share is the way the alleged apes move away once they have been seen by the photographers/witnesses. There seems to be no panic at all, they just stride off into the forest. I will admit this is the one characteristic that I leave some space on as I know that these creatures will, at times, bolt at an incredible rate of speed when they realize they have been seen by humans. People I know and respect have seen these animals do just that and have marveled at how fast they can traverse steep and heavily wooded terrain. My experience, though, is more like what is observed in the Patterson-Gimlin footage and the other photos/videos to be disussed. A friend and I came up on what I believe was a sasquatch while driving on a forest service road in the Sam Houston National Forest in May of 2005. My friend brought the vehicle to a stop and the subject simply turned and walked off the road and into the woods. It moved quickly but calmly in a manner that in no way could be described as running. I believe I was very close to one of these animals again later that summer. My brother and I were hiking the same general area where my visual had taken place about three months earlier when something of interest occurred. We had stopped to rest and were just visiting when I caught a glimpse of movement over his shoulder. I raised my 35mm film camera and took a photo. Whatever I had seen did not run and crash away through the brush. It made hardly a sound at all as it just sort of melted into the forest. The resulting photo is as close to compelling photographic evidence as I have personally captured. I admit the fact that I have directly observed this calm but quick moving away behavior has affected the prism through which I view any photographic/video evidence. Still, it is something these pieces of evidence all have in common and when seen in conjunction with the other factors previously mentioned gives me pause.



The Patterson-Gimlin footage is by far the clearest video evidence out there but it is not the only video I think may very well be the real deal. Another piece of footage I think may very well be the real thing is that shot by Harlan Ford in the Honey Island Swamp of southeast Louisiana in 1963. The footage, shot on 8mm film, shows a bipedal figure moving smoothly beyond the tree line from Ford’s right to left. Admittedly, the footage is a bit grainy, but I believe many of the characteristics exhibited by the Patterson-Gimlin subject are also exhibited by the figure in the Ford footage. The figure is clearly upright and large. It is, at minimum, “man-sized,” if not larger, and appears quite robust and thick through the chest. The creature exhibits a slightly hunched posture and the downward head tilt previously mentioned as if paying particular attention to its foot placement. The Ford subject is clearly moving out of the area quickly but, in my opinion, is not running. I have heard others describe the locomotion shown in the footage as running but I just do not see it that way. A purposeful, quick striding is evident but certainly nothing that would lead me to describe what I am watching as a creature on the run is present. Also, of great interest to me, though not one of the criteria previously mentioned, is that fact that this footage was shot almost four years prior to the Patterson-Gimlin footage. That being the case, it cannot be said that Harlan Ford was in any way trying to capitalize on the “bigfoot fever” that spread across the country after the Patterson-Gimlin footage hit the mainstream. As a matter of fact, the Honey Island Swamp footage was not even known to exist until after Harlan Ford’s death in 1980 (this would also counter any argument that Roger Patterson was attempting to copy Ford’s footage). Ford’s daughter found the reel of 8mm film in a box in the attic of her father’s home while going through his things. Many want to dismiss the footage these days due to Ford’s belief that reptilian tracks he had found belonged to the creature. Most, including myself, belief the tracks cast were nothing more than those of a bull alligator while others believe the tracks were an outright hoax on the part of Ford and his friends. Whatever the truth is regarding the track castings, dismissing the 8mm footage is a mistake, in my mind. Ford never publicized the footage or attempted to capitalize on it as a hoaxer likely would have done. Why? I think it is because he believed he had captured legitimate footage of a bigfoot-like creature and wanted to bring it in himself without any competition. His ultimate goal might have been fame and fortune but, even if true, that does not make the footage any less convincing in my mind.

