Monday 18 March 2024

Scottish Bigfoot?

 

Bigfoot investigator claims he has proof legendary monster is hiding out in SCOTTISH forest
Robert Shankland, 56, has shared snaps of what he claims is a 14-inch footprint left by the giant creature in Dumfries and Galloway
Part-time labourer and gardener Robert Shankland has shared snaps of what he claims is a 14-inch footprint left by the giant creature in Dumfries and Galloway.The 56-year-old has spent two years hunting for evidence of a "bipedal hominid creature" in Galloway Forest Park, which spans 300 square milesAs well as pictures of the "footprint", Robert, from Burnside, Lanarkshire, reckons another image could show the creature staring at him from trees. Scotland already has a Bigfoot legend in the shape of "The Scottish Wildman” - Am Fear Liath Mor, in Gaelic - which haunts the summit of Ben Macdui, the highest peak in the Cairngorms.
Robert's theory is that the Galloway creature could be a relative and may even use a "green corridor" of woods to travel between the south-west of Scotland and the Cairngorms. Robert’s photographs show a large footprint-shaped mark outlined in gravel near to Corson Cone in the Craigdulyart Forest, New Cumnock.Using a four-inch long phone for scale, the “footprint” is at least 14 inches long and seven inches wide.He also highlighted parts on the creature that he believes are pressure points on the ground and show the curve of its heel.
Speaking about his encounter with the beast, Robert said: “I actually didn’t realise it was there until I got home and looked at the pictures.
Read rest see photo here:

I live in this area and there have never been reports of wildmen or bigfoot type creatures according to locals. There have been reports of big cats and a friend of mine found a paw print in the forest (see link below).I would be more inclined to believe in a big cat living in the forest than a bigfoot. It’s a busy tourist area and surely someone would have reported something before this?
What is also interesting is this appeared after my crypto fiction book came out set in this area which has a bigfoot like creature in it. (The Weird Helmet ) They say life imitates art or something.

Sea Wolf, myth or killer whale?

 

Wasgo or sea wolf

Sea-Wolf, is a creature believed in by the Tlingit and Haida peoples of British Columbia and Alaska .It is said to be  a sea-monster who was once a human being. The Sea-Wolf was said to bring  luck and wealth to anyone who sees it, or hears its  call.

It is described as a  long ,sea-going creature with a horned or crested  head.It has large  eyes and a mouth full of  sharp teeth, like a crocodile  .Some describe fins or flippers with a long powerful tail for swimming.

It is supposed to be represented on a totem pole which was purchased by the Canadian Museum of Civilization. The Field Museum restored the talking stick to the pole, where it now protrudes from the forehead of the lowest of two Wasgo (or Sea Wolf) figures. The myth associated with this pole is that of the Wasgo, who lived in the lake behind Skidegate village and had the ability to transform between the form of a Wolf and a Killer Whale. The pole shows the Wasgo in two states, with and without his Whale attributes.

So is the Wasgo simply a killer whale or something else? Descriptions sound more like a prehistoric beast ,a plesiosaur.Could it simply be a myth or another mysterious beast as yet unidentified?

Thursday 22 February 2024

Pterosaur Sightings.

 A reprint of an old post from 2009  by request.

Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs sightings 35 years later

A report 35 years later of a prehistoric bird sighting:

