Mt. Hood Bigfoot & Bear Video
Posted by: Loren Coleman on July 20th, 2007
Dianna Martin, who has been sharing what the Mt. Hood trailcam has been photographing, sends in this video which may show, first clearly a bear, and then perhaps closer to the cam’s lens – a Bigfoot, a bear cub, or what? Your opinions please.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
I can’t see enough in that clip to have any opinion about the second presence.
How high is the camera off the ground?
Nice video! I look forward to more from Mt. Hood. Here are some random observations.
1) The camera seems to be 2 feet above the shoulder of the “brown” black bear. If a typical black bear has a 3 to 5 foot shoulder height then the camera is in the 5 to 7 foot range above the ground.
2) The bear appears to act as if it’s being followed at the end of the clip. In the last couple of frames its head is turned towards the camera.
3) The camera’s field of view is invaded 3 times at the end by some unidentifiable object(s) that are too close to be resolved. Once at the bottom right hand corner. Twice, consecutively from left to right. Conclusions. If it was bear cubs the direction would have been top to bottom as in climbing down the tree – not left to right. It would be an animal that’s not concerned with the presence of a black bear.
Also, stop the video at 26 and 27. Whatever obscures the camera can be seen in those frames. It is vertical it has a rough (furry?) surface and has narrow width. The first object covers 4-5 frames while the second one appears in 1 or 2. Even if this didn’t have a BF theme I’d still be reminded of 2 upright creatures or legs moving across the lens.
Big Foot? More likely a cub or cubs. Read the bear’s body language. The bear shows no adverse reaction to what ever presence is there, in fact it(she?) seems to be waiting for the possible youngsters to catch up and stop fooling with the camera.
hey loren , interesting black bear & bigfoot video but more research etc needs to be done to it in my honest opinion. thanks bill green
At first I dismissed this as nothing to see, worse than a blobsquatch because it shows very little apart from a couple of near black frames. The most obvious answer seems to be one or two cubs following their mother. However, this, I understand is a motion sensitive camera. If there is no more footage then we can assume that whatever it was, didn’t follow the bear. Unusual behaviour for a cub. Establishing if there is more footage than has been posted may give us more insight.
I agree with searoom. The bear does not appear to be spooked by anyone(thing). Nice clear video though!
I agree, it is hard to tell exactly what it is but most likely another bear. I sure wish Bigfoot would put his/her mug in the shot though.
That’s a bear cub…or another bear.
I have to agree with searoom here.
It does look like the bear is looking back at the end but it also looks like it is waiting, hence the stopping and head turns. I would say it’s waiting for young to stop playing and get moving.
If the bear were turning to look and saw a BF, I think it would have started to run.
Well, I see a dark thing move across the field of vision of the camera. Seriously that can be anything, and I would be more willing to bet that it is a mundane phenomena before jumping to any conclusions that it could be a sasquatch. We have an unhurried bear lumbering away from the camera and then there is a black something that moves across our field of vision which is pretty much where the bear started off. Think about it, which one is more likely. That
A) The bear was with her cubs and they were following after her.
or
B) This is an undocumented hairy hominid that just happens to be in the same area as this bear and causing no alarm or even nervousness whatsoever. It is a stretch to start theorizing that a bear would be that nonchalant. The sasquatch would not have just materialized there either, it must have been lurking in the area before this shot was taken. Yet the bear actually sits down quite casually towards the end of the video.
So which is it, a bear cub, or undiscovered hairy hominid that somehow can hang around bears without causing alarm or even mild curiosity. Occam’s Razor, folks. I know the answer I’m going with. That it’s a sasquatch! 🙂 Seriously, I think the answer is pretty clear here.
I’d bet big money that it’s a bear. We (TBRC) have quite a few similar photos and video of bears trying to eat or harass the cameras.
Bears love petroleum byproducts (paint, plastic, etc.). They will stand up in front of the cameras while gnawing on them and slapping them, and will work hard to turn them into a heap of nuts and bolts. They are a camera trap’s worst enemy.
