Update: Erickson Project News: Bigfoot DNA Project Using Two Dead Bigfoot Bodies for Samples
Posted by: Craig Woolheater on June 28th, 2011
This topic is also under discussion at Bigfoot Forums.
Derek Randles, founder of the Olympic Project, offers clarifying information regarding this explosive issue.
OK, it’s time to put a few things to rest. I just spoke to the “bear hunter”, who is also my friend. He is beside himself because of all the BS being spread. He’s asked me to clarify a few things here on this forum. First of all, he is not a poacher. I repeat, not a poacher. Second, it was bear season and he was hunting in a legal area with a bear tag. Please don’t ask me these things again. That’s the truth. Third, he has not killed 1000 bears. He’s killed 3 in his lifetime. Yes 3, not 1000. It’s also very important to note, he never gave Sasquatch a second thought. He was a complete skeptic. Because of his unfamiliarity with the Bigfoot subject he had no idea of what he was looking at through his riffle site. He assumed that it was a very strange looking bear that was standing on it’s hind legs. In his mind that’s all it could have been, a bear. When the bullet hit its mark, it started to become apparent that it wasn’t a bear. It did not drop right there, it ran off. They thought they heard it crash in the brush but did not see it go down. Things started getting very weird at this point. Two smaller creatures appeared from the brush, sometimes on two feet, and sometimes on all fours. In his description they looked like a cross between an ape and a bear. They got very close to him and at one point one positioned itself above him on a outcrop. He shot it out of fear of being attacked. Probably the same thing I would have done in the given circumstance. When I’m in the wilderness I always pack a gun to protect my self from wild, sometimes unpredictable animals. There are a few times I thanked God I had it. This was starting to feel like a nightmare to him and he quickly left trying to wrap his mind around what had just happened.
It’s very important to note that he doesn’t feel good about this incident. As a matter of fact he felt terrible. This was a case of miss-identification plane and simple.
At a later date a search was carried out at the site and a piece of flesh was recovered. NOT A BODY, only a small piece of flesh witch was later cut in two pieces, hence the cut line. I’ll say it one more time, no body’s were found or recovered.
It’s very unfortunate that this happened, but hopefully some good will come out of it. I’m probably going to have a whole bunch of people mad at me for talking about this, but my first obligation is to the bear hunter. He’s my friend and I gave him my word that I’m there for him. He wanted me to convey this message, so take it or leave it, it’s the truth.DR
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films:
OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.
That sounds a lot more plausible of a story. Every part of that story passes the logical “what would you do at that point” test.
Sounds like another bigfoot in a cooler. Show us the DNA tests. Show us the sample.
Until then, cut the BS stories.
I have to say, I hope this isn’t true, because if true, it’s a terrible tragedy and I’d hate to to think what the young bigfoot is going through. Regardless of whether it’s true or not, however, it hammers home the point that every bigfoot researcher and “believer” or concerned person needs to get laws passed protecting bigfoot. I’m not interested in punishing, per se, some poor hunter who panics and shoots an 8′ tall primate in “self-defense”, but it would send the message to hunters everywhere to “BE CAREFUL”. I’d hate to think we’re on the brink of “finding bigfoot” and “exterminating bigfoot” at the same time, due to logging, hunting, and just plain stupidity, including in which is “outing” bigfoot, or “proving his existence” without any kind of realistic plan to PROTECT BIGFOOT.
Personally, I’m willing to let it be a mystery… with the understanding that all of the encounters, over hundreds of years, more than demonstrates we have family living in the woods of North America… then, leave it at that. The more we expose bigfoot, the more at risk he may be, unless we put bigfoot’s interests first and not our own “scientific” must-have-proof mentality.
What can we do collectively to PROTECT BIGFOOT? And what is already being done??
Looks fishy to me. He should have taken out a body.
DNA might prove some things, but science wants a body. The testing needs to have repeatable data, and a body would have provided that and a proper scientific description.
Well, we’ll see how true it is when the Data comes out and if anyone else un related to the project can repeat the test results.
Hang on a sec.
In the original Lindsey blog entry, the “Bear Hunter” with “1,000 kills” was relating a story about the “poacher” who allegedly shot the two hominids.