Next up on my list is the footage shot by Paul Freeman in the Blue Mountains of Washington in 1994. The Blue Mountains footage may very well be the most compelling since that shot by Roger Patterson in 1967. Freeman was running his video camera while following what appears to be a track way when he spotted a large, hair-covered, bipedal figure up ahead. Again, I will not speculate on the height of the subject but the impression one gets watching the video is that the creature is enormous. The depth of the chest and torso of the creature are very impressive and seem to dwarf the chest and torso dimensions of even the hardiest human. The figure moves from Freeman’s right to left and does glance briefly at his pursuer. The video quality is too poor to tell much from that glance but one thing that is perfectly clear is how the subject drops its head and seems to be looking at the ground as it moves away. It is almost as if it is pressing its chin against its upper chest. While the locomotion exhibited by the creature in the Freeman footage is a bit “choppier” than that seen in the Patterson-Gimlin or Harlan Ford footage (some feel it is due to debris and/or the terrain), it does mimic the behavior seen in the other videos as it does not run but quickly strides away. Freeman made no secret of his belief that the sasquatch was real and claimed to have found hundreds of tracks, impressions and other trace evidence during his search for the creature. He also claimed to have seen a reddish-brown wood ape near Walla Walla in 1982. Some feel he simply had too much luck in finding evidence and doubt his findings. All I know is that the huge chest/torso, downward head tilt and quick striding, but not running, retreat is visible in his 1994 video.



The final piece of photographic evidence that I believe is likely authentic is a pair of photographs taken in November of 2000 by an Arapaho tribesman named Russell Lumpmouth. Lumpmouth and a crew were cleaning up an area in Canadian County after a tribal function when he spotted a large, dark figure in the tree line nearby. He managed to snap two photos of the figure before it turned and walked away. The photos might be the clearest ever taken of an alleged wood ape. The first photo shows the subject facing the camera with the body at about a three-quarter angle. The face is partially obscured by a leaf in the foreground but a deep-set right eye and a possible protruding brow ridge are visible. The second photo, taken after the subject has turned away from the camera, shows a low-set head tilted down in the manner already discussed with the chin almost resting on the upper chest. The face appears quite flat but specific features are hard to discern. The figure exhibits a massive barrel-shaped torso and thick buttocks that would be characteristic of a habitually bipedal hominin. According to Lumpmouth, the subject did not run but walked away once it realized it had been seen. NAWAC Chairman Alton Higgins wrote an article on the photos that was submitted to The Relic Hominoid Inquiry that broke down the photos and described the on site investigation. You can view an abridged copy of that article on the NAWAC website. The backstory, location, analysis of the creature’s physical characteristics, etc. are discussed and I highly recommend you visit the site and read it for yourself. I just want to stress that, once again, the presence of a downward tilting head, massively deep chest/torso and a calm manner of retreat are all seen in the photos or described by the witness. I would add, also, that the photographer did not seek to gain notoriety or profit financially from the photos. This would not be the behavior expected of a person attempting to perpetrate a hoax.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion regarding these photgraphs/videos and the men who attained them. What cannot be denied, however, is that these images leave zero room for middle ground. They either show what they are purported to show, a wood ape, or they are hoaxes. Each of the pieces of film, video and the photographs discussed has been dissected and analyzed and the results of those investigations are easily available to anyone willing to spend a little time online. Right now, that is not what I am interested in when it comes to these images, though much of the information gleaned from these investigations only strengthens their case. I am going more by the “eye test,” if you will. The physical similarities between the subjects discussed simply cannot be ignored. They look like the same animal. Certainly, there are other photos and videos that may be genuine but I believe those discussed here are the best evidence supporting the hypothesis that an unrecognized species of great ape exists in North America.


Sources:

Moneymaker, M. (2010, January 31). Was the Patterson-Gimlin Film Ever Proven to b a Hoax? Retrieved from http://www.bfro.net/news/korff_scam.asp

Tom, C. (2013, May 13). Honey Island Swamp Monster 1963. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtXzA3oeypo

Strickler, L. (2015, May 19). Paul Freeman's Bigfoot Video. Retrieved from http://www.phantomsandmonsters.com/2015/05/paul-freemans-bigfoot-video.html

Higgins, A. (2012, May 6). Possible Wood Ape Photos From Central Oklahoma. Retrieved from http://woodape.org/index.php/about-bigfoot/articles/220-oklahoma-prairie-photos

Why Didn't I Shoot?

I apologize for being absent for so long. As I mentioned on the Facebook page a little over a week ago, I had to have some minor surgery. The procedure was supposed to be pretty simple and take only 45 minutes to an hour to complete. Things turned out to be more complicated than the doctors anticipated, however, and the procedure that was supposed to take less than an hour turned into 4 hours on the table for me. Naturally, this lengthened the planned recovery time as well. I am now pretty much back to normal and will be trying to get back into the swing of things. This post, while not the topic I had intended for my first article back, is an attempt to do that.