What is on the video above is probably a bear sniffing around, or he may be trying to get to the camera. Seriously, we’ve seen it dozens of times.
I think I agree with every on this… It’s another bear… Most likely a cub… Like some of you have said… This bear isn’t at all concerned with what is behind it… And it does look like it’s waiting for the culprit… I don’t think a bear would sit down in the presence of a BIG ONE… Maybe they should aim a cam at the cam… Next time this happen’s… Mystery solved… Though I think we have pretty much solved this one…
agree with everyone… I mean…
Like everyone said, bear.
In a lot of reports dogs are afraid of BF and run away or something. You would think a bear would…
The camera seems to shake for a moment at 22…
bear cub(s).
Just before clip ends, you see bear in distance pause – more than likely doing a status check on her kids. End of story.
I have some experience with trail cameras (I have a Cuddieback No Flash) and hunting and filming bear. I believe the cub is the bear walking away from the camera. It is a year old cub so it is a little bigger in size. Cubs stay with the sow for 2 years. If you watch as the bear walks by the stump in the center of the screen they are about level and that stump is probably only about 2 feet tall. That also gives me a clue that the camera maybe set low to the ground (2’). So I think it is a young sow (cub’s mother) that walks by the camera close up so all you see are her front and back legs. I say young sow because an older one would have a belly that hangs all the way to the ground. The two ways to size and age bears in photos are the size of the ears and the size of the belly. Big ears = young small bear. Small ears = big bear. Big belly = big older bear.
This is absolutely nothing. Unless BF comes up and licks the camera lens, let’s not bother with game camera footage.
The camera is 3 feet off the ground. Cuddeback recommends 3 to 4 feet we have tried up to 5 feet you miss a lot of activity. The tree is a small one about 10″ across.The camera is set in a bear box that protects it from being destroyed.
Just stupid. C’mon guys…
I live and have camped and hunted in that area for decades (25 years).
Probably her cub or even possiably a mate..she is looking back casually and does’nt appear alert to danger.
If it was anything large or threatening, she would not turn her back.
The bear would face it or run.
Most ‘bigfoot’ sightings up there are just bears.
Usually from people who have little experience in the mountains.
Ditto.
How in the blue hell is this even being considered bigfoot related?
Ok yea that can be absolutely anything.
Although I did want to say that- who can say that wild animals are necessarily afraid of cryptids?
To a bear, or another wild animal, bigfoot may just be something they are familiar enough with to not panic over.
Bears don’t know that Bigfoot is rare and unusual.
Dogs are different then wildlife. They are domesticated and don’t grow up in the wilderness to know what is out there.
A bear just may see a Bigfoot as typical fellow forest animals rather than unknown monsters. Especially if bigfoots are not a threat to bears, they wouldn’t see the bigfoot as a predator to run away from.
I don’t think the video shows a bigfoot. But I don’t think that the fact the bear didnt panic and run away is the reason behind that.
This is a good video of a bear, or perhaps bears, but it is a real stretch to try to posit a sasquatch in it. In my view one of the reasons that the sasquatch phenomena is viewed as flaky by many people is when a video like this is presented as possible evidence of said critter!! I think the bigfoot phenomena exists but stuff like this video does not help the cause. On the positive side the video does establish the existance of bears in the Mt Hood area!!!!!
CrimsonFox79- That is not excactly true. It is not only about whether the animal perceives a predator or not, and not about whether it is a cryptid or not, but rather another large, possibly hostile, possibly dangerous animal in its area. It is not that they “know” it is a rare animal, but it is a large creature getting apparently very close to it. An animal does not have to be an actual predator of another to instill fear, besides, bears have no natural predators anyway yet they will still show signs of agitation and are still wary of other animals that venture too close. Typical forest animal or not, it is not in the bear’s best interests to completely ignore another creature like this in its area for a variety of reasons. Conversely, why would a Bigfoot want to range that close to another animal that could possibly be dangerous to it? What would be its purpose for this?