Now, this “clarifying” post not only refutes the existence of any bodies, but also merges the two hunters into one person. The “Bear Hunter” doesn’t have 1,000 kilss, wasn’t poaching (it WAS bear season), but WAS the one who shot the hominids.
Amazing…
No explanation how that ‘BS’ got spread, despite the fact that it was supposedly an interview. If I’d been misquoted in an interview, I’d damn well say that, and find out how the interviewer got it so wrong. Instead, we get an edit to the story that’s just a wee bit extreme. Bodies down to flesh pieces, 1000 bears down to 3…sorry, doesn’t pass the sniff test.
“Show us the DNA test”??? What exactly do you expect a DNA test to tell you? People expect far too much from DNA. Sometimes I think you’ve been watching too much science fiction. You can’t take DNA, run it through a sequencer and get a photograph of an animal.
You test it by looking for distinct genetic markers (called single nucleotide polymorphisms or SNP) of *known animals* and you get a hit, a miss, or an error.
You have to *know* what to look for because known samples have been studied. You cut out the distinguishing gene you want to test. If the SNP is there, an enzyme will cut the gene and that will show up on a PCR gel.
That’s *it*. That’s how it works. You can’t run it through a computer program and get a little video of what the DNA makes. This isn’t Star Trek. It’s not even CSI. TV lies. This is the real world.
Yes, if you had DNA you could study it and probably learn a lot, but it takes *years* — decades — of expensive, concerted effort to complete an entire genome. Until there is definitive proof and a consensus among the scientific community, there will be no funding or access to personnel, expertise or equipment to complete such a project.
It should be noted that we have complete genomes of humans, chimpanzees and even Neanderthals. If Sasquatch is proven to be a real animal, it would be of tremendous value to science and I am certain every effort would be made to sequence a complete genome.
Just thinking about it inspires me. It reminds me of why it is so important to keep looking. If we find Bigfoot, what we can learn from it is just staggering.
Hm, the truth I smell is that Derek is trying to cover for his scum friend – someone who poaches and has killed 1,000 bears. Apparently neither enjoyed the anger that this has caused and now Derek is trying to put the boom back in the bottle.
Not saying that I believe this to be the real deal, but, this is always the way I thought the first definitive proof of Bigfoot would be obtained.
Something doesnt add up here. In the original post, Robert Lindsay is speaking to this “Doyen of North American” whatever, who hence forth is known as the “bear hunter.” “Bear hunter” is not the man who shot and killed the bigfoot. Bear hunter says that he was in contact with another hunter from a taxidermy messageboard and that this messageboard hunter was the bigfoot killer/ poacher. So now Derek Randles seems to think that they are one and the same?
Yeah, a small piece of flesh could easily be from human remains so how the heck will they even be able to verify his story even if it is true if it comes up human or even unknown due to degraded condition? This is another worthless but fanciful tale only in that it could have happened but more than like did not.
Also, one more thing… Not sure if this is supposed to be a secret, but I did some sleuthing and a few quick google searches reveal all.
The only person who has recently been called the “doyen of North American…” is a man named Ken Walker. In a 2005 Telegraph article entitled, ‘Stuffing bunnies? It’s an art form,’ Walker was called “the doyen of North American taxidermy.”
He is or was employed by the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History as part of their taxidermy team.
I have citiations for this info if needed. So much for hidden identities.
@ mandors
I agree 100%
Is anyone else as confused as I am or did I miss something? Is the “bear hunter” that Derek is talking about in this post different from Bear Hunter (BH) in the original post (the interviewee)? Who killed 1000 bears (the interviewee “BH” in the original post clearly said he has killed 1000 bears – unless it was a typo) and who killed 3? Maybe we need a flow chart and some new aliases so we can keep everything straight! 😉
As they would say on “Finding Bigfoot”, the hunter got a “Squatch Swatch”! 😉
This is the type of reason the mainstream does not take Sasquatch seriously. For the love of god, get your story straight before you release it, especially if you claim somebody has a body.
People interested in this stuff have had their hopes built up countless times, only for that hope to rain down all around them. I’m still incredibly excited for the Erickson Project, but if it wasn’t for the involvement of respected people such as Professor Meldrum, I would have already given up on it.