LONG BEACH, Calif./EWORLDWIRE/June 8, 2007 - A psychologist at a university in Central China asserts that he saw, in 1971, a prehistoric-looking creature flying in Papua New Guinea. Brian Hennessy of the Chongqing University of Medical Sciences described the creature as black or dark brown with a "longish narrow tail" and a beak that was "indistinguishable from the head." In the daylight of an early morning on Bougainville Island, on a dirt road that led down to the coast, Hennessy heard a slow "flapping" and looked up to see a "very big" creature with a "horn" at the back of its head. There was "not a feather in sight." After thirty-five years, in the summer of 2006, a friend of Hennessy referred him to the American, Jonathan Whitcomb, author of the book "Searching for Ropens," who interviewed him. The eyewitness account was added to the second edition of the book, which was published on May 30, 2007. Until 2006, Hennessy had been unaware of cryptozoological expeditions related to what he had seen. (Whitcomb's book tells how, in the 1990's, a few Americans began investigating, in Papua New Guinea, creatures described like living pterosaurs, commonly called, by Americans, "pterodactyls.") Hennessy was also unaware that many natives have names for giant flying creatures: One of those names is "ropen."
The American author noticed similarities between Hennessy's description and that of a creature reported 500 miles to the west, near FinschhafenPapua New Guinea, twenty-seven years earlier. In 1944, Duane Hodgkinson, now living in Montana, saw a giant "prehistoric" creature flying over a clearing where he and another soldier were standing. Whitcomb had interviewed Hodgkinson in 2004 and realized, two years later, that both the American veteran and the psychologist had seen a dark flying creature with a long tail but no sign of feathers. Both men used the word "prehistoric." In 2006, Whitcomb showed Hennessy a series of sketches for determining the shape of the head, including the beak and the head appendage. (A similar questionnaire had been given to Hodgkinson two years earlier.) Whitcomb then drew a sketch based on Hennessy's answers, and concluded that Hennessy had seen, in 1971, the same type of creature that Hodgkinson had seen in 1944.

Jonathan Whitcomb, the author of Searching for Ropens, and Live Pterosaurs in America, interviewed Hennessy by email in 2006 and made up a composite sketch of the head from the descriptions. Whitcomb said it was very similar to a composite sketch from another interview two years earlier with Duane Hodgkinson who described a "pterodactyl." Hodgkinson talked about the size of the creature he saw saying it was similar in size to that of a "Piper Tri-Pacer airplane" .In the second edition of the book Searching for Ropens, Brian Hennessy was quoted as saying : “It was so unusual. I actually heard it before I saw it. A slow flap . . . flap . . flapping sound. The air was still, and our truck had stopped on our downward journey from the top of the range to the coast way below . . . it was very big (wingspan at least two metres, probably more . . . possibly much, much more). It was black or dark brown. I had never seen anything like it before. . . . I recall seeing this creature with a longish narrow tail . . . the head was disproportionately large compared to the body [no feathers in sight]."

Both the 1944 and 1971 sightings were in daylight and Whitcomb's book asserts that Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs live in Papua New Guinea and that they are larger than the normally discovered Rhamphorhynchoid fossils.

Although I don’t dispute the men saw something , I am not sure that it could the Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs that Whitcomb asserts it is. The world has changed so much that creatures would have had to evolve and would not look exactly the same as the fossil record. Plus bear in mind we can only guess a lot of the time what creatures looked like from fossils. Very few complete skeletons are found and often no tissue so colour and texture is often guesswork. There may be an unknown species of giant bat as some assert or it may be some evolved creature from the Rhamphorhynchoid pterosaurs .



Sunday 21 January 2024

Mongolian Lake Monsters

 

Mongolian Lake creatures

Several lakes are said to have lake monsters dwelling in them in Mongolian.

Lake Hovsgol

Thought  to be between  two to five million years old, Lake Hovsgol in is northern Mongolia is the home of a large creature..It is Mongolia’s largest freshwater lake, with depths of over 800 feet. The lake  drains via the Egiyn River, which feeds the Selenge River in the Lake Baikal drainage basin.

Lake Baikal has its own monster.See link below.

https://cryptozoo-oscity.blogspot.com/2021/03/mysterious-lake-baikal.html

South of the lake lies the Hövsgöl Mountain Range. In October 2007  a report appeared in some Chinese newspapers. Diver Dave Woodward and sonar operator Gregg Mikolasek were  boating on Lake Hovsgol when they saw  a giant 'trace', or shape, suspended about 35 metres below the surface in the freshwater lake..

'I think we saw something and I think it was about six metres long,' Woodward recalls telling his diving buddies back at the camp later that afternoon. About three metres wide in the middle, whatever was down there exhibited the half-moon shape typical of the image of a fish on sonar. Its thick central section glowed red, indicating density, another pointer that whatever it was, it was probably a single entity and not a school of fish. Woodward thought about going in, hesitated, then decided not to.

