Fresno Bee reported on Bigfoot sighting in 1986

According to an article ran in the Fresno Bee in August of 1986, a five man construction crew was spooked by what they say was Bigfoot while working on a job.

The job entailed building a foot/horse bridge near the Pacific Crest Trail on the south fork of the Kern River in the Inyo National Forrest (roughly about 25 miles south of Mt. Whitney) and given the remote location the men were camping at the site where they worked. One day, as the sun was setting the five men heard a scream so loud and described the intensity of it as something that "sounded like a stadium loudspeaker. The scream came three more times, and one of the workers used a rifle to fire a warning shot in the air.

At that moment, four of the five men saw a humanoid figure several feet away from them. They weren't able to make out any details but say the figure was at least 8 feet tall and as it walked away it look like it was "lumbering and kind of hunched over" but was traveling upright on two legs. Spooked the workers walked two miles to their vehicle and drove to the nearest ranger station to stay the night.

Several rangers think what the men heard was nothing more than a mountain lion and that then spooked a bear to rise up on two feet and that is what the men saw.

The lone member of the crew who did not see the figure, but heard it, disagrees. John Davis, a Mono Indian, said he had worked in the mountains for over four decades at the time of the sighting and claims what he heard sounded nothing like a mountain lion. And even though he never saw the figure, he says that the description sounds nothing like that of a bear.

The story doesn't end here though. It seems the original story got the attention of several bigfoot hunters. An unidentified man accompanied by two Dobermans was seen at the Blackrock ranger station informing the rangers that he was there to search for Bigfoot and wanted to know where the crew was currently at. Apparently this was the only sighting of the man. The only other incident regarding a Bigfoot hunter was when a man by the name of Danny Perez who runs at the time a newsletter called BigfooTimes (did a bit of research and he now has a website here) visited the Fresno Bee office looking for directions to the construction site and then soon left. Whether this is the same person who was seen at the Blackrock station was never stated in the article.

Personally I don't think what the men saw was a bear. Yes bears do stand on their hind legs, but I've never heard of one walking on its hind legs for more than a few feet (if I'm wrong someone please correct me). And as for the scream, I'm not sure on that. I know several Bigfoot hunters claim to have the creature's call recorded on audio. But these calls where more of a hoot, similiar to other primate calls. Whether this is the sound the workers heard is hard to say. But what I really find interesting is that the Fresno Bee ran two articles on Bigfoot, one on the sighting itself and the other on the Bigfoot hunters searching for the site. Whatever these men saw, the local newspaper felt it was a big enough story to report on it.

Below are scans of the newspaper articles I was able to get off Google News. Click on them for a larger view.

Top 10 strangest things to happen in Fresno for 2010

It’s hard to believe that 2010 is almost over. This year saw some good things for Weird Fresno. I’m now a featured writer over at Fresno Famous and I've also started a forum for people to share their stories with others. Going back through all the posts I did over the year, I was able to trim down the 165 posts (this one will make it 166) to what I felt was the top ten posts of the year.

Number 10 - Another strange creature sighted at Millerton Lake

I've done a few posts now on Millerton Lake and the strange things that people have seen in the water. This one story was interesting to me due to the fact I got a phone call from someone who had searched strange creature sightings in Millerton Lake on Google and my site was the first thing that came up. Out of all the e-mails I get, weird things seen at Millerton Lake are the most common. One has to wonder what's lurking under the water's surface.

Original post can be found here.

Number 9 - Strange triangular shaped craft seen over Fresno

Usually I ignore most UFO videos on YouTube, but this one grabbed my attention. To this day I still don't know what it is. But there's been some strange things in the skies above Fresno over the past year.

Original post can be found here.

Number 8 - Was the Chupacabra seen in a Bakersfield park?

It wouldn’t be a Top Ten post without at least one post of the unofficial mascot for Weird Fresno. This time the sighting was in a Bakersfield park and was complete with the grainy cell phone camera image. Most likely this was yet another animal with mange, but for whatever reason they keep being misidentified as chupacabra. One has to wonder how many sightings will occur in 2011?

Original post can be found here.

Number 7 - KMPH 26 reports UFOs seen in Fresno over the Fourth of July weekend

Like I mentioned earlier, some strange things have been seen in the Fresno skies over the past year and there was some crazy UFO stuff going on over the 4th of July weekend in the Fresno area. Several sightings occured, including a large cigar shaped craft flying over a house in Clovis. KMPH 26 even did a small news piece on the sightings.

Original post can be found here.

