Cryptozoology - from Ayia Napa seamonsters to the Zanzibari leopards

[Chindie]

I absolutely love all things cryptozoological, fascinated me since I was a kid.

Saying that, I actually don't believe there's much substance to almost any of them. Things like Bigfoot simply can't be real. We don't find large animals anymore, certainly not many land ones, and when we do in recent years, inevitably they've been no bigger then a cat and in incredibly remote and unpopulated areas. The typical Bigfoot territory, the Pacific Northwest of the US, might not be the most populated area of the US, but its still got a decent population. Something that large, would leave evidence everywhere , and assuming there is a viable population, increase the likelihood exponentially. Everything that has ever been found was either fake or mistaken identity (in nearly every case, bear).

The ones that may have legs are inevitably things like known species that are thought to have recently gone extinct and things like 'alien' big cats. Which nobody ever cares about, really.

I'd love it if any of them were true, it would be amazing if there was some completely new, sizable, animal out there, but it's exceptionally unlikely. Even something like the chupacabra, which is supposedly actually a genetically modified animal (and has a bit more 'evidence' of is existence than most), would be fantastic. But isn't happening. We'd have found them by now. And be well on the way to wiping them out.

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

There was a series of documentaries a few years (10, maybe?) that focused on Bigfoot, the Chupacabra and all the rest of it. Possibly History channel.

 

Anyway Unknown Explorers is a nifty website for this kind of thing.

[Chindie]

As for actual stories, given I'm in Birmingham we don't get a lot of these things, so I can't add much. I can distinctly remember when I was much younger we had a shed in the garden and there was some strange noises out there, we went out and on the sheds roof was an absolutely enormous cat. It took up half the sheds roof and I swear you could see the roof flexing under it's weight. It wasn't just big, it was heavily built as well, vicious looking and powerful. My sister in laws family had a very (very) big family cat, it was bigger than the dog we used to have, but that was obviously still a domestic cat. This thing must have been house cat, but looked like it belonged curled up next to Cerberus in front of the fire in Hades. It actually spooked my mom so much so wouldn't go in the garden at night for a good while afterwards.

I've also seen an eagle owl up close. Driving through Wales whilst I was at university, we spotted one pitched on a fence post next to the road. Very big bird, I could see why spotting one at night would lead you to thinking it was something else, more supernatural.

[Marka Ragnos]

The idea that there is some ingrained psychological dynamic which dictates that people are liable to see (or want to see) people (or large humanoid beings) in places which are atypical intrigues me also. I forget what this theory is called ...

 

Does wanting to see AVFC strikers in our opponents' six-yard boxes count?

[abdomlahor]

There was a series of documentaries a few years (10, maybe?) that focused on Bigfoot, the Chupacabra and all the rest of it. Possibly History channel.

 

Anyway Unknown Explorers is a nifty website for this kind of thing.

Monsterquest? I've seen most of those. Pretty good program, when of the best and most credible when it comes to cryptozoology. 

 

Concerning the argument that we don't find any new sizeable species anymore, a brand new species of monkey was found a few years ago, totally new to science deep in the amazon. There has always been tales about them by local tribes, but nothing had ever been found until a couple of years ago.

 

Then you have the giant squid, which no-one ever believed was real until they found one. Granted, that's in the depths of the ocean, but it still shows how something dismissed to be a myth can actually be real.

 

Les Stroud (Survivorman on the discovery channel) has spent a large portion of his life alone in the wilderness and was so affected by what he called an experience which couldn't be rationally expalined (deafening ape-like screams, grunting and rock-throwing) that he arranged his own two-part documentary show investigating it. Unfortunately for him, he hired a clown called Todd Standing who doctored his own amusingly fake footage and presented it as evidence.

 

I don't really know what to believe, but I like to think there are species out there that we don't know about.

Edited April 3, 2015 by adz.villa

[Marka Ragnos]

... I can distinctly remember when I was much younger we had a shed in the garden and there was some strange noises out there, we went out and on the sheds roof was an absolutely enormous cat. 

 

I'm convinced these sightings are real but also culturally influenced. How is it that, in Britain, people are always seeing giant felids? That's always what you hear about there. 

 

You might think Carl Jung is bollocks, but his collective unconscious thing seems to apply here.

Edited April 3, 2015 by Plastic Man

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

Monsterquest? I've seen most of those. Pretty good program, when of the best and most credible when it comes to cryptozoology. 

 

 

Sounds about right. I remember an episode about 'real Hobbits' and MonsterQuest's episode list shows it.

 

This one sounds great/bonkers

 

 

"In 2006, The New York Times revealed a sinister plan by Soviet dictator Josef Stalin to create monsters by crossing humans with apes. Travel to Russia to find out if this was true and if so how far did he get? Take a look at the many efforts, both by man and Mother Nature, to combine the strength of apes with the intelligence of man. This real Frankenstein story involves everything from head transplants in the U.S. to cases of ape on human attacks. One-part history, one-part science and one part monster, discover the truth behind legendary monsters."

[Chindie]

... I can distinctly remember when I was much younger we had a shed in the garden and there was some strange noises out there, we went out and on the sheds roof was an absolutely enormous cat.

 

I'm convinced these sightings are real but also culturally influenced. How is it that, in Britain, people are always seeing giant felids? That's always what you hear about there. 