(I cannot show the link to the newspaper articles as it contains a virus.)

It sounds typical of a lake creature description . I was unable  to access other reports.

Could the creature be the same one as in Lake Baikal perhaps travelling from one lake to another.

 

Lake Uureg.

 

The Lake is a saline lake in western Mongolia. It has a maximum depth of 42 m (138 ft).

A Mongolian traveller  saw a huge creature, which he captured on video whilst he was taking a trip around Uureg Lake .Traveller Mr S. Sodnomdorj said “Foremost I thought there was a timber floating on the lake. Then I asked from a local man who was joining with me if it was possible or not. The local said ‘It is not possible’. We were in the distance of 250 meters away from the object. After that I tried to see that thing carefully, and then it seemed like an animal. I switched on my camera and started to record. I was running to the lake while recording because it was too far to capture it. That animal began to move its body and turned to the centre of the lake. Finally I realized it was an animal”.The creature’s fin appeared on the surface of the lake and it was approximately 7-8 meters.

Local people tell of a myth about a giant creature in the Uureg Lake. They call the giant creature  “Khukh bukh” (Blue bull).It is said to moo like a bull and appear once in 60 years. Elderly people used to say “I will give you to ‘blue bull’, if you behave naughtily” to children. They also used to warn people not to swim in the lake.

Mr. Sodnomdorj who captured the creature wants to have the video analysed  to prove if it is a creature or not.

As it is a salt water lake it could be  a sea creature that somehow entered the lake.

Near by is another lake with a creature. Uureg Lake lies a 150 kilometers from the Khyargas Lake.

Khyargas Lake.

This is also a salt water lake and is 50 metres( 150 metres approx) in depth

There was news released about Russian researchers working on a mysterious trace that was on the lake shore. A group of Mongolian and Russian geological researchers  team led by Victor Yarmoluk, discovered a huge trace on the shore of the Khyargas lake in the 1980’s. (Voice of Russia Aug 31, 2013).

The researchers  discovered several newly made footprints on the shore  1.5 km ( 5 feet approx) from the lake. It seemed like many reptiles came out and were lying on the shore for some time.

Writer and public figure Igor Grishin and a team visited Khyargas Lake in 2013 for a second time. They visited the lake first time in 2010.

“We found different sizes of traces and also bones which are cannot belong to the animals in Mongolia. However fishes that bitten by big teeth were caught from the lake many times, but there is only a species called ‘toothless Osman of Altai’ exists in the lake as known. We afforded the observation of the footprints on the ground and bed of the lake with echometer. Those footprints can be divided into 3 groups. There can be different sizes of several animals or those footprints can be traces from different parts of one animal.”

Researchers found out that some prehistoric animals such as plesiosaurs were not able to digest its food unless to swallow stones.

Valery Nikolayev is a zoologist and scientist of Valdai protected area. He stated that he agrees the prediction on existence of the prehistoric giant reptiles The Uureg Lake belongs to the same region of geography. It raises the assumption of existence of the similar giant creatures in both lakes or travelling from one lake to another.

Lake Kanas

Kanas Lake means 'a gorgeous and mysterious lake' in Mongolian. Local legend has it that there is a huge 'lake monster' in the lake, which often drags horses drinking by the lake into the water.

Read more here:

https://cryptozoo-oscity.blogspot.com/2009/07/kanas-lake-monster-china.html

Lake Khaiyr

 Its depth is yet unknown. It is called "Khaiyr" (meaning "to love" in modern Mongolian) 

In1940 there was a sighting of "two large black creatures" by the polar aviator, Ivan Cherevichny and a  polar helmsman Valentin Ivanovych Akkuratov . They  saw two large animals when flying over the lake at the height of 800–1000 metres. Getting curious, they got down to 50 metres and observed the animals, but the noise of the plane scared the creatures and they submerged.