Number 6 - ABC 30 reports Bigfoot sightings on the rise in Fresno County

Like UFOs, Bigfoot sightings were also on the rise in the Fresno County area this year. What surprised me about this was that the reporter actually took the subject matter seriously. Usually with anything paranormal they always try to make jokes about it, add the X Files theme (happened to me once) or just make the people in the article look like kooks. ABC 30 was different. Granted they didn’t show any conclusive evidence, but still this was better than what other news stations have done. I hope they take note for the next time they do something.

Original post can be found here.

Number 5 - Did a UFO crash near Fresno over the weekend?

This has to be one of the strangest stories of the entire year. A UFO was reported to have crashed east of Fresno in the foothills and was military in origin. Jeffery Gonzalez of the Sanger Paranormal Society claims to have video taped the craft, but it’s hard to really make anything out. Still this story was of interest as it made news on several national paranormal sites. Unfortunately nothing else was ever reported on this story.

Original post can be found here.

Number 4 - Return to Snake Road

This one was interesting just because of what I was unable to do. Bored one night, I decided to head out towards Sanger with a fully charged video camera in tow. I’m on the fence about the story, but wanted to shoot some video to show what the area was like. After a 30 minute drive, I arrived and parked my car on the side of the road, grabbed my camera and started to walk. But when I turned on my camera I was surprised to find out that I only had about five minutes left on the battery (normally it can shoot for 90 minutes or so). So I hastily shot some video on the side of the road (which didn’t come out right as it was too dark) and then jumped back in the car and shot some video driving down the road.

Original post can be found here.

Number 3 -The return to the Fright Night Scream Park

Granted this one isn’t paranormal in nature, but it shows that even I can still get scared. Last year I had done some great promo work with the Scream Park and was asked to do it again this year. The idea I had was to have someone there call the Weird Fresno hotline and goad me into coming back. Problem was they were so busy setting up that when I arrived to shoot the video for the blog post, no one had called. But I had worked out something where I would get a few phone calls and then I would post the video a bit later then I planned.

A few days passed when I received a phone call. I let it go to voice mail (as I always do) and then listened to the message. It sounded nothing like the person who was supposed to call me and didn’t mention anything about the park and figured it was someone else. But before I could get a chance to call them back, they started calling my phone constantly. At work, at home, late at night. And the messages were just weird. The person kept saying they had something to show me, that they wanted to be my best friend and they loved me. Having my fair share of psychos calling me, I got a bit nervous and if you follow either @weirdfresno or my personal twitter feed you would know this. My tweets got the attention of the person who ran their twitter feed and they contacted me and said it wasn’t them, which terrified me even more. The calls continued and finally I started to freak out even more. Finally I received a message via twitter from the park saying it was them all along. I’m to assume it was someone else, as I didn’t recognize the voice. Luckily I was able to work in into the post even though I was expecting something entirely different. But needless to say I fell victim to my own promotion.

Original post can be found here.

Number 2 - Strange things going on at Lost Lake

This was one of my favorites of the year because we have two different types of sightings here. One was the ghost of a small child and the other was of a strange creature. Even more interesting is both accounts are from the same witness, but at different locations in the park. Both were definitely weird and plans to visit the park are in the works for 2011.

Original post can be found here.

Number 1 - Update on video of strange creatures captured on Fresno CCTV

and

SyFy channel show airs strange video shot in Fresno

These two go together in that they are related in the fact the first post then warranted the second one. One of my first posts was done about this strange video of these “creatures” that someone had captured on a CCTV video. About a year later I was able to find more video, this time showing the person’s house and yard and putting the size of the creatures into perspective. If you watch the video you and compare the size of the tree to the creatures you will see they can’t be more than 18 to 24 inches tall.

What’s even better is the second post put me in touch with a show on the SyFy network. The show was called Fact or Fiction and they try to either prove or debunk supposed paranormal related videos on the internet and had come across the one above. Through Google they had found my site and called me with a few questions. Unfortunately they didn’t offer me a job, but after watching them splicing some footage shot at Woodward Park and saying it was near the person’s house (which it’s not), I wasn’t too upset over this.

Original posts can be found here and here.

So there you have it, the top ten strangest things to happen in around the Fresno area for 2010. With the new year approaching us, that means that 2012 is that much closer (and the end of the world as some people want you to think). Who knows what crazy shit will happen in 2011. All I know is that whatever it is, you'll read about it here.

ABC 30 reports Bigfoot sightings on the rise in Fresno County

Recently ABC 30 did a short newspiece on multiple Bigfoot sightings in the foothills and mountain regions of Fresno County. Gene Haagenson interviewed several people in the area who have claimed to have witnessed the legendary creature in some capacity.

