Strange flying creature seen near Delano

Searching one of my favorite sites for weird and strange tales I ran across a creature sighting near the small town of Delano.

The creature is described as having a bat like body with a head similar to that of a crow and covered completely in feathers. Witnesses estimated it to be about three feet tall and about the size of a large dog (between 40 and 60 pounds). It's been seen mostly near Avenue 8 between Delano and Richgrove for the past seven months or so.

Locals also think that it may be eating stray dogs as many mutilated carcasses have been found in the area with feathers similar to that seen on the creature found next to it.

As to what this creature could be, I don't know. I wish there was a description of the wing span, not the height of the creature, as that could help explain things more. My first thought is it's just nothing more than a vulture, but the description is a bit different. That and I don't think a vulture would leave feathers as it's head and neck are featherless to begin with.

So this had me thinking about a story I wrote about sometime ago of another large flying creature spotted in the Central Valley, this time in Fresno. This sighting was of a large bird like creature with a 12 foot wing span seen flying over Fresno. Could this creature and the one seen in Delano be somehow related?

To be honest I think the creature is just a misidentification of a regular bird (perhaps a hawk) and not some strange dog eating creature roaming the country side. As for the feathers found by the dogs, could be any type of bird. Crows are scavengers and the feathers could be from them.

Or I could be completely wrong and there is some unknown creature flying around the country side in the southern part of the San Joaquin Valley. I'll keep my eyes and ears open for anything else regarding these sightings.

Chupacabra forces prom in Mendota to be canceled

Did this friendly lil guy cause the prom in Mendota to be canceled?

Photo courtesy of sapherequeen from fanpop.com

First off let me apologize for the lack of recent context. I've been in the process of moving and didn't have time for much else. Now that I'm settled in I can focus again on providing content for Weird Fresno. Today I thought I would do that by revisiting an early story that I had done.

According to a website called the Chupacabra Tracker, on May 10 (the year is never told) in the small farming town of Mendota a rooster is said to have died of "mysterious" circumstances. Soon after that the Fresno County Department of Agriculture started to receive reports of Chupacabra sightings in the area. This apparently alarmed the local parents so much that they had the prom canceled out of fear their children might become victims to the legendary goat sucker.

How legitimate this story is, I have no idea. When I first came across it I contacted both Mendota High School and the Fresno County Ag Commissioner (there is no county Dept. of Ag, only state) but never received a reply from either party. Still I love this story. Something had to have happened to freak out the local parents to have them go as far to cancel the local prom. I just really hope it wasn't a dog with a case of mange.

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.

Large bird like creature seen in Fresno skies

Kwakwaka'wakw totem pole depicting

a Thunderbird perched on the top.

Image courtesy of Wikipedia.

Last week while attending the monthly Fresno Filmmakers Alliance mixer, a friend of mine approached me and asked me if I knew of any thunderbird sightings in the Fresno area as his wife and young son had recently spotted a large bird like creature with a wing span estimated to be over 12 feet in width.

For those who don't know what a thunderbird is term used in the cryptozoological world to describe large bird like creatures that are associated with the Thunderbird of Native American mythology. Most thunderbirds sightings are of the feathered type, although some sightings have reported the creatures to have lizard like features similar to a pterosaur.

Modern thunderbird sightings go back over 100 years with one of the first stories reportedly occurring in April 1890 in Arizona where two cowboys killed a giant birdlike creature with a huge wingspan. It was described as having smooth skin, featherless wings similar to that of a bat and a face that looked like an alligator. They are said to have taken the carcass back to town where they pinned it on the outside of barn with it's wings outstretched the entire length.

Sightings continued into the 20th Century when in the 1940's several sightings occurred in Illinois where witnesses at first thought they were seeing a plane flying overhead until they saw the "plane" flapping it's wings. A few weeks later in another part of the state a man and his son saw a large bird creature flying at a height estimated to be around 500 feet and the shadow it cast was the size of a small passenger airplane.

One of the more stranger occurrences, and one I wanted to share, happened on July 25, 1977 in Lawndale, Illinois. A group of boys were playing in their back yard when two large birds approached and chased the boys. Two escaped unharmed, but the third boy, 10 year old Marlon Lowe, did not. One of the birds clamped it's talons around his shoulders and lifted the now terrified boy about two feet off the ground and carried him some distance before Low was able to fight off the bird, getting it to release him.

Most viewed this as some sort of tall tale made up by the boys, but given the description of the birds one has to wonder. The description matched that of an Andean condor; a large back bird with a white ringed neck and a wingspan of 10 feet. There's a problem though, the condor's talons are said to not be strong enough to lift that of a heavy object (i.e. a 10 year old boy). So what then did the boys see?