Recently, I was interviewed by Jim Harold for his Paranormal Podcast program. You can download/stream the interview here. During the course of the interview, Jim asked me about the visual I had of what I believe to have been a wood ape in the Sam Houston National Forest in May of 2005 (you can read my account of this sighting here). During this portion of the interview, I mentioned several reasons why I felt it was highly unlikely what I witnessed was a person perpetrating a hoax. Toward the end of my relating of the account, I mentioned, somewhat in jest, that one of the reasons I believe a hoax to have been unlikely was that, “This is Texas. Everybody has a gun. This guy would have been taking his life in his hands running around in an ape suit” (paraphrase). I say “somewhat in jest” because, obviously, not every Texan owns a gun and of those that do, not everyone carries one everywhere they go. The comment was an attempt to inject a bit of levity into the interview while still making a valid point. That point being, while not every Texan carries a gun, a LOT of them do, making a hoax along these lines a very dangerous undertaking.

I received a comment from someone called “Bobodean” regarding the interview and that comment in particular. His (I am assuming the commenter is a male) comment is below:

“Regarding your siting (sic)... if everyone in Texas carries a gun...why didnt (sic) you shoot?”

I cannot be sure whether this commenter is asking a serious question or if he is taking a dig of some kind at me. I suspect it is the latter. Even if that is the case, at the heart of the comment lays a legitimate question, actually more than one. Was I carrying a gun that night as I claim so many Texans do? If so, why did I not attempt to collect the specimen I feel is necessary in order to prove the existence of the wood ape/sasquatch? These questions are fair enough so, here goes.

Was I carrying a gun that night? Yes, I was. I hold a CHL (concealed handgun license) here in the state of Texas and was legally carrying a sidearm that night. According to the latest data I could find, and I am very open to being corrected if there is more current data out there, there are in excess of 500,000 CHL holders in Texas. While this is a significant number, many might find it surprisingly low for a state with a population of approximately 26,528,398 as of 2013. Part of the reason more Texans do not obtain a CHL is that it is legal to carry a firearm in your vehicle here without a license. One only needs a CHL if they wish to carry a concealed weapon after they leave their vehicle. How many unlicensed Texans carry a weapon in their vehicle? Your guess is as good as mine on that, but I will say that the number increases every day. I also think it is safe to assume more Texans living in rural areas carry a weapon in their vehicle than those living in urban areas. So, you see, while I was attempting to bring a bit of levity to the interview when I mentioned the risk any would be hoaxers would be taking by donning an ape suit and traipsing about a lonely forest service road in rural Texas, the point is valid. A lot of Texans, including me, carry a weapon on their person or in their vehicle. To attempt to perpetrate such a hoax is almost suicidal in nature. I was not being hypocritical, as “Bobodean” seems to be implying, by making the statement I did. I was carrying that night. I know many, many other fellow Texans do the same on a daily basis and anyone attempting to perpetrate some kind of bigfoot hoax in this part of the world is taking a huge risk because of it.

Fine, you may think. Point taken. It still does not explain why you did not shoot that night. That is true enough. So, why did I not take the shot?

There are many reasons.

The sighting was fleeting. As detailed in my report, I was sitting in the front passenger seat looking out to the right of the vehicle when my friend brought the car to a stop and asked, “What is that?” I turned, leaned forward to get a better look and watched the subject turn and walk from the road into the woods to our left. The entire incident lasted only a few seconds. There is simply no way I could have unstrapped my seat belt, exited the vehicle, drawn my weapon and fired before the subject disappeared into the forest.