One was a member of the Mono Indian tripe and says he was in the woods once and smelt a strong odor and associated it with Bigfoot (there have been multiple occurences of a strong rotten egg like odor accompanying a visual encounter of Bigfoot). Another was a Northfork resident who heard strange sounds outside her window one night. Only later, when she heard similiar sounds on a Bigfoot sight did she realize what was outside her window was a Bigfoot. The newspiece then mentions a Bigfoot museum in Santa Cruz and then goes into how many people have taken the search of Bigfoot seriously.

I actually liked the piece, as they weren't trying to make these people out to be a bunch of cooks and portrayed them as normal people who just witnessed something strange. Mainstream science still hasn't taken the idea of Bigfoot seriously, but with the ever increasing amount of evidence being gathered it's only a matter of time before they do.

Bigfoot reported seen in eastern Tulare County

A view of Kings Canyon National Park, near where the creatures

were reportedly seen.

In the summer of 2007, a lone hicker was backpacking up the Pacific Crest Trail which lies about 70 miles east of Visalia in Tulare County in the Kings Canyon National Park. At around 2:00 pm that day the witness describes seeing two large upright figures in the distance covered with dark fur. At a distance of about 200 yards he observed the creatures at the edge of a deep canyon for around 10 minutes. The hiker then decided to make a coyote call to see what the creatures reactions would be. Needless to say it spooked the creatures and they left the area in a few seconds.

The witness further stated that he did have a camera on him, but he was so caught up in the moment that he forgot he had one on him. But given the distance he was from the creatures, the pictures would have not had that much detail to them. The witness decided to go back to the same location the following year (2008) to see if he could see the creatures again and this time photograph them. Unfortunately he didn't see anything, but did find some month old scat that he assumed was from a Bigfoot (why he thinks this is never stated in the report) and he claimed it contained hair from small mammals and some finely chewed vegetation, including some type of red berries.

As I had posted many months ago, this is another sighting seen in the area during the summer. A colleguae of mine theorizes that the Bigfoot are migrating through the area during the summer months and that's why most of the sightings occur then. One day we plan on making a trip up to where the sightings have occured, but with money being as tight as it is right now that may be a while. Hopefully an organization like the Bigfoot Researchers Originization can take a look into this and discover what's going on.

The link to the original report can be found here.

Man dials 911 after seeing Bigfoot

Timothy Peeler of Casar, North Carolina reported seeing a "man-beast" that was almost 10 feet tall. Peeler said the creature screeched like a "night bird and grunted in the warm night air. He was convinced that he was seeing a local legend named "Knobby"

The creature got it's name as it was originally seen near Carpenter's Knob in the 1970's. The sightings were proflic back then, but for some reason mysteriously stopped until Peeler saw it.

Full source: Shelby Star

Written by: David Allen

Legend speaks of an ape-like creature who called Upper Cleveland County home in the late 1970s.

Robert Williams, then covering the news for Charlotte media outlets, named him “Knobby,” a towering beast many considered as the resident Bigfoot.

Williams never saw Knobby — “I only wrote what I was told.”

Knobby stories flew overseas, Williams said, drawing interest from New Zealand and beyond. Newspaper articles from 1979 detail more than a dozen Knobby sightings and investigations by the North American Research Association and researchers from a university in Massachusetts. But the rumors and sightings near Carpenter’s Knob — hence the creature’s name — mysteriously stopped decades ago.

Then, Timothy Peeler called 911.

Peeler, of Vanada Drive in Casar, is a self-proclaimed “South Mountain man.” He’s surrounded by woods and a ridge worthy of postcards.

It was June 5 when Peeler supposedly spotted a man-beast, upwards of 10 feet tall, that screeched like “a night bird” and grunted in the warm night air.

The creature sported dark hair, Peeler said, with a grey beard stretching to its navel.

Authorities were dispatched that morning around 3 a.m., according to a report from Cleveland County Communications.

Deputies filed a suspicious person report after investigating the incident.

Williams was surprised to hear of the recent sighting. It had been years, he said, since Knobby’s supposed existence made headlines.

The sasquatch was reportedly sighted in the 70s by numerous people, including highschoolers, a banker and an elderly woman. One man said Knobby might have broken his goat’s neck.

“People came in from everywhere,” Williams said. “People contacting me from around the world.”

Sasquatch watch

What if you spot a Knobby-esque creature fiddling through your trash? Spotters say the walking legend isn’t aggressive, but police say to take caution anyway.