So this leads me back to the Fresno sighting. What exactly did the two see? Was it just a normal bird (say a hawk or crane) mistaken for something else? Someone mentioned a Californian Condor, but that is highly unlikely as the habitat for this species is in Southern California. Could a large bird like creature, one that was the inspiration for the Native American Thunderbird myth, be in the Fresno area skies? If there have been more sightings, hopefully those witnesses will hear of this article and share their stories.

California werewolf documentary claims to have werewolf footage shot near Fresno

Over the weekend I received an e-mail from a group who had recently filmed a documentary on werewolves in California. They thought I might be interested as there is some footage shot near Fresno of an alleged werewolf sighting. In 2004 Michael Lakoma was camping and was shooting some video on his cellphone when he saw a black creature in the distance bounding toward him. In the video he says it looks like a wolf jumping but on two feet. I have to be honest, it's hard to determine what the object was given the distance and quality of the video.

Later on in the documentary shows video shot in Tehachapi, Bakersfield. What I find interesting is that all three occurrences took place in 2004. And as an associate of mine put it, why wait seven years to bring this to the masses? Why not alert the media that you found something?

I'm going to leave my opinion out of this for right now. But I have asked the creator of this documentary to put me in contact with the experts they had in it as I have a few questions of my own that I would like to ask. Though I'm curious as to what others think of this video and would encourage to leave your thoughts below as well as on their YouTube page.

California's own Loch Ness Monster

Lake Tahoe, home of Tahoe Tessie

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.

Situated on the California/Nevada border lies Lake Tahoe. At an elevation of 6,225 ft and over 1600 feet deep, it is a major tourist attraction throughout the entire year. What most visitors to the lake don't know is that there are stories of a large serpentine creature estimated to be at least 60 feet in length and "as wide as a barrel". Residents of the area have named the creature Tahoe Tessie (a play off of Nessie from the Loch Ness in Scotland).

Stories of the creature date back to the mid-19th century where members of the Washoe and Paiute tribes claimed that a large creature resided in an underwater tunnel beneath Cave Rock and sightings have continued to this day. Most are from somewhat of a distance where people see a large serpentine body moving in the water. One interesting sighting occured in the winter of 1979 where four witnesses saw a large snake like creature feeding off a school of trout. They estimated it to be between 30 and 60 feet in length and as thick as a telephone pole. It didn't swim like a snake would (side to side), but was diving up and splashing down with it's head into the school of fish. Speechless, they watched the creature for several minutes before it finally disappeared.

Another interesting story is that sometime in the 1970's, famed French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau explored the depths of Lake Tahoe. Whatever he encounted down there must have spooked him as he claimed the world was not ready for what was at the bottom of the lake. Subsequently he refused to release any of his underwater footage or any data he collected. I feel it's worth saying that Lake Tahoe was known to be a dumping ground for bodies by the mob during the 1950's. Given the depth of the lake and the near constant temperature of 39 degrees, it's most likely Cousteau found a large watery graveyard were the bodies were preserved by the near freezing water.

So what lurks just underneath the waters of Laka Tahoe? Theories include a Plesiosaur, Icthyosaur or a Mosasaur, due to fossils of the creatures being found in the surrounding area. But Tessie experts quickly dismissed this as the lake was formed in the last Ice Age, long after the creatures went extinct. Other theories claim that it could be anything from a population of sturgeon to some sort of undiscovered fresh water eel. Whatever it may be, there's something there as witnesses have seen it for over a century now.

High Times goes searching for Bigfoot

Reports of sightings of Bigfoot in pot country are on the rise.

I have to be honest. When I first came across this article I thought it was a joke. Combining the topics of marijuana and Bigfoot just reeks of satire. But to my surprise, the article was quite serious. The author of the article goes into detail about the history of the creature and also the history of his two guides and what got them into searching for the legendary creature.

Its way too long of an article to post here, but giving a brief synopsis the group is up in the Cascade Mountains in an area known for pot growing, looking for Bigfoot. While camping the only incident that was noteworthy was of a foul stench that was detected near their camp. After investigating the surrounding area and finding several half eaten fish quite a distance from the river, the group gives up. They speculate that the stench was a Bigfoot and that the fish were carried to higher ground by the creature as well.

Like I said, I had my doubts when reading this (long) article. I figured it would have just been a bunch of pot heads hot boxing a tent and then go search for Bigfoot. Seems that I was wrong (for once). Though I wonder if the stench they detected was Bigfoot getting into the author’s stash?