Having said that, and I feel this is very important, I would not have done so even if there had been more time. The first rule taught in any hunting safety course is that you must absolutely, positively identify your target before drawing a bead and pulling the trigger. You get no “do overs” once you take a shot. You have to be sure.
I was not sure what I was looking at that night, not initially. Even though I was out looking and hoping for this exact scenario, it took several seconds for my mind to work out exactly what was standing in that road. By the time I realized what I was likely seeing, it was gone. It is only in hindsight that I have become absolutely convinced what I saw that night was a living, breathing wood ape and not a man in a costume of some kind. Re-enactments, comparative measurements, etc. confirm that what I thought was “man-sized” was actually much larger. I did not have the luxury of all that data that night in 2005. I had only a few fleeting seconds in which to decide what to do. As has been established, I would not have had the time to fire a shot anyway but, even if I had been walking down that road, instead of riding shotgun in a vehicle, and able to draw my weapon quickly, I would still not have taken the shot. I simply could not be sure of what was in front of me in that moment. I do not feel this diminishes the truth behind my statement about a hoaxer taking his life in his hands by pulling a stunt along these lines, however, as there are a lot of folks out there who are less disciplined when it comes to what they are willing to shoot at and under what circumstances.

There are other reasons. I am sure most of you have read accounts where hunters claiming to have had a wood ape in their sights did not pull the trigger because they felt they “didn’t have enough gun.” I certainly fell into that category that night. I was carrying a 9mm semi-automatic handgun that is meant more for self-defense “fight in a phone booth” situations than for taking down big game at 40 yards. I could go on but I am sure you get the idea by now.

Again, while I get the feeling that “Bobodean” was taking a dig at me, he did touch on an aspect of my sighting that I have never explained in detail before. I think this post should serve to explain why I made the statement I did in the interview with Jim Harold and why, despite being armed that night, I did not take the shot.

Any more questions?

My Story

I received an email this week in which I was asked, “How did you get interested in all this cryptozoological stuff?” It got me to thinking, always a dangerous thing, and I realized that I have really not discussed that here on the blog. I figure now is as good a time as any to do so.

I split my time growing up between the Piney Woods of what I consider true East Texas and the Golden Triangle areas of Southeast Texas. I clearly remember seeing the Patterson-Gimlin footage in a movie theater in San Augustine as a young boy. This would have been around 1972-73. I was absolutely mesmerized by what I saw on that big screen. I turned to my grandmother, who had brought my brothers and me to the show, and asked, “Maw Maw, is that real?” She simply replied, “Well, that’s what they are saying.” From that point on, the idea of giant hair-covered bipedal apes roaming the woods was never too far from my mind. I read every bigfoot book in the school library and then branched out to books about other ‘monsters’ like the yeti and Nessie. I wore those books out. It was not unusual to see my name three, four, five or more times in a row on the card of the books before any other name appeared. I remember my 3rd grade teacher making me check out books on something different from time to time so I would be “a well rounded young man.”

My formative years really were something of a golden age for the “big three” of cryptozoology. Despite only being able to receive the three major television networks (no Fox, no cable, not even the local PBS affiliate) there was no shortage of monster related programming. There were specials at least twice a year that documented the search for bigfoot, the yeti and Nessie such as ‘The Mysterious Monsters,’ narrated by Peter Graves. Weekly programs like Leonard Nimoy’s ‘In Search of…’ and fictional dramas like ‘Kolchak: The Nightstalker’ only fed the fire of interest I had in the subject. One of the big moments of my childhood came when Colonel Steve Austin, the Six Million Dollar Man himself, battled a sasquatch in primetime. Saturday morning serials also got in on the act. ‘The Secrets of Isis,’ starring Andrea Thomas had an episode called ‘Bigfoot.’ The kings of Saturday mornings in the 1970’s, Sid and Marty Krofft, produced a serial called ‘Bigfoot and Wildboy’ that was shown weekly on ‘The Krofft Super Show’ and later became its own weekly series. Whether it was the more serious documentary type of program or the campy Saturday morning fare made little difference to me. I ate it all up in equal measure.

As I got older, I began to hear more and more of what most would consider campfire stories. I heard tales of the rougarou from an old Cajun man who, along with a bunch of his friends, had coffee every morning at a local drug store. When I was in the fourth grade, my family moved to Silsbee, Texas. Tales of Ol’ Mossyback, the Wildman of the Big Thicket and Village Creek were regularly discussed in a most serious fashion while eating lunch outside under a large pine tree. I could go on but you get the idea.

My interests in the topic never went away but other things, mainly athletics, cars and girls, replaced cryptids atop my priority list. I was a decent basketball player and had the opportunity to play for a small Central Texas university. I still live in the area and this is the region where I first heard the tales of the Converse Werewolf, the Beast of Bear Creek, the Hairy Man of Round Rock and the Wildwoman of the Navidad among others. I found it fascinating that tales of these bipedal creatures were not limited only to East Texas.