Hey guys! I’ve been lurking for a long time both here and at the Bigfoot Forum, but I decided to jump in here. First of all, I’m quite cautiously optimistic at the prospect of what the Erickson Project might provide us, and trying not to get too excited. This all sounds pretty unbelievable when you take a step back and realize that we are talking about Sasquatches perhaps being shot, killed, flesh possibly taken for DNA, bodies parts that may or may not be in some guy’s freezer, etc. Did this stuff really happen? Is this really real? Pretty crazy stuff…
Anyways, the reason I decided to sign up so I can reply here was to hopefully clarify how this story has changed so much. Here’s the way I understand it:
The original (quite outlandish) story is a result of a guy (who claims to have killed 1,000 bears because he loves them) relating a story about another guy to the interviewer who posted the interview. The guy who was being interviewed knows nothing about the story except what he pieced together from some guy talking about this on a taxidermy forum. The guy being interviewed was the guy who claims to have killed 1,000 bears, but is not the guy who supposedly killed the two sasquatches.
Apparently, Derek Randles happens to know the guy who was involved in the shooting, and got the story directly from the horse’s mouth. This man is not nearly as legendary as the guy who was originally interviewed, as he has only killed 3 bears. His bear-to-sasquatch kill ratio currently sits at 3:2. The new updated (and quite different) story is a result of Derek relating the story as it “really” happened, according to his friend who is the actual shooter.
So there are four people involved here, two groups of two: The original interviewer and the guy he interviewed who seemingly wanted to run his mouth about something he heard about second- or third-hand from an internet forum, which in this context it is easy to see how the story might have been completely butchered. This is the original story that was posted. Then there is Derek Randles and the actual guy who did the actual shooting, who only felt compelled to correct the story because of how outrageous it became.
Hope this clears things up. If you can get past the fact that we are talking about the killing of something that supposedly is not even known to exist, the updated version seems to be much more reasonable than the original story. The original is just some redneck who likes to embellish things, as evidence by his claim to have killed 1,000 bears; apparently he has averaged 10 per year for the last 100 years.
Everyone calm down. The original interview was with someone who had heard the story, not with the actual person who shot or allegedly shot the Bigfoot. Two different people. Derek is trying to clear up what happened as he knows the actual person involved in the shooting incident. On Bigfoot forums Lindsay has acknowledged the clarifications. Read the thread, it’s pretty interesting. Bottom line, there seems to be some serious tissue testing going on and I for one am excited we are getting closer to solving this mystery! Craig, Loren, what are your thoughts?
Another to keep in mind, RL did not record his interview with BH. He took notes during a 2.5 hour phone call. He then reconstructed the interview to create the transcript. I have to think the 1,000 bear comment got lost in the translation. It may have just been a purposely exaggerated number in order to emphasize his expertise. “I’ve killed thousands of bears. I know what I’m talking about.” Much like I would say, “I’ve seen Planet of the Apes thousands of times. I know everything about it.” Just a guess. BTW – I mean the original Planet of the Apes not the remake. 🙂
A Google search of “the doyen of North American” led to an article in The Telegraph, where a Ken Walker is named the doyen of North American taxidermy. If you then Google that name plus bear hunting multiple articles come up, including one naming him as a “Smithsonian taxidermist.” (BTW- this is confirmed by a search of the name, plus Smithsonian)
These facts seem to match up with clues dropped in the two articles, so I’m curious if anyone has any other knowledge or first-hand information on Mr. Walker, in the off-chance that he is the mystery “Bear Hunter.” If, in fact, he is, does it make the story more or less believable?
Cernovog,
While I agree that testing a DNA isn’t as simple as CSI makes it out to be, it still doesn’t take 6+ months to test a sample to see if its human or not. Nor does it take 6+ months to decide if it’s not human and then check the database of primates and hominids to see if it matches.
Something smells here, and it’s not Denmark and it’s not fish.
Ok enough Bigfoot stories. I want me some lake monster stories. Specifically all things Caddy! It’s summer someone must have seen something in some lake!
@ dm
Fabulous sleuthing, thank you for that name it will make things easier to verify.
@cernovog
I do realize that DNA sequencing is NOT a replicator on Star Trek, but it is a good starting point. It will at least narrow down the family we are looking for. I think we all agree it is mammalian, but is it bear, primate, human? We do have hundreds if not thousands of genomes on record for each of these. Even if the DNA is not an exact match to anything on record (and that in itself is helpful) it will at least narrow things down a bit.