Full source: High Times

Author: Chris Simunek

Piranha fished out of the San Joaquin River back in 1987

The stretch of the San Joaquin River in Fresno County where a

piranha was caught in 1987.

On July 4, 1987, a lone piranha was caught in the San Joaquin River in the western part of Fresno County. It was fished out of the San Joaquin River north of the city of Kerman along a stretch of river near the intersection of Madera Avenue (Hwy. 145) and Modoc Avenue (this is according to the LA Times, but is incorrect as both Modoc Ave and Hwy. 145 run north/south and therefore are parallel).

The fish was about 15 inches in length and weighed roughly two pounds. A biologist with the Department of Fish and Game confirmed that the fish had been in the river for some time as its growth pattern and scales confirmed it came from the San Joaquin.

More representatives from Fish and Game were dispatched to determine if there were any more of the fish, which is illegal to own in California, as there was a rumor that another fisherman had caught another piranha downstream, but nothing was ever found.

The question remains, even twenty three years later. Where did the piranha come from? Most likely a person somehow obtained the piranha, probably for a fish tank, and when the fish started eating the other fish the owner decided that it would be smart to dump it in the San Joaquin instead of disposing of the fish. Who knows how long the fish was in the river before the fisherman caught it.

Full source: Los Angeles Times

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.

How to report a ghost or monster sighting

I've talked a lot on here about local haunted places and areas that strange monsters have been spotted, but I've never really talked much about what to do if you see something strange (cause I know I'd be dumbfounded if I came across a Chupacabra that wasn't a coyote with mange).

But how does one go about reporting what they saw in a way that the skeptics would have a hard time to debunk? While searching my usual sites for a story I came across this list. While I don't agree with it 100 percent (I think taking a picture with of a ghost with a cellphone camera is pointless), most on here are pretty good. I really wish I had come up with this list, but wanted to share it nonetheless.

These steps should be taken as soon after the experience as possible, while it is all fresh in your mind.

1) Get hard evidence. If at all possible and you have a camera handy, try to get photographs. Even if it's with a cell phone camera, a low-resolution photo is better than none at all. If you can get an image, it will increase the credibility of your story manyfold. If you have a voice recorder, record what you see as it is happening.

2) Physical evidence. If it's a creature, see if you can get photos of footprints or other physical evidence it might have left. Collect hair or stool samples, if possible.

3) Time and place. Write down the exact time and place where you saw the phenomenon. In as much detail as you can, note everything you saw, every action. If you didn't have a camera, make drawings.

4) More details. Make note of its size, shape, color, gender. How far away from you was it? (Measure if you can.) How did it move? Did it speak or make noise? Did it see you and react to you? What did it do?

5) Sensory details. Was there a distinct odor or fragrance? How did it make you feel? Did it affect you physically in any way?

6) Other witnesses. If there were other people with you who witnessed the event, record their names, ages, addresses and occupations.

7) Location. Note the exact geographic location of the sighting. This is especially important if you're out in the wilderness. Otherwise, record the building name, room number, street, city and country.

8) Environment. Note the time of day, lighting, weather conditions - even if you're indoors. Was it sunny, brightly lit, dim lighting, overcast, dark, moon-lit, raining?

9) Sky position. If it was a flying creature, where in the sky was it: north, south east or west? How fast was it moving? Estimate its size in relation to something else in the environment.

10) History. Does the location have a history of ghost sightings, haunting activity or previous sightings of weird creatures?

11) Your story. From your notes, write a narrative of your experience, just as it happened. Tell it like a story, but do not exaggerate, make assumptions or add elements to make the story more interesting. Stick to the facts.

12) Other stories. If there were other witnesses to the event, have them write their own stories. Do not consult with each other during this writing; you want each story from each person's perspective.

13) Make a formal report. Report all this information you have documented to a respected paranormal research group. (Do not give them your original materials; give them copies.) You can also provide the information to an established paranormal website, like this one.

There's also several links at the bottom of the page for further reading. Some are a bit silly, but ones like the link to the Centre for Fortean Zoology are rather usefull.

Full source: paranormal.about.com

Written by Stephen Wagner

Gargoyle-like creature seen in Puerto Rico

Image courtesy of Tim Parkinson from Flickr.

There was a recent report coming out of Puerto Rico that a strange creature resembling a "gargoyle" has attacked several animals over the weeks and even one person fell victim to it's attacks.