Soon I was engulfed by the daily grind and family responsibilities that marriage, kids and a full time job bring. There was little time to pursue my interests in this particular area other than watching a bad cable special from time to time. Then one night I attended a Legacy Outfitters meeting. Legacy Outfitters is a Christian outdoors group made up of hunting, fishing, hiking and camping enthusiasts. Most chapters have a monthly meeting where the members get together, share a meal and hear a speaker who talks on some outdoor related topic. On this night, Daryl Colyer, then a member of the Texas Bigfoot Research Conservancy, was the speaker. He told us some amazing stories, showed us a few plaster castings of footprints and even played some pretty impressive audio. He presented the topic in a professional and scientific manner. To say my interest was rekindled would be an understatement.

Following the meeting, a friend and I decided to go out and look around for this creature. We picked our search area by looking at the Texas Counties that had the most sightings. We chose a spot on the Montgomery/Walker County line in the Sam Houston National Forest. We made several trips and then caught lightning in a bottle. I won’t recount the entire story at this time (you can read the official report here) but, to summarize, we saw a very large, upright, hirsute, bipedal creature on a forest service road at approximately 3:15 a.m. in May of 2005. We were in the middle of nowhere and, in our minds anyway, felt the chances of what we saw having been a hoaxer in some sort of ape suit at that time and in that location were extremely low. I felt then, and still feel to this day, that what we encountered that night was the real deal.

The experience, though brief, changed the course of my life. I joined the TBRC soon after (now a member of the North American Wood Ape Conservancy or NAWAC). Daryl Colyer, the man I heard speak at the Legacy Outfitters meeting has become one of my closest friends and someone with whom I have shared many an adventure. I have seen and heard some very interesting things over these last eight or nine years.

About six years ago, I decided to start writing the Texas Cryptid Hunter blog. There was, and still is, so much garbage out on the internet regarding topics of a cryptozoological nature that I felt a voice of reason was badly needed. I do not pretend to be an expert on any of this but do feel I have brought a measured, level-headed and logical point of view to the topics of wood apes, black panthers, chupacabras and such. I wasn’t sure about the name for the blog initially. I couldn’t decide if it was silly or not but, for better or worse, it stuck and here we are today.

Well, that’s the story of how I got into all of this and began writing the blog. It may be more information than you ever wanted to know but that is ok. I decided to make this post not only because I was asked the question, but to show that I was a normal person going about the business of life when I had my encounter. I was an unextraordinary person who had an extraordinary experience. My story really isn’t much different than that of a lot of folks out there. I’ve come to realize that a lot of folks, more than most realize, have some kind of story that relates to my interest in this topic. I’ve heard countless statements like, “Well, I’ve never seen anything but my grandfather once saw…” or “I’ve never seen anything weird but there was this one time while I was hunting when…” Most people don’t talk a lot about such things but the stories are out there.

Mine is just one of them.

Expanded Perspectives Interview

My interview with the guys from Expanded Perspectives is now available. We discussed all manner of things but the bulk of the time was devoted to black panthers and wood apes. I think it went well.

You can hear the interview by visiting www.expandedperspectives.com or by downloading the podcast from the iTunes store.

An Amazing Trip

I have recovered a bit now from my week long excursion into the field in search of evidence that would help officially document the North American wood ape or sasquatch. The trip was very eventful and I will be sharing more specific details on the events that took place at a later date. In the meantime, I thought I’d share some of the highlights.

I’ll start with my two “near death” experiences. Ok, that is a gross exaggeration but two situations, and maybe a third, did arise that could have taken a bad turn. The first incident involved a mountain lion walking into camp. Several of us were sitting around camp about 11:40 p.m. on Sunday 7/15 just visiting a bit. We were keeping an eye on the surrounding woods with some night vision equipment and one thermal unit. My friend with the thermal unit picked up a large heat signature coming over a hill right for us. As you might imagine, this got the old heartbeat going pretty good. As the figure approached, however, he quickly realized he was looking at a big cat. He described it as being three times the length of a gray fox that had been hanging around with a tail that was nearly as long as its body. The mountain lion walked down the hill and within about 30-40 feet of us as it proceeded about its nocturnal business. This is EXTREMELY unusual behavior for a mountain lion and we stayed a bit on edge and on high alert the rest of the evening. A friend of mine had a close-up mountain lion sighting only a few hundred yards from where we were camping a month or so ago. This leads me to believe that this spot is right in the middle of this big cat’s territory. Certainly, the presence of a cougar in the area, and a bold one at that, was something we all kept in the back of our minds all week but we did not see the cat again.