Cleveland County Sheriff’s Capt. Alan Norman said local Bigfoot sightings are few and far between, but “if there is a call, there's standard protocol to be dispatched to the area.”

“Deputies basically check the area for any unusual sightings,” he said. “A suspicious person would be treated in the same category.”

Man claims Bigfoot sighting in Arizona

Roger Peterson claims in 1981, while camping with four friends in the Arizona desert, he had an encounter with Bigfoot.

Click the image for the link to the video. Unfortunately

the poster didn't allow embedding and I had to resort to this.

It was at night when it happened and claims it to be a female of the species (how he came to this conclusion is never stated). Peterson then goes on to say another Bigfoot appeared in front of his friends and charged at them. In self defense, he fired his rifle at the creatures and apparently hit one of them as he heard one let out, as he puts it, a god awful scream that he remembers to this day.

Over the years he's come back to the area in hopes of seeing one of the creatures again. He recorded some video in 2001 and claims to have captured footage of a Bigfoot crouching behind some dry brush (around the 1:45 mark).

Roger then contacted Tom Biscardi, who is famous from a few years ago when he and two claimed to have found the carcass of a Bigfoot and had it stored in a freezer. Unfortunately this turned out to be a hoax as it was nothing more than a gorilla suit and some deer intestines, but that hasn't stopped Biscardi from trying to cash in on the Bigfoot craze.

I'm sure Peterson has good intentions, but the fact that he turned to Tom Biscardi to "help" him find Bigfoot has me thinking hoax. I'm surprised people still turn to him when they there has been so much in the crypto world that this guy isn't to be trusted. Or perhaps Peterson hasn't seen Bigfoot at all and is just using Biscardi to help him pull one over on people.

Still the debate will go on until a viable piece of evidence is produced and blurry video is definitely not that.

Over one hundred Bigfoot sightings reported in Southern California annually

A still taken from the Patterson-Gimlin

that was shot in 1967.

More than 100 reports of Sasquatch sightings are made every year in Southern California, and local members of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Association say they are frustrated that a reported Sasquatch capture in Georgia turned out to be yet another man in a monkey suit, it was reported Saturday.

"These people who conspired to make this hoax brought all the research down, in my opinion," said Palmdale resident Richard Hucklebridge in an interview with the Daily News.

"It kind of upset me," he told the newspaper. "We've been at this for years now and we're trying to prove these things are real."

Hucklebridge said Bigfoots living in the Los Angeles County mountains have "a bad attitude" and are hiding because target shooters take potshots at them.

A policeman in Georgia was fired last week, and he and his partner were sued by a California Bigfoot researcher, after they accepted $50,000 from the Californian to tell their story of a reported recovery of Bigfoot remains.

Branded a myth and superstition by scientists, Sasquatch lives on in popular belief, with more than 20 percent of Americans believing that Bigfoot is real, according to a Baylor University professor quoted by the Daily News.

Hucklebridge, a retired jet engine mechanic from Palmdale, told the paper he believes at least 12 Bigfoots live in the San Gabriel Mountains north of Pasadena, and that they have been spotted about 18 times since the early 1970s.

Bobbie Short, a San Diego Bigfoot Web site operator, told the Daily News that credible reports "suggest there are pockets of Sasquatch families living in and around dense tree cover, usually in higher elevations."

All credible evidence from reputable paleontologists, anthroplogists, and sociologists concludes that Bigfoot is based on a modern myth, bred by an innate need by humans to believe in something mysterious, and fed by a grainy movie shot in 1958 in Humboldt County, the first of many Sasquatch hoaxes.

But Hucklebridge scoffs at that. "The scientists won't believe until somebody comes up with a body," he told the Daily News.

The Bigfoot researcher says he is positive that the elusive mammals live in the local mountains, which are the heaviest-used National Forest in the nation, according to park rangers. That means his mission to find them must continue, he said.

"But we don't want to capture or harm them," he was quoted in the paper. "We have people who come out here and shoot at them. I know they have been shot at and hit.

"And I know it's something that gives them a bad attitude."

Link to the original article can be found here.

Man claims Bigfoot abducted girl while camping.

Fresno, Calif.

A suspect who claims the legendary apeman Bigfoot abudcted a teen age girl was freed from jail three days before the scheduled start of his trial on child-stealing charges.

Fresno County authorities said they were forced into letting Russel Welch, 44, back on the streets to "avoid double jeopardy if they later choose to charge the man with murder."