Witnesses descriptions of the creature describe it as a short bipedal winged creature and emits a "sulferic or rotten odor". What's intersting is how similiar the description is to the original Chupacabra sightings in Puerto Rico, the only difference is that this creature has wings. Apparently this creature has been seen for several years in the Guánica area of Puerto Rico, but in Lajas and San Germán as well.

Another difference between this creature and the Chupacabra is it's choice of prey. The Chupacabra was known for going after livestock, but this gargolye creature has apparently decided to add humans to it's choice of meals. A man in the 1990's claims that he was attacked by a larged winged creature in his backyard. There were injuries to the man's back and stomach, as if something with claws attacked him.

Others have seen this creature over the years. One was a police officer who didn't see the creature, but heard the beating of powerful wings and knew it couldn't be a typical bird. Other witnesses aren't so forthcoming. They are afraid of going to the local police telling of what the saw in fear of either being scorned or being labeled as mentally disturbed.

Could this creature just be another sighting of the Chupacabra? Even though this one has been described as having wings, everything else is similiar to the blood sucker (except for the attack on the person as there haven't been any known accounts of a Chupacabra doing this). Whatever the case may be, I can at least say for certain that this is definitely not an animal with mange.

Full source: Inexplicata

Strange reptilian bird found in Mexico

Given that this video is entirely in Spanish and my understanding of the Spanish

language is lacking to say the least, I have no idea what the hell is really going on in this video. All I know is that some strange reptilian-like bird was found in Mexico and it looks mean. Surely this has to be some known species of bird, but I've never seen one with a mouth/beak like that. Can birds get mange like dogs? Maybe it's a flying Chupacabra sighting? Still, it's weird whatever in the hell it is.

Sea monster spotted off the coast of Great Britain

Is this photo evidence of some sort of sea monster

that was seen off the British coast?

There have been reports of some sort of "sea monster" being spotted off the coast of Saltern Cove, Paignton in Great Britain. It was first seen hunting a school of fish about thirty yards off the coast. Witnesses at first thought it was a turtle, but that opinion quickly changed when the creature revealed a long neck with a reptile like head that looked nothing like that of a turtle. Apparently the school of fish were so terrified by the creature that they beached themselves onto the shore.

Some think the sighting could be linked to that of a sperm spotted off nearby Devon recently, but one authority dismissed that claim saying that sperm whales don't come that close to inshore and the reptilian like head is different that that of a whale's. The theory of it being a turtle has also been dismissed as it is said that the tutles in the waters off the British coast only eat jelly fish.

So what was seen off the British coast? A spokesman from the Marine Conservation Society said "It was reported as a turtle as it had large front flippers and small back flippers and what appeared to be a shell but was also said to have a small head on a thin neck about two-feet long which craned above the surface like a Plesiosaur." This statement has me questioning their validty. How would the person know what a Plesiosaur's neck would look like above the surface as it swam? The creature has been extinct for millions of years. And the photos don't help at all (for once can someone take a non blurry photo of a UFO/monster/ghost?).

Personally I think it was a type of whale that was feeding on the school of fish. The fact that they beached themselves doesn't mean they were terrified of some sea creature. It means they were trying to get away from whatever was trying to eat them. People just assumed they were terrified because they thought they saw a sea monster and it would add validity to the claim. Unless clearer photos are shown showing the creature, I'm going to have to say this isn't a sea monster like people are saying.

Full source: Daily Mail

Was the Chupacabra seen in a Bakersfield park?

There have been reports of Chupacabra sightings in Kern County for the last month or so. In July, one witness saw the creature in Hart Park. They pulled their car over and watched it walk around before it stopped to look at them. She was able to take a photograph of the beast which shows the typical hairless creatures that have been all over the news lately.

The Bakersfield CBS affliate, KGET 17, showed the pictures to the head of county parks. His opinion of it was that it was a coyote with mange. I'd have to agree with that statement, the photo looks like the typical canine with mange case that is usually the explanation for these sightings. Though the witness stands by her claim that what she saw as indeed the chupacabra.

Full source: CBS KGET

Chupacabra seen in Oklahoma?

A group of teenagers in Tecumseh, OK say they spotted the mythical Chupacbra behind the local high school. They described it as having long back legs and it's front legs were smaller and looked similar to a kangaroo's. The creature was also hairless and had a long tail. The group was able to snap a photo of the creature with a cellphone camera. Unfortunately the picture was a bit blurry and it's hard to make out any details.

The news story goes on to mention some of the other recent sightings and how that the likely explantion for those was some sort of animal with mange and that is this the case here. Still, this is the first sighting that I have heard of in Oklahoma.

The teens stated they have seen the creature several more times and their goal is to now capture it.