My second scary moment occurred while I was walking a dry creek bed to the south of our camp. I was looking for any sort of sign that might indicate a wood ape was in the vicinity. I stepped over a fallen tree and found myself about five feet from a sunning cottonmouth. The moccasin did not take kindly to my disturbing its sunbath and quickly assumed the “S” position. I froze immediately but this did not seem to help the snake’s mood any. He decided that disturbing a good sunning session was a crime worthy of the death penalty and lunged forward at me. I’m sure the strike didn’t get within three feet of me but it sure felt closer. I was wearing snake guards and a solid pair of hiking boots, but that strike seemed thigh high (haha). I retreated back over the fallen log and the cottonmouth slithered under a large rock. I crossed again, taking a wide berth around that particular rock, and did not see the moccasin again. The cottonmouth has a nasty, nasty reputation, much of it blown way out proportion, but I must say this guy fit the stereotype perfectly.

Late in the week we located a large track that I feel could only have been made by a wood ape. The track was about 14” long, 7-8” wide at the ball, and 4-5” wide at the heel. The terrain in this area is very rocky and the soil very thin. The track was located in one of the few spots on this particular trail that would have been capable of taking a track. Due to these factors, the track was not deep at all and, therefore, not suitable for casting. Toes were clearly visible and it looked like what we’ve all come to expect a bigfoot track to look like. Very big, very wide, and with toes that all seemed to be about the same length. Though it is difficult to see in this photo, there seemed to be a bit of a pushup in the middle of the track indicating flexion. This fits in beautifully with Dr. Jeff Meldrum’s theory that these animals have a mid-tarsal joint in their feet. I shot video of the track but am not including that footage here at this time. I have included two stills taken from the video. The first shows only the track while the second is the same still but with some notations made. I realized there is nothing in the photo to provide scale and I have broken my own rule here to some degree as I’ve always felt that anything in a photo needing a red circle around it, an arrow, etc. probably was nothing significant. The full video will be released at a later date and the track appears much clearer in it.

The highlight of the trip for me personally was a brief visual of what I believe to be the very animal I was seeking. I was hiking to a dry creek bed to look for sign (a different tributary than where I met my moccasin friend). My friends and I had decided to spread out a bit and stagger our departures from camp. I was the first one to leave. As I was approaching a heavily wooded area I was stopped in my tracks by a deep growl. It was not long in duration and not unusually loud but the “that’s far enough” message was pretty clear to me. I stopped and saw a dark figure, at about my 2:00 position, moving through the woods away from me. It was late afternoon and the shadows were beginning to get a bit long but I was facing the N-NW so the area was backlit pretty well. The gaps between the trees, leaves, and undergrowth was lit brightly. As the figure moved away from me it blocked out this light allowing me to track it with my eyes. I had the impression it was quite wide. I cannot estimate the height as I could not see a “top” to the figure. The undergrowth was two feet high in most spots and had it been a bear, or any other quadruped I would have seen some light filtering through the vegetation over its back. This was not the case. I could not smell it nor hear it as it made its retreat. It was very dark in color but, as I mentioned, it was backlit by the sun, which could have made the animal appear darker than it really was. I radioed my friends who rushed to the scene. We spread out and proceeded through the woods in the same direction in which the creature retreated. We found nothing and I proceeded to the creek to continue with my original plan. I decided to call it a day shortly before the sun set and started back to camp. I briefly smelled the unmistakable odor of a wood ape on my hike back. I’ve only smelled this odor a few times in two locations (several times in the area in which we were camping this past week and once in the Big Creek Scenic Area of the Sam Houston National Forest). It didn’t last long and I did not have the impression that one was shadowing me. I made it back to camp without incident.