Welch is accused of abducting Theresa Ann Bier, 16, last June. The two went camping in the Central Sierra and the girl did not return.

Welch told authorities that the legendary apeman, also known as Sasquatch, had taken the girl. Detectives say Welch apparently sincerely believes in Bigfoot creatures and claims to have had continued contact with a tribe of them.

Deputy District Attorney Elvoyce Hooper Friday offered Welch a one-year term on child-stealing charges if he would sign a waiver allowing for a murder trial in the event the girl's body is found.

But Welch's public defender, Mel Rube, refused to sign a waiver and Hooper said he was forced to drop the charge in case authorities later want to charge Welch with murder.

If the body is not found, Hooper said, he will probably refile the child-stealing charges, with a maximum penalty of four years in prison.

Welch had been scheduled to stand trial Monday. Rube denies his client had anything to do with the girl's disappearance but would not say if Welch is still contending that Bigfoot took the girl.

The double jeopardy statute prevents a suspect from being charged twice for the same crime.

Note: This article was originally written on September 30, 1987. You can find a scan of the article here.

Sadly, Theresa Ann Bier has never been found. Below is some information I was able to get off a missing person's database.

Missing since: June 1, 1987 from Fresno, California.

Date of Birth: April 16, 1971

Age at time of disapperance: 16

Height and Weight: 5'5", 110 pounds

Distinguishing Characteristics: Caucasian female. Brown hair, hazel eyes. Bier's upper front teeth protrude. She has a surgical scar on her lower leg due to a childhood fracture. Bier's nickname is Sam.

Clothing/Jewelry Description: White t-shirt, jeans and laced sandals.

Bier resided with her family in Fresno, California in 1987. She was last seen during a cammping trip with Russel Welch on June 1, 1987 in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. Bier and Welch, whose nickname is Skip, camped in the area of Shuteye Peak, approximately 25 miles northeast of Bass Lake. He was 43 years old at the time. They were reportedly searching for the legendary creature known as Sasquatch or Bigfoot. Welch considered himself a "student" of the legend. Bier disappeared during the trip and has never been heard from again.

Authorities questioned Welch when he returned to Fresno several days later. He initially claimed that Bier ran away from him on June 1, then he changed his story. Welch eventually stated that Bier had been forcibly taken by Bigfoot. Welch was charged with her abduction, but the case against him was dismissed due to lack of evidence in October 1987, more than four months after Bier disappeared. Searches of the Shuteye Peak area produced no clues to her whereabouts. Foul play is suspected in Bier's case.

If anyone has any information regarding the disappearance of Theresa Ann Bier pleace call the Fresno Police Department at (559) 621-7000.

Couple call 911 after Bigfoot sighting

San Antonio police have released a 911 dispatch call reporting a "Bigfoot" sighting.

The audio recording between a dispatcher and the homeless couple lasts more than eight minutes. In it, the primary caller appears sober and deliberate as she describes the beast Nov. 30.

“And I know you guys are going to think I'm crazy, but I'm dead serious," she says on the recording. "This big thing was 75 feet away from me, smelled awful, devoured a whole deer carcass, and then took off and screamed, screeched, and took off across the street.”

“I'm going to tell you right now, I've lived in the woods six years. Swear to God, I've never seen nothing like this. I'm 6'3"; it's bigger than me,” said her 63-year old husband.

The couple claims the creature walked upright as it carried the deer carcass off into the woods.

Police reports indicate dispatchers sent an officer by the location that night, but he found no sign of the couple or the beast.

The callers said they were living in a tent in the woods in northwest San Antonio, near the intersection of Highway 151 and Loop 1604. The area has acres of wooded terrain surrounding it.

Original article can be found here.

Weird Fresno's first podcast

Something I have been wanting to do for a while now is start my own podcast. I have done several over at the Dumbdrum and had fun doing it, so I thought I would give it a try. So I grabbed my best friend Tom (whom I refer to as Lestat, listen to the end of the podcast and you'll hear why) and recorded some audio. Basically we just talked for around 30 minutes about one of our favorite haunts, a bigfoot theory of his, and some plans for Weird Fresno for 2010. I must warn you though, we swear A LOT. This isn't a typical paranormal themed podcast where everyone is way to serious, this is just two guys talking about things paranormal like they would talk about sports. It's just how we are.

Feedback is greatly appreciated, I know the audio isn't the best. All I had to record was my EVP voice recorder and couldn't find my mic so it's a bit echo-ey. That and I know I talk WAY to fast so it may be hard to understand me. Still, please comment and let me know what can be done better (if anything). And if anyone comments "You suck!" I ask where your paranormal podcast is at.