In 1964 when a group of scientists from Moscow University, claim to have encountered an animal with prehistoric biology whilst on an expedition surveying mineral deposits.An article written in Komsomolskaya Pravda by G. Rokosuev explains that the "monster" was initially seen by N. Gladkikh, the deputy leader of the expedition team.Gladkikh went out to the lake to draw water and saw a creature that had crawled out onto the shore, apparently to eat the grass - a small head on a long gleaming neck , a huge body covered with jet-black skin and a vertical fin along the spine.Gladikikh's story was at first met with incredulity by the rest of the team. However, the creature then reappeared to be seen by the leader of the expedition and several other members.

Rokosuev wrote:

“Suddenly a head appeared in the lake, then a dorsal fin. The creature beat the water with its long tail, producing waves on the lake. You can imagine when we saw with our own eyes that the stories were true”

The descriptions sound like a  a plesiosaur, which became extinct  66 million years ago. Some researchers think that this creature represents a mammalian herbivore related to the hippopotamus. Due to the isolation of this northern lake,a unique adaptation could arise.

The 1964 story has since been reported as a hoax however the 1940 sighting has not been debunked.

Being so isolated it needs an expedition of neutral scientists to get to the truth.

It seems Scotland is not the only country with  lots of lake monsters or water kelpies .Interestingly  both are in the northern hemisphere.

 

 

Monday 25 December 2023

Seasons Greetings

 Merry Christmas to all. I hope you all find some joy in the holidays. I hope for lots of new cryptid sightings in 2024 and a better year for us all.xx

Saturday 16 December 2023

Christmas Monsters

 Christmas is also for Monsters!


 Not all Christmas creatures are benign like Santa Claus. Krampus looks like a demonic goat who walks on its hind legs like a human. He punishes naughty children, beating them with birch branches and carries a basket on his back so he can carry off a child to eat later.The 5th of December is Krampusnacht ,men in homemade Krampus costumes run around Alpine villages causing havoc. These 'Krampus Runs' continue today. The Karakoncolos looks like a cross between the Devil and a Sasquatch. In Turkey, the legend says he would stand at street corners on winter nights setting riddles for passers-by. If the traveller gave an answer that included the word ‘black’ they were free to go on their way. If not, he would strike them dead .Sometimes the Karakoncolos would just put them in a trance and leave them to roam free. In Serbia, the story says the Karakoncolos jumps on the victim’s back and uses them as a ride. The exhausted person was only released at dawn. Jólakötturinn is the Icelandic Yule Cat or Christmas Cat. Jólakötturinn, who first appeared in the 19th century, a huge, ferocious beast with razor-like whiskers, blazing eyes and terrible claws who consumed any child who did not receive new clothes on Christmas Day.It is tied into an Icelandic tradition in which those who finish their work on time received new clothes for Christmas, while those who were lazy did not . Jólakötturinn could tell who the lazy children were because they did not have at least one new item of clothing for Christmas and these children would be eaten by the Yule Cat. Then there is the macabre skeleton mare of Welsh tradition,Mary Lwyd, which rises from the dead and wanders the streets with her undead attendants, to remind the living of their existence. Mary Lwyd wants to to get into your house. To keep the zombie horse out, you must engage in a battle of rhymes . Usually singing the rhymes to which the zombie horse replies.On New Year’s Eve, the undead mare is represented by a puppeteer parading a horse skull on a pole draped in white cloth around the towns and villages. Next there is a creature from Scandinavian folklore who looks like a gnome and lives among the dead inside burial mounds called the Tomten.He can act as a caretaker of the household, that is if you keep on his good side. The Tomten has quite the temper and is known for biting people who upset him. The bites are poisonous and deadly. People leave a gift of food out on Christmas Eve for the Tomten. One of Iceland’s creatures associated with Christmas is Gryla a giant troll who is bad tempered with an insatiable hunger for children. Each Christmas, Gryla comes down from her mountain dwelling to hunt for naughty children. She catches them in a sack and takes them back to her cave where she boils them alive for her favourite stew.