Something this close to it is going to instill at least some cusiosity, or apprehensiveness, if not an out and out defensive posture. A complete lack of any sort of reaction at all would be extremely unusual indeed and would need more reasoning behind it than “it is just another forest animal”. Wild animals are not all out there frolicking about ignoring each other.
I’m sorry, but I don’t see a second presence at all in this video. I see a bear lumbering off into the distance, pausing briefly, and that’s it. Where is this other critter supposed to be appearing?
mystery_man,
Makes sense 🙂 thanks for clearing that up then.
Can someone tell me which area of Mount Hood this trail cam lives in?
I don’t need specifics, just general location, please.
Also, I think bears, for the record, on this video.
I agree with Richard888’s comments that whatever moved in front of the lens is upright on 2 feet. However the figures that move past the lens could be from a solitary figure striding by within feet of the camera.
Watching the motions at regular speed the first dark figure that enters the view hesitates slightly, in a wobbly fashion, before moving through to the right. This motion is similar to the gait of a human where there is a slight hesitation of the torso as the next leg swings forward.
The second dark figure crossing the lens appears to glide quickly past without a hesitation and is similar to the smoother swaying of a human arm on a figure that is in full walking motion.
The film on Google Video frames can be paused at .25-second intervals. Too bad the frames do not have a .1 second interval to see more detail given the speed of the figure. Nevertheless some detail is evident as originally pointed out by Richard888.
A play-by-play of the stop motion goes as follows:
25.50 sec – a small shadow appears in the bottom right corner of the screen and could be a reflected shadow by the figure approaching from the left.
25.75 sec – no evidence of the figure present.
26.00 sec – the entire screen goes black.
26.25 sec – a vertical (posterior) edge of the figure appears on the left of the screen and it appears to be covered with short hair, shorter than what I expect to see from a bear at this proximity to the lens.
26.50 sec – Given the speed the figure enters the picture in the 26.00 frame, the figure makes little forward motion to the right in the 26.25 frame. This is the slight hesitation referred to earlier where a leg is likely being brought forward into the next step.
26.75 sec – The figure moves sways slightly backwards, likely while the leg is still in motion, and all the while maintains its apparent vertical positioning. The frame is also part of the hesitation with wobbly motion referred to earlier. The moving leg may have planted the foot at this point.
27.00 sec – The figure is halfway across the viewing field moving to the right with the hair showing more clearly. Likely the other leg is being moved forward at this point.
27.25 sec – The first figure is past the lens and the approaching shadow of the second figure is evident on the left of the screen.
27.50 sec – The screen is completely blackened.
27.75 sec – Without hesitation in motion the second figure is completely past the lens.
I cannot say this is definitely a sasquatch but it is clear the bear is somewhat threatened by whatever is approaching the area and is skulking away. The bear is reacting as if a more dominant animal is appearing on the scene but is not running in fear as if was a strange human approaching.
Given the motion and hesitations of this unknown figure and the 1.5 seconds it took to move across the lens it had to be walking on 2 legs. A four-footed would have required a longer time to move past the lens and provide more frame eclipsing. Combined with the short-dark hair on the figure, shorter than a bears, an interesting scenario presents itself.
A large man in a fur suit? Personally I do not think so. Is the bear simply responding to a sudden camera noise and someone later shaded in the figures? I do not think this happened either!
I don’t see any evidence in this bear’s behavior that it is acting in a threatened manner. It is certainly not clear as such and it actually seems to be walking away from the camera in quite a leisurely fashion. It is also totally turning its back on whatever it is and seems to be looking back towards the end of the clip as if to make sure its cubs are following it, sort of like “Hey, are you coming along?” more than anything else. The way it is acting is normal if its cubs are following and there is no immediate threat in the area, but odd if there is an eight foot tall hominid that close by. It is not acting in the manner that I would expect from it if it was reacting to a dominant animal.