I have no proof to back up my sighting claim. No photo or video. No supporting evidence like a track or broken branches showing a large animal moved through the area. I hope my reputation is good enough that you will afford me the benefit of the doubt. I’m not one of those “researchers” who seems to find a sasquatch behind every tree on every outing. I guess that’s why I don’t have a television show, haha. This is only the second visual I’ve had since 2005. I simply don’t make wild claims.

There is much more to tell about what went on during this trip. A lot of strange and, at times, downright unnerving things occurred during my week in the field. It may have been the most eventful week I’ve ever had in the field. As I mentioned before, a more thorough report on the events of last week will be forthcoming at a later date.

Trust me… it is going to be worth the wait.

My "Blobsquatch" Photo

I’ve started and restarted writing this post several times over the last year or so. I’m just really not sure what to write, or even if I should write, about the photo below. I have taken a pretty hard line in the past on people and/or organizations who present bad photos as proof positive that the sasquatch does exist. The bar for photographic evidence is set very high. This is how it should be. A “blobsquatch”, which is basically what the photo below is, just won’t do it. I do think that, while they don’t meet the criteria for establishing proof positive, some photos are more compelling than others. In my mind, and I admit to possibly being biased as I was the photographer, the photo below falls into this category. So, how to present this? I think the best thing to do is just to tell the story of the sequence of events that led to the photograph being taken and leave it at that. Understand that I do not know what is in the photograph and make no claims as to what it might be. Simply, since I found it compelling I thought some others might too. Here goes…

In May of 2005 I had a sighting of what I believe to be a sasquatch in the Sam Houston National Forest of SE Texas. I won’t get into the details of the actual sighting as I’ve done that before and the details are available under the “my sighting” tab and on the TBRC website here. In August of that year, just three months after my visual, I returned to the SHNF. I made several trips back to the area during the weeks and months after the sighting. These trips predate my membership in the TBRC and took place during the time when I had decided I was going to attempt to find out what it was I saw and confirm, mainly for myself, once and for all, whether this animal was real or not. Three other men accompanied me on this trip including my brother and the friend who was present that night in May when a large, hair-covered, bipedal figure was seen on a remote forest service road.

We had been in the forest a couple of days. We had not seen or heard anything unusual. The trip had been decidedly unpleasant. It was brutally hot during the day and the nights were warm, sticky, humid, and buggy. On our last afternoon my brother and I took a walk in a low-lying area not too far from a creek. The area is heavily wooded and was colored a brilliant green as all the plants and trees were fully out. Palmetto palms are plentiful and there is a thick canopy provided from the hard woods growing in this bottom area. To move about requires a lot of meandering around various obstacles like deadfalls, vines, thorns, marshy areas, etc. The bottom line is that it is difficult to get around down there. My brother and I walked to this area hoping to get into a shady spot and escape the brutal heat. We were right in that there was a lot of shade but the overhanging canopy seemed to hold the humidity in like a sauna. Even so, we decided to stop and rest for a while before heading back to camp.



We had been down in this area for roughly 30-40 minutes when I noticed movement over my brother’s right shoulder roughly 20 yards away. I wish I could be more specific about what I saw but that is all I can really say. I had a 35mm film camera in my hand and immediately raised it and snapped a photo. I did not take time to aim or zoom. I simply raised the camera and snapped the picture. I caught a fleeting glimpse of something moving at about a 45-degree angle away from our position (picture a clock and an object moving from the center of the face to the 2:00 position). My brother turned immediately but whatever had been there was out of sight and he saw nothing. We did both hear the sound of something moving through the palmettos and leaf litter for a few seconds and then silence. We stayed still for another couple of minutes to see if we could hear more movement. When nothing happened we walked to the area where I thought I had seen something move. We sniffed around for quite a while but found nothing that indicated anything had ever been there. Shortly, thereafter, we returned to camp. As I mentioned, the camera I had at the time used film. It was not digital. That being the case, I had no idea what, if anything, I had captured. I did take the film in to be developed within a day or so of getting home but did not actually make it in to pick it up for a couple of weeks. Upon viewing the pictures, I was intrigued by the photo I took over my brother’s shoulder. Something large and dark appeared right in the middle of the photo. It is significantly darker than the surrounding vegetation. I think, and, again, I might be biased here, it is clear that whatever it is it is not a tree or stump. The contrast in how dark it is as compared to the trees and plants in the foreground and behind it is significant. Why would this tree or stump be so much darker? One friend who viewed the picture posited that it might be a burned tree stump. While controlled burns do take place in this area from time to time there was absolutely no sign of one having taken place in the recent past as of the taking of this photo. If that had been the case, other trees surely would have exhibited charring as well. I can’t imagine any sort of fire where only one tree was scorched. In addition, if the dark object had been a stump or tree it would have still been present when my brother and I examined the area. No such charred tree was there. I believe the dark object in the photo is what I saw move over my brother’s shoulder. I can’t prove it but that is my opinion.