The hardest part is going to be verifying the source and ruling out any contamination during collection. In some cases this would be evident; say getting a mix of bear and human DNA from a single sample. In others it may never be clear and thus the sample must be disregarded (REMEMBER TO GLOVE UP AND KEEP THE EVIDENCE CLEAN FIELD RESEARCHERS) as human and primate DNA would more than likely be too closely related to cleanly separate the source DNA from the contributing/contaminating DNA.
I can’t even begin to list how many parts of this story (both versions) that don’t sound right. I say we just start harassing Ken Walker. Let’s all interview him. We can compare notes with Lindsay and Randles afterward.
I don’t believe any versions of this story for one second. If someone actually shot and killed a Bigfoot, that person would be a millionaire overnight. He would be applauded as the man to make the biggest discovery in the history of mankind and science and would instantly be known worldwide. If an event like this actually happened, there would be no stories about it. We wouldn’t be hearing about it on some random blog from some guy posting on a taxidermy forum and “followed” up to investigate this story. Seriously people, and you wonder why mainstream science and people view Bigfoot as a complete joke and pure fiction? Its because of BS like this, and the crypto community gets their hopes up and sucked up into the latest bigfoot rumor and story. Take a deep breath and think logically here. And oh don’t hold your breath on this story and their supposed DNA samples from tissue from a guy who claims he shot 2 bigfoots but no body just a small sample of flesh. This is all BS, and when its all said and done you all know I will be right on this one.
The doubters are going to be out there even if and when the actual real thing happens. So far, everything I have seen in the last 5 years like this has had tons of unbelievability to it even before they presented it. This Erickson project seems to be the exception. This story, as I said, the first version had aspects that really seemed legit but the whole thing had too many parts that had to be dismissed out of hand. Now this second version incorporates those good aspects in the first one and adds a much more believable scenario to it. It has long been theorized that if we ever did get a body or DNA evidence, it would come from a hunter. It simple odds, thousands of hunters out in the woods each day with a gun trying to shoot an animal, sooner or later they would either mistakenly or intentionally get a bigfoot if it does exist. Also, if you read through the different hunter encounters of a bigfoot, the idea of other bigfoot attacking the hunter as retaliation has been shown in many accounts.
I think that if a hunter who didn’t even believe in bigfoot accidentally shot one that he thought was a bear and then sees some younger ones screaming and coming at him, I can see him doing exactly what he did in a pure fit of unimaginable panic. Now maybe this will all fall apart in the end, but so far this has the marking of something big. Just look at Erickson’s site, no big hype, no big teasers no big promises, they sound legit.
The interview throws a lot of names out there…Erickson Project, Project Olympus, MoneyMaker, etc. but doesn’t give other more important names.
Actually, the whole thing doesn’t really seem to tie in directly to the Erickson Project other than to mention it by name.
I haven’t gone back and read Fred123’s link from the other one, but until I hear from someone that actually works with the Erickson Project and they release some data, I ain’t holding my breath…
That and all of this just sounds too calculated…call me skeptical and cynical
This is too funny, it’s the exact same story i saw and heard on kusm channel 8 based out of saltlake city utah about 30 years ago, I think the show was called the body human. They showed a hunter(fat fella,mustasche,glasses, red flanel shirt and hunters vest.0 gun down a family of bigfoots the mail lunged at the hunter after his mate and child were shot by the hunter; but when they searched no bodies were found just a lump of unidentifiable flesh. Another segment had a little girl sitting in her daddies truck and seeing bigfoot jump across a canyon and another part had a woman telling a man to shoot and he said i can’t it looks to human. Anyone remember this show documentory?
There was a disney family movie simular to this in the late eighties around the time of mr boogety flics as well where to human kids are taken by bigfoots.
As for the bear hunter/poacher bit thats way too simular to the new troll hunter flic. What a croc!
meant male not mail my bad.
Clone the animal from the tissue sample, then we’ll know.
The most glaring thing about this story is that they could go back and find the bodies to get a tissue sample, and no one thought to take a camera? Hmmmm.
A bit more plausible sounding this time around .. or at least typically consistent with the average “hunters” report of these encounters.