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.

More Chupacabra sightings in Texas

It seems once again that Texas is the hot spot for supposed Chupacabra sightings.

An animal control office in Hood County, Texas shot and killed a creature that was hairless and didn't look like anything he had ever seen before. But that wasn't the only creature that was seen. Another creature with similiar characteristics was spotted and killed several miles away.

The animal control officer was quick not to say whether he killed the legendary goat sucker or not. The animal was sent away for DNA tests (most likely at tax payers expense) before he makes a decesion. He did say he knew whatever it was it wasn't normal. Another officer stated that it was nothing like she had ever seen before.

To me that the creature shown in the video is either a coyote or dog suffering from mange, which would explain the lack of hair. As for the emanicapted look, that can be explained by both the mange and the fact the creature was problably starving (which would explain why one was in the barn, most likely it was searching for food).

I found it a bit humorous that the reporter was looking for a "pack of Chupacabras" at the end of the video and the rancher said if he was a Chupacabra, that a certain clump of trees is where he would live. Part of me was hoping something would have jumped out when he investigated the clump of trees, but alas nothing happaned. Hopefully when the DNA tests comeback showing that this was nothing more than an animal with mange people will realize that these aren't Chupacabras. But that has happened before and nothing has changed. Meanwhile the real Chupacabra is in Puerto Rico laughing at all the imposters in Texas and the rest of the Southwest.

Thanks to Brodiemash over at the DumbDrum for sending me the video.

The legend of the Dover Demon

This cryptid that I am going to talk about has nothing to do with Fresno, or even California in general, but is one of my favorite legends. It was seen in Dover, Massachusetts over the course of two days in 1977 and even after three decades it still is one of the strangest things to ever occur in the realm of the paranormal.

The first sighting occured on April 21, 1977 at night by a group of teenagers who were driving through a wooded area when their car's headlights illuminated the creature. The driver, Bill Bartlett, thought at first it was perhaps a cat or dog, but as he got closer he realized it wasn't either of those. Instead he described it as a bizarre, unearthly creature crawling along a stone wall that ran adjacent to the road.

Bartlett continued to observe the creature and described it as having a disproportionately large, watermelon-shaped head with glowing orange eyes. It had long, thin arms and legs with slender fingers, which it used to grasp onto the wall. The creature had no hair and the skin appeared to have a rough texture and was flesh-toned. The creature had no discernable mouth, nose, or ears.

Two hours later and about a mile away from the first sighting the creature was seen again, this time by John Baxter as he was walking home from his girlfriend's house. He saw the creature moving toward him, but when it spotted him it fled into the woods adjacent to the road. Baxter, thinking it was a neighborhood child, pursued the creature through the woods, across a shallow brook, and through a field. Soon though Baxter lost sight of the creature and decided to stop and rest for a minute.

As he was resting, Baxter finally got a clear view of the creature which was leaning against a tree. His description was similiar to what Bartlett described, down to the glowing eyes. During the following media circus, Baxter insisted that he made his report without knowing that Bartlett had seen the same creature a few hours earlier.

This wasn't the last time the creature was seen. The following day a Abby Brabham and Will Traintor saw a similar looking creature on the side of the road from Traintor's car. Brabham described it as a hairless primate with a bulbous head. She also said the creature had bright green eyes, different than what both Bartlett and Baxter described. This description has some skeptics claiming a hoax as the descriptions differ.

All of the eyewittnesses were asked seperately to sketch the creature they had encounter. Amazingly, the results were remarkably similiar. The only difference being the difference in eye color.

The creature as Bill Bartlett describes it.

John Baxter's version of the creature.

No one really knows what the Dover Demon was or what happened to it. Some ufologist think the creature was somesort of alien. Others speculate that it was a being from another dimension. All of these are speculations of course, but famed Loren Coleman (who coined the term Dover Demon) said "this is one of those situations where I'm most definitely secure in saying I don't know what this is" and "It's almost as if the Dover Demon popped in to our reality and popped out."

Skeptics weren't without their own theories. One wrote that the description of the creature's head matched that of a newborn moose. This is unlikely as one of the sightings of the creature specifically stated that the creature had visible fingers, whereas a moose has hooves. Other skeptics mention that all the witnesses were high school teenagers and claim that it was some sort of hoax. In a recent interview Bill Bartlett stuck by his story, thirty years later. He said he didn't know what he saw, but he saw something.

Evidence was never found of the Dover Demon, but the story persists to this day.

Sources:

Wikipedia - Dover Demon

American Monsters - The Dover Demon

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.