With that warning being said, you can either download the file here or click below to stream it.

Recap of the weird in Fresno for 2009

2009 has been an interesting year here at Weird Fresno. It was hard to determine what the top then weird things were, but after a few shots of Jagermeister I was able to narrow it down.

Number 10 - The Fourth Kind.

I was really looking forward to this movie, alien abductions have always scared the hell out of me and was hoping this movie, with it's Blair Witch feel and reported real footage would scare me. But alas my hopes were dashed almost as soon as the opening credits rolled. Somehow I sat through this mess, but figured I could do better. Hence the my reenactment of the reenactment you see below.



Self promotion? Maybe, but this my blog and I can do whatever in the hell I want. But on a serious note, all the backlash that the studio received, plus the lawsuit Universal had to deal with over should teach other studios that you can't make crappy movies. Of course there is a remake of Karate Kid coming in 2010, so I'm probably wrong. The link to my review on this turd can be found here.

Number 9 - Interstate 5 Mystery Lights solved?



Last year I had reported on some strange lights being scene on Interstate 5 between Kettleman City and Coalinga. But someone sent me an e-mail with some footage they shot on the way back from San Francisco. In it you can clearly see it's an airplane, what I assume to be a crop duster. Still there are these lights which I haven't been able to explain.

Number 8 - Fresno's own Bigfoot hunter.

I was surprised that the Fresno area had it's own Bigfoot hunter, and that it was someone who had years of experience. Dave Raygoza has been searching for Bigfoot for several years and has recently teamed up with the Sanger Paranormal Society. In May of 2009 they were able to capture something on film. Link to the original story here.

Number 7- Large black triangle shaped craft spotted in Fresno

It seems that most UFO reports these days are of black triangles, and Fresno is no stranger to this. I had found a report on the National UFO Reporting Center on an account of someone seeing such a craft over the skies of Fresno one night. It was reported in Jan 09, though seen in late December 08 and the witness reported seeing a large black triangle shaped craft floating through the night sky. About a football field in length, and a red light at each corner the witness the craft made no noise as it traveled south. Link to the original story can be found here.

Number 6 - Strange craft caught on film over Kearney Blvd.



I had just set up my own hot line when I received a call. Someone had taken some photos over Kearney Blvd and when they had the pictures developed, they noticed something strange in the last photograph. Even more interesting is when I mentioned this to a friend, they had seen something similar a few years ago while working in the area. What it is I have no idea. Link to the original story can be found here.

Number 5 - Graveyard Camping. Only in Madera.

Ok so I know I call this blog Weird Fresno, but I live in Madera. It's my hometown, and even though I make fun of it, I love the place. Though it scares me. One day a friend of mine needed to do some filming and wanted to shoot at a creepy cemetery. I mentioned the one on the outskirts of Madera where I had heard little girls. They were interested, so we headed on out.

Upon arriving there we see some guy camped out in the cemetery and as we drove past the person camping there walked out onto the road, dragging his foot like he was either a zombie or Keyzer Soze. Curious we drove back again and he supposedly waved at us. Crazy thing is, I went by there a week ago for something else and the dude is still there. Oh Madera I love you. Link to the original story can be found here.

Number 4 - UFO spotted over Fresno



Now I know what you are saying. "Three UFO posts Mike?" Well my response is "Yes, deal with it." I recieved a lot of good UFO stuff this year and I think this was the best as I have never seen anything like it before. Link to the original story can be found here.

Number 3 Fresno's Adorable Poodle Saloon considered one of the most ghostly spots on Earth.

I had stumbled on a post from a UK site listing some of the most haunted places on Earth, and an old pet grooming business, the Adorable Poodle Saloon, was on that list. Given all the other lists that Fresno usually makes (which I won't repeat here), it was nice to see something different and in a positive note. Link to the original story can be found here.

Number 2 - Zombie protest in Fresno.

I can't say it enough, I freakin love zombies. Love em. Favorite horror movie? Night of the Living Dead. So imagine the glee I felt when I got a strange e-mail saying there was going to be a group of zombies protesting for their rights on Shaw and Blackstone. Arriving there, I found both the pro-rights group, which was zombies and the anti-rights group which were regular rednecks err people. I was able to talk to both sides and get their story.

Ok this was just a publicity stunt for Fright Night Scream Park and their Halloween attraction. Still I've been wanting to organize a zombie crawl for years now and these guys did the best job I've seen so far. So props to them. Link to the original story can be found here.

Number 1 - History Channel's Monster Quest recently filmed episode in Fresno.