I personally do not see anything in the movement of the shape past the camera that rules out a bear cub and I am surprised that people are seeing something there that could conclusively rule this possibility out. As for a man in a fur suit, that would have most definitely caused more of a reaction from this bear than it is demonstrating. I also wonder what kind of foolhardy person would dress up in a fur suit and mess around with a bear this close just so that they could produce a hoax video of a black blur past the camera. That just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
Also consider that a sasquatch just wouldn’t have materialized on the scene to cause the bear to skulk away, even if that is what it is doing, which I’m not convinced it is. Odds are that if the bear considers sasquatch a dominant animal, it would likely make sure that it didn’t get this close to begin with and would keep its distance. Unless the sasquatch took it by surprise, or is following it, in which case that is another factor that needs to be explained, we wouldn’t see a sudden response to its presence in this video clip. The same thing goes for a guy in a fur suit. How would someone get this close to begin with?
However, if this is a bear cub, then it has been following along side it the whole time. I really think that the sasquatch explanation is drawing at straws a bit here. I understand the desire some have for this to be a possible sasquatch, but the simplest explanation for what I see here and the behavior being exhibited is that this is a mother bear with its cub or cubs. One could speculate on all sorts of other theories, but if you really want to apply Occam’s Razor here, this is footage of a cub.
The first thing that drew my attention to the bear’s state of mind is its lowered head while it is walking away and is why I referred to it as ‘skulking’ away. In fact it appears the bear kept its head down until it looks backwards at the 15 sec point.
There are other subtle signs of the bear’s somewhat threatened state and with viewing the footage on a Google Video Player the following details can be seen:
1.00 sec – The bear’s hackles (hair down the spine) are raised.
2.25s -2.75s – A broader area of hackles is raised across the back of the bear’s shoulders.
2.75s -3.00s – The right ear is clearly laying back.
3.50s – Right after the bear reaches a clear area with all 4 feet it arches its back with hackled fur and with lowered head looks briefly to the left in effort to catch a glimpse of the figure approaching from the left.
15.25s – After the bear reaches what it considers a safe enough distance it suddenly stops and looks back to the right with its ears raised high and pointed forward in a state of alert.
21.75s – After taking a couple of steps the bear attempts to go no further at this point after it looks back to the right and likely senses the approaching figure is not headed its way.
23.50s – The bear looks quickly back to the left as the figure approaches and by 23.75 begins to turn its head back to the right likely in effort to keep an eye on the figure as it passes through to the right.
25.75s – The first shadow suddenly darkens the view and moves through to the right.
28.25s – The figure has moved past the view field and the bear’s head is now facing fully backwards to the right with the both its face lowered and ears half lowered until the filming stops.
There is no evidence the shadows moving left to right across the viewing field are of bear cubs climbing down the tree or that the bear is old enough to have cubs. It appears to me to be around 3 or 4 summers old. The bear is definitely clearing the area even before looking backwards and is definitely following a figure coming in from the left and traveling to the right. There is no proof the shadows are Sasquatch however I feel there is strong evidence (motion and time to clear the viewing field) that supports the opinion that whatever it is walks on two legs.
Personally I am not trying to see a Sasquatch in this footage or nor do I have a desire to see one in this video. In fact I am not looking for proof of the existence of Sasquatch in any video but I am looking for evidence of its presence. I am comfortable in knowing Sasquatch exists thanks to frames of the Patterson-Gimlin film that I first saw in 1973. From that time I have spoken to several eyewitnesses and their families from Ontario, B.C. and NY state and held copies of footprint castes while meeting with Dr. John Bindernagel as well as having my own sightings.
Knowing these hominids exist enables me to view videos without the doubt of skepticism or the fear of being duped by a hoax or fear of knowing they are real! With the large number of cameras now in existence I am looking forward to the many new videos that are bound to turn up. However, given the technology today I am not interested whatsoever in any of the blobsquatch digital blurry footage being circulated that lacks any clear detail. There will no doubt be many examples of clear and unmistakable film (video) footage of Sasquatch yet to appear in the future.
Holy Cow John5, that’s a whole lot of speculation there.