 

You might think Carl Jung is bollocks, but his collective unconscious thing seems to apply here.

I think the big cat thing is most likely because there are legitimately some alien big cats in Britain, particularly in places like Bodmin (there's been numerous filmings and more torn up livestock than you can shake a stick at). It's been reported in numerous media over the years enough times to have planted the seed in peoples mind. Then when you're out in the country and you see something that doesn't immediately compute as 'that's a dog or that's a house cat' the brain jumps directly to panther or whatever.

For the avoidance of doubt, what we had in our garden I have no doubt was just a domestic cat, but a very unusual one. It wasn't a panther or a lynx or anything. Still spooked us though.

There are loads of 'big dog' myths in the UK as well, tbh, but those inevitably are much more supernatural in nature (Black Shuck, for instance).

[abdomlahor]

I think the real Hobbit one was regarding the Orang Pendek of Sumatra, which I'm led to believe is essentially a small version of Bigfoot. That one has some decent credibility behind it as renowned researchers have claimed to see it up close. I remember one providing an example of how dense the forest is over there - she'd been researching in those forests for over 20 years, and in that span she'd only seen an elephant twice. Kind of an eye opener.

 

Pretty bad researching on her part for not carrying a camera to be honest...

[useless]

I saw a dead badger on the side of the road, but it wasn't a normal one like something you'd see on springwatch, It was massive, bigger than a rottweiler and most other bulky dogs I can think of. I'd stop short of saying it was as big as a lion but it wasn't far off. Apparently if one bites you they don't let go until they hear your bone crack, so the trick is to find a branch and snap that.

[LondonLax]

I read somewhere that there may be some truth to the `big cat` stories in the UK.

Apparently private zoos only became illegal a few decades ago. It used to be pretty fashionable for aristocrats to keep exotic wildcats but once it became illegal a lot were just released into the country side, possibly some managed to survive and breed.

[abdomlahor]

I think it's basically pretty well known by now that there are big cats over here, almost certainly a result of escapes from Zoos or personal collections. I'm led to believe exotic pets were in vogue in the 80s, where laws on pets were less restrictive than they are now. People will have got them as cubs and released them into the wild when they got too big.

 

The government won't acknowledge it though.

 

edit: beat me to it!

Edited April 3, 2015 by adz.villa

[useless]

There's meant to be some sort of sabre toothed rabbit in Scotland as well. But they're not myths, as they actually exist, one of the scariest looking creatures I've seen (in photos) extremely rare though.

[Chindie]

... I'm not sure Monty Python and the Holy Grail was meant to be viewed as a documentary

[useless]

Seeing a clip of that is what made me remember it. Searching for a picture of one I've just found out that there's such a thing as a sabre toothed deer. There might not be many animals new to science but there are plenty that are new to me.

[Xela]

Slightly more on topic here... people are often dismissive about Bigfoot's existence (almost certainly down to the ridiculous programs produced whereby a group of investigators or 'experts' embark on a mission to find one using hilariously elaborate methods), but there is some decent evidence to put forward when debating it's existence.

 

See Dr Jeff Meldrum, an anthropologist who's collected many footprints which appear to show evidence of features which would require an intricate knowledge of anthropology to be able to replicate with a stamp, or any other method of hoaxing.

 

For me there are too many detailed reports of the same thing to totally dismiss it. The idea that there is some ingrained psychological dynamic which dictates that people are liable to see (or want to see) people (or large humanoid beings) in places which are atypical intrigues me also. I forget what this theory is called but I'm sure a google search will come up with something.

 

I think they are dismissive because they don't exist. As much as I would love them to, there has never been clear photographic evidence or any remains/skeletons ever found to back up the existence of such a creature.

[Xela]

This is a good read if you like this type of thing:

 

[abdomlahor]

 

Slightly more on topic here... people are often dismissive about Bigfoot's existence (almost certainly down to the ridiculous programs produced whereby a group of investigators or 'experts' embark on a mission to find one using hilariously elaborate methods), but there is some decent evidence to put forward when debating it's existence.

 

See Dr Jeff Meldrum, an anthropologist who's collected many footprints which appear to show evidence of features which would require an intricate knowledge of anthropology to be able to replicate with a stamp, or any other method of hoaxing.

 

For me there are too many detailed reports of the same thing to totally dismiss it. The idea that there is some ingrained psychological dynamic which dictates that people are liable to see (or want to see) people (or large humanoid beings) in places which are atypical intrigues me also. I forget what this theory is called but I'm sure a google search will come up with something.

 

I think they are dismissive because they don't exist. As much as I would love them to, there has never been clear photographic evidence or any remains/skeletons ever found to back up the existence of such a creature.

 

The Patterson film is as close to clear photographic evidence as there is, and it's been analysed to death. It's been said that the proportions of the subject in it are too extreme to be a human in a suit. To my untrained eye, it looks like it could be just a guy in a gorilla suit, but that's just me. There is alleged photographic evidence, people just choose not to believe it because of the ease in which they can be hoaxed.

 

The skeleton and remains argument has been brought up many times, but bodily decomposition in the wild is a very quick process. Add that to the fact that there must be a very small population of them (if they do exist) makes it even less likely to find bones or any other remains.

Edited April 4, 2015 by adz.villa