To me this was a big one. I was contacted by Jeff Gonzales from the Sanger Paranormal Society about how how Monster Quest had just finished filming him and Dave Raygoza (the previously mentioned Bigfoot hunter) for an upcoming episode in 2010. Jeff and Dave had taken some interesting shots up in the Sierra Nevada's and Monster Quest was interested in their story. Link to the original story can be found here.

History Channel's Monster Quest recently filmed episode in Fresno

A few months ago I had posted on how Fresno had it's own Bigfoot hunter, Dave Raygoza. He and Jeff Gonzales from the Sanger Paranormal Society had recently done a Bigfoot expedition up in the Sierra Nevada mountains back in May 2009 in hopes of finding something. They had set up a few trail cameras, hoping that something would pass in front of the sensor and then set off the camera and capturing whatever it was. Mostly they caught deer and other wildlife typical to the area. Except for one picture.



What you see is directly from the site and has been both enhanced and outlined to show a human sized figured standing by a tree. Once the group saw this photo they decided to investigate the area and see if they could determine if something natural caused this photo or if it was possibly Bigfoot. They ruled out the chance that it was a bear as the slope of the hill was near 45 degrees and it would have been hard for a bear to stand up like that. They took several photos of the site for comparison, you can go here to see them for yourself.

Apparently word got out of this Bigfoot photo as they were on Coast to Coast AM a few weeks ago. Even better is that the History Channel's Monster Quest show (a show that explores sightings of different cryptids throughout the world) was doing a story on another Bigfoot hunter out of Hanford, a Joseph Walls, and wanted to re-enact his Bigfoot sighting when they heard about Dave and Jeff's photo, they decided to interview them as well.

Jeff sent me a few photos from the interview which I am posting below. Also the episode of Monster Quest is to air some time in January 2010. When I find out the actual date I will post an update.

Fresno's own Bigfoot hunter

FRESNO, Calif. - What’s David Raygoza’s idea of a good time? A full tank of gas in his Jeep, fresh batteries for his video camera and a bag of apples for bait.

Bigfoot bait.

Raygoza, 49, is an award-winning principal at Central Unified’s Pershing Continuation High School west of Fresno, Calif. But for 14 years, he’s also had a secret hobby: tracking Bigfoot in Sequoia National Forest in the southern Sierra Nevada.

Raygoza admits his belief in the legendary creature makes him sound crazy.

‘‘It’s one of those things that you don’t talk to people about. I think mainstream America looks at it like UFOs or ghosts,’’ Raygoza said.

Also known as Sasquatch, Bigfoot purportedly is covered in hair and stands 7 feet tall. The creature roams remote forests, with most sightings concentrated in the Pacific Northwest, from north of Eureka, Calif., to British Columbia, said David Byrne, a high-profile Bigfoot hunter.

Raygoza had kept a low profile on his Bigfoot convictions until July, when he led a symposium on the creature in Hanford, Calif. Raygoza has several photographs of large footprints he believes could be from Bigfoot, as well as video he says shows glimpses of the creature. He said he once found an old nest Bigfoot may have used.

Raygoza’s interest in Bigfoot dates back to his senior year at Riverdale High School, when he read a newspaper article about a 17-year-old student in the Bay Area planning a Bigfoot hunting expedition.

‘‘I thought, ‘Wow. What a bold thing to do,’ ’’ Raygoza said.

Then, 14 years ago, while camping with a friend in the Sierra east of Fresno, Raygoza came across 17-inch footprints he could not identify. A science teacher at the time, Raygoza was hooked on tracking Bigfoot.

But he found no further evidence for 10 years: ‘‘I was really beginning to believe there was no such thing.’’

A chance meeting with a man in Coarsegold, Calif., at a gold-panning exhibit four years ago piqued his interest again. The man, an American Indian, said Bigfoot roamed an area near an old sweat lodge in Sequoia National Forest. He told Raygoza: ‘‘If you go there, you’ll find what you are looking for.’’

Raygoza and a friend made a trip to the location and found several sets of tracks Raygoza thinks were from Bigfoot. Over the past four years, he’s videotaped what he believes may be Bigfoot in the forest, although he admits the images are inconclusive.

‘‘Is it definitive? No, of course not,’’ he said.

Raygoza said he once filmed Bigfoot eating an apple he had put out as bait.

Stephanie Martin, a counselor at Pershing High, said she ‘‘didn’t have words’’ when she learned last summer that her boss believed in Bigfoot. She prefers not to discuss it with him; she said his stories sound credible, and she is scared by the idea that Bigfoot may exist.