I’ve had my own squatch encounter years ago and I want there to be film or video evidence as much as the most fervent believer, but man, there’s just nothing to support all those points.
The one thing that seems to be consistent with animals and sasquatches is that everything is terrified of them. Silence in the woods, right down to insects? I suspect every creature that lives in the wilderness instinctively knows that squatches are the *ultimate* omnivore and nobody -from an 8 point buck down to an 8 legged arachnid- is safe, and flight or silence is their best defense.
Accordingly, I don’t think any bear smaller than an adult grizzly would hang around that close to something it knows could pick it up and take a bite out of it’s ass. If bears generally run from approaching humans, they’d flee at a full gallop from an approaching sasquatch.
I say the shadow is either a mate or a cub.
John5- Well, you may be right abut the hackles raised, but to me it looks like it could just be a play pf light across the fur. Interesting. It’s hard to tell with the resolution I am getting here. I don’t believe the other behaviors are necessarily indicative of agitated behavior either. The head hung low is quite a normal way of walking for a bear, and the ear could be back for any number of other reasons. The curiosity it seems to show towards the end of the video could be brought on by alot of different things, and does not seem to be any sort of reaction of alarm.
I also think that saying the bear is not old enough to have cubs is speculative at best no matter how young it may appear in this video. We simply don’t know, so I feel making the jump to the conclusion that it cannot possibly have cubs is assuming a lot, as is all of the speculation on what you feel it thinks is a safe distance or what its thoughts are as it looks back. Besides, even if this bear were clearly agitated, which I don’t think it is demonstrating to any appreciable degree, who is to say that a sasquatch would be what was causing that? It could very well be a dominant bear in the area, or the click and whirr of the trail cam. The way the shadow moves past the camera is admittedly odd, but in no way concrete evidence of bipedalism.
As to looking at the video with a mind clear of skepticism, make no assumptions of my level of skepticism or “fear of being duped” here. I am looking at this video with clear (as clear as the resolution will allow anyway) and unbiased eyes and have no strong desire for it to be one thing or the other. I am fully open to the idea of sasquatch existing, but see no evidence of it in this clip, in fact for me nothing really points to the jump that this is a sasquatch we are seeing rather than other mundane possibilities. If I am to weigh what I see in this video and decide if it is A) a large, undocumented hairy hominid, or B) A bear with its cubs, possibly slightly agitated by SOMETHING, then for me, from a scientific perspective, the likely answer is fairly clear.
I respect your sightings and think it is fortunate for you to have the experience you have had. But I think “knowing” it exists still does not mean that that is what is being shown in this video. Maybe it IS a sasquatch, who knows? However whether I know sasquatch exists or not is irrelevant here. What I see in the video could point to possibilities other than there was a sasquatch that walked by, and I just feel making too many assumptions or jumping to conclusions is really not going to help sasquatch research in the long run.
Thanks for the comments. It does seem rather pointless to get into the length of detail on this video that is of dark blurs going past the lens. I would like to repeat though that I cannot sy beyond the shadow of a doubt that this is a Sasquatch! However my first impression upon seeing this flick is that what passes in front of the lens is on two legs and is why I took the time to look for further details.
The first hairy shadow (the torso?!) enters the view field abruptly and after wobbling slightly (but still maintaining the apparent vertical positioning) for 1 second passes totally through to the right. The second shadow (the arm?!) enters the view field abruptly as well but disappears in less than .25 seconds.
A four legged critter would require more time to pass in front of the lens and would likely be one large shadow if it was the body and several if it was the legs. Not one long shadow and one blip.
Also I originally thought the bear’s reaction was from it hearing the camera switch on causing it to scramble away. For it to look behind, first from the right side then to the left and finally back to the right, is an indication of it keeping an eye on a moving object and synchronizes nicely with the shadows passing from left to right in front of the lens. A detail I found interesting!
While we have only photos and films to view the proof of the presence of Sasquatch will be foound in the details of the images. That is until another ‘Jocko