I’ve enlarged the image and zoomed in on it closely. I still don’t know what it is. At some point enlargements begin to do more harm than good. Get too close and it looks like nothing or, depending on your mindset, anything. The picture proves nothing and I make no claims as to what it shows. My brother and I made no size comparisons to try to decipher the size of the object at the time as we had no access to the image. Remember it was a 35mm film camera I used. At the time I wasn’t sure I had managed to photograph anything at all. I’ve revisited the general site many times but can’t be sure I’ve ever managed to get back to the exact same spot. The area has flooded multiple times since this incident took place and it looks different every time I visit.

So, there you have it. The story of how I attained my very own “blobsquatch” photo. I can’t say with any certainty what, if anything, this picture shows. Some will look at this and just blow it off as a blackened stump. After all, you have only my word that there was no such stump there. Others will clearly see…something else. What was there I can only speculate upon. Make of it what you will.

Coming Clean

I’ve been asked many times why I “believe” in the existence of bigfoot. Prior to May of 2005 I would have said that I wasn’t completely convinced that such a creature actually existed but was open minded regarding the subject. I would have pointed to the ancient Native American legends and lore, the abundance of newspaper accounts from the 1800s and early 1900s, and the discovery of dermal ridges on some plaster casts made from alleged sasquatch foot prints as pretty convincing evidence that something really was “out there”.

On May 14, 2005 things changed for me. I had begun to do some research of my own by this time. A co-worker of mine shared my interest in the subject and usually accompanied me on my outings. I had been spending the bulk of my time in the Sam Houston National Forest as it had a history of sightings. The night of May 14 my friend and I were camping in this area. We decided to turn in right at nightfall and get up about 2:00 a.m. to drive the forest service roads in hopes of a sighting. Well we did see something. At approximately 3:15 a.m. we crested a small hill and saw an upright figure standing in the road about 30 yards in front of us. My friend was driving and brought the vehicle to a stop. We watched for 2-3 seconds before the figure turned, stepped over a bar ditch, and walked into the forest. The figure was a dark reddish brown and stood upright. I estimated at the time it was about six feet tall. It walked away on two legs. At no time was the figure ever down on all fours. It moved smoothly and quickly as it made its way back into the forest. You can read the official TBRC report on the incident here.

After the figure walked away we continued to drive the road and others in the general area. We did not see any sign of it again. We did not get out of the car at any point to try to follow it. I will admit to having no desire to do so. We were both pretty rattled by the experience. We did return to the spot at day break to look for any physical evidence but found nothing.

So, there you have it. I am now out of the “crypto closet”. I have seen what I believe was a living breathing sasquatch. I know what I saw was not a bear, cougar, horse, cow, vagrant, etc. The only other possibility, in my mind anyway, is that it was a hoaxer in some kind of ape suit. The possibility of this, however, seems even more outlandish than it being a real sasquatch. We were on a very remote forest road, nobody knew where we were, and it was after 3:00 a.m. Remember, also, that this happened in Texas. Anybody traipsing around in a monkey suit in this area would be taking his life in his hands as there are quite a few folks who carry guns in their vehicle. I also found out later that a sighting just a mile or so away was reported only a month or so prior to my encounter.

I’ve told practically nobody about this incident. If I had been alone I never would have told anyone at all. I have been chided, laughed at, made fun of, and derided by the few who know of my experience (outside of the TBRC). I have developed a lot of sympathy and admiration for those who report sightings as there is often a high price to pay on a personal level.

So there it is. Really, other than the fact that it is bigfoot related, the whole incident is less than spectacular. Just an animal in the road. My life and way of thinking has forever changed because of it, however.

I would be glad to answer any serious questions regarding my experience. Just leave me a note in the comments section.