Shades of Erik Beckjord with bear/baboon-like prognathism? (grin) .. I take it the trapper meant “halfway between a bear and an ape” due to the long “bear-like” hair appearance in contrast to the short hair appearance of most of the African apes. Even homo erectus was not baboon muzzled nor the Russian claimed photo of an Almas which was bit Australopithecene appearing.
All the reports I’ve ran across indicate a different conclusion than “Mr. Thousand Bears”, that while yes, these widely diverse various Genus, species & haywire polluted gene pool hybrids are routinely shot at, rarely but for a handful of examples are they ever actually killed within even one days tracking of any sort of a blood trail due to being larger and far stronger with far “harder”, tougher musculature, sinews & bones than bears which usually wimp out, cry & lack stamina & try to flee when mortally wounded. Most of the reports indicate catastrophic bullet failure under the skin in the “rock hard’ outer musculature layers of all standard soft lead & expanding bullets before the bullet can penetrate thru to destroy the vitals .. that is your typical elk & bear loads that a North American hunter would carry. These adult creatures (particularly the “True Giants”) require, unless a lucky shot, African “Bull Elephant” safari rounds. Otherwise most reports indicate they just go running into the woods yelling in pain when shot. Traveling over many miles of mountain ranges & swimming rivers in a single day foraging builds tremendous muscle tone compared to sedentary African apes trapped in a jungle canopy lb for lb wise.
As far as one DNA targeted sequence indicating at some point of maternal ancestry a homo sapiens parentage, what would one expect? Captured male Native Americans or Caucasian hikers or hunters would have been kept for food larder & wouldn’t have been raping female “Bigfoots”. On the other hand Native American females & female European & African Americans over the centuries are reported to be raped & given birth before expiring thru deprivations & successive Winter exposure or as food larder. All African & Asian apes are aroused by human females. What is needed is full specimens because whatever native Himalayian, Indian subcontinent, Vietnamese, Chinese bipedal tendency giant apes crossed the Bering Land Bridge with the rest of the megafauna, that DNA is so contaminated with human female DNA & escaped Orangutan & Chimpanzee DNA from American 19th century circuses & released exotics that the samples even if uncontaminated should give wide ranging in results. Fred Bear of Fred Bear Archery fame was allegedly informed by contacts at the Smithsonian (grin) that decades ago they were aware of half a dozen bipedals, but none were closer to homo sapiens than one (from Russia?) which was getting close to maybe a homo eructus type.
Robert Lindsay saw my comment on these boards and sent me an email clarifying the “1000 bear” remark that has everyone outraged, befuddled and suspicious. He gave me permission to relay his explanation.
The 1000 bear claim was the result of a casual discussion about tracking and hunting bears. Lindsay used the wrong word because he misheard the source. He did not kill 1000 bears. However Lindsay doesn’t wish to reveal the correct word because he fears it will reveal his sources profession and ultimately his identity.
The other issue I have with the 1000 bear claim is that a lot of people are attributing it to the wrong person. The person who “killed” the two Bigfoot never made the 1000 bear claim. How could he? He’s not Lindsay’s source. Lindsay never interviewed the BF “shooter.” The source made the 1000 bear claim to illustrate his own expertise. If you read the paraphrased transcript to the conversation, the source is clearly saying it about himself and not the BF shooter.
So to sum up:
1. The 1000 bear claim was a casual boast.
2. The word “Killed” should not have been used. Lindsay misheard the source during the course of a 2.5 hour conversation. Now knowing what the source said, Lindsay cannot make a correction because it would reveal too much about his source. For all we know, the source hugged a 1000 bears. I noticed today that the 1000 bear claim has been removed from the original posting.
3. The “killing” of 1000 bears was incorrectly attributed to the guy who “killed” the two Bigfoot somewhere along the line when that was not stated in the posted transcript.
I have no dog in this hunt. I don’t know if the original story is true or not. I don’t even know Lindsay. I’m just relaying the information Lindsay shared with me at his request.
I don’t know what to think of all this, other than that stories make good stories. And stories are not “evidence.”
I do, however, have one response to the comments of Greg102, above. The notion that someone such as the shooter in this story would never leave the body because he “…would be a millionaire overnight…” is simply not realistic.