‘‘I know it sounds kooky and crazy, and (Raygoza’s) obviously not,’’ Martin said.

Terry Cox, president of the Central Unified School District board, had not heard of Raygoza’s Bigfoot tracking but isn’t bothered by it.

She said she and her sons, now grown, have always enjoyed the Bigfoot legend. Her children belonged to Indian Guides when they were young and participated in several Bigfoot hunts.

One of the Indian Guide mothers made a Bigfoot costume that an older guide wore, running through the woods, allowing the younger guides glimpses of ‘‘Bigfoot.’’

One year, they forgot to bring the Bigfoot shoe coverings, so the creature ran around the forest in silver basketball shoes, Cox said.

Raygoza declined to be specific about where he searches in the Sequoia National Forest, saying that he’s worked hard tracking the creature and wants to be the one to come up with indisputable evidence that Bigfoot is real.

He has plenty of company hunting Bigfoot.

Byrne, the Bigfoot expert, has led three expeditions since the 1960s, outfitted with helicopters and infrared sensors. The work of Byrne and two other Bigfoot aficionados is part of a yearlong exhibit that opened last week at the State Capital Museum in Olympia, Wash., examining Sasquatch as a cultural phenomenon in the Northwest.

Several Web sites are devoted to the legend. The Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization lists hundreds of sightings, separating them into Class A or Class B reports. The organization says that Class B reports are not considered less credible or less important, but they have more potential to be something other than Bigfoot, such as bear sightings or practical jokes.

Byrne, though a believer, says that ‘‘90 percent of what we think we know is pure speculation. There’s no experts. We’re all students.’’

There are too many eyewitnesses to discount Bigfoot’s existence, Byrne said: ‘‘These are really good, down-to-earth people with no reason to fabricate a story.

‘‘I think there could be something out there.’’

But Denise Alonzo, a spokeswoman for Sequoia National Forest, is more skeptical. She’s worked in the area for 20 years, and ‘‘I’ve never heard or seen anything about a Bigfoot in the forest.’’

Stephen Lewis, chairman of the earth and environmental sciences department at California State University-Fresno, said that if the creature existed, trackers would have found ‘‘Bigfoot poop’’ and other forensic evidence.

His department offers a critical thinking course, ‘‘Facts, Fads and Fallacies in the Natural Sciences,’’ which explores the pursuit of mythical creatures such as Bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster.

‘‘My speculation is that people have a need to believe in magic and mystery, unexplained phenomenon,’’ Lewis said. ‘‘People enjoy the idea that there’s something out there that is mysterious and not yet discovered. They get captivated by all this stuff.’’

Raygoza is not bothered by the skepticism.

He said he’s enjoyed not only the pursuit of Bigfoot, but the beautiful wilderness he’s explored.

‘‘I’m going to continue looking until I get that shot that is definitive, where people won’t say, ‘That’s a bear,’ or until I can’t walk those hills,’’ Raygoza said.

Original article can be found here.

Bigfoot caught on camera?

In Jefferson County, Kentucky a man was having problems with his garden as there was something disturbing the crops he had planted. Not sure if it was some sort of wildlife or perhaps a vandal he set up a field camera to take pictures. For those who don't know, a field camera is a camera with an infrared sensor on it. When an object moves in front of the sensor, it's tripped and the camera takes a picture of the object. Hunters mainly use these on trails to see what game is there.



After a few days the owner checked to see what the camera caught, hoping to find the culprits. On it were animals typical for the area, birds, raccoons, etc. But one large black object caught his attention. The object was about 55 yards from the camera and was estimated to be at least 8 feet tall given the height of the brush in the area. The owner theorizes it was Bigfoot as bears are not known to be in that area. But whatever the object was, it hasn't been seen since.

Bigfoot sigtings in Fresno County

My friend Tom (whom I'm hoping will be doing an upcoming podcast with me) showed me a website, the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization, that had a listing of sightings by State, and then a sub listing by County. Under Fresno County there were several sightings up at Florence Lake, which is above Hunnington. What's interesting about the sightings is they occur only in the late summer and early fall. Tom has a theory that perhaps Bigfoot is a migratory animal and that is why sighting of them are rare. They are always on the move. We've been talking about taking an expedition up to Florence at the start of summer and set up some cameras that are set off by an IR sensor (these are the type that hunters use to photograph game on trails) and come back in six weeks to see if we captured anything. When we do I'll definitely post what we find, if anything, on here.

Here's the link to BFRO's lisings for Fresno County.