A lone hunter who did not previously believe that sasquatch was anything other than a myth, who then encountered one and shot it – either under threat of attack or by mistaken identity – would most likely be in a state of shock, AND quite likely scared ****less. From his point of view – that of an “unbeliever” – he would have either (a) just committed murder/manslaughter under VERY strange conditions, or (b) just killed a monster.
In either case the urge to retreat would probably be overwhelming. All sense of being in control of the situation would dissipate quickly. At the very least, the sense of “something strange is going on here and I have NO IDEA what it is” would become overwhelming.
And if his response is (b), well, when confronted with the reality of monsters, even a big, burly, well-armed man would most likely have a hard time not pissing himself. Remember, this is someone who “doesn’t believe” in such things. This isn’t someone who follows these blogs and message boards, or has a clue about rewards, much less the hope for “scientific studies.”
So this story – as opposed to the first version – seems entirely plausible.
But plausibility doesn’t make it true.
Personally, I’m not buying the whole “hunter shot a bigfoot but was afraid he was gonna go to jail for shooting a human” explanation as to why we don’t hear about these shootings. It’s probably pretty safe to say that there’s a pretty clear physical distinction between a human and a sasquatch. Are we really to believe that the hunter who shot and killed (whether by accident or otherwise) one of these creatures then stood over the eight foot tall hair covered body and thought “uh oh, they’re gonna lock me up for sure for killing this guy!”
Sorry, but that dog don’t hunt.
Personally I find it difficult to guess whatever truth maybe swirling about somewhere in these stories and do not think it is productive to do so at this point. It seems possible DNA sample or samples may have been obtained and these will be available for analysis. Hopefully these seedy events wont put off the labs doing the analysis and interpretation of results which will be made public at some point. Hopefully also the DNA results will be treated as a valuable scientific resource which they are.
Cernovog implies that if bigfoot DNA samples are not on the Genbank data base they will not have much impact. Not true, first of all they should be put on the database without a body but with an identity based on what the analysis shows and what correspondences are shown, such as probably, it is a large primate etc. With a description of what is known of it and what correspondences it has with homo sapien etc. It would not be traditional to do this I know but untill a few years ago DNA was not traditional either and DNA has assumed such huge importance and value with knowledge increasing every day.
Even if DNA results are not added to the DNA database the fact of the matter would be to put the finishing touches to the already comprehensive matrix of evidence for the reality of bigfoot and by association similar manimals. The evidence is there for bigfoot but its a little different from other new disoveries because it is so hard to believe and no body is apparently available at this point. I don’t understand what a bit of bigfoot flesh is doing laying about in the wood (terminator like)?
Whole planets are described without quibble from scientists on the basis of a faint wobble in a point of distant light. Bigfoot has a much greater evidence base!
It is important to establish bigfoot as a reality not only for fascinating and useful knowledge but so it could be protected and conserved.
gridbug,
That dog doesn’t hunt, but that’s not what happened. He shot it, it ran off into the woods and supposedly chased there are some point while two younger ones came at the hunter as if to attack him. There isn’t a person in this world who wouldn’t run in that situation.
Personally, I’m not buying much from any of the sources. Let the Erickson Project come out and make a statement, and then I’ll turn ears on, but until then, this just smells too much like Georgia…
Too many details. I don’t buy the logger conspiracy theory. If they’ve been knocking off Bigfoots for as long as they would have needed to, somebody would have yapped by now–human beings are just not known for their ability to keep anything a secret for very long. It’s too neat and easy.
The Georgia thing was clearly a scam from the start. All you had to do is watch the youtube videos those slack-jawed yokels put out and you knew they were clowns. I’m not saying this is the real thing, but this is nothing like that 3rd grade hoax.
The Erickson Projects web site is leaking some info from the DNA analysis. Says the male is 100 % non human, but the female is part human. How can that be true? Since the females bear the young, wouldn’t she pass on the human DNA to her children? Including the males? Would be nice to have someone in the research field who’s not a nut job.
This is an old leak.
Leaks, rumors, and speculations do the field no good. Proof and firm scientific findings will.
As has been stated before, multiple results discussing a link to human DNA in a “Bigfoot” sample could be caused by faulty collection techniques that introduced human skin or hair cells into the samples.
We need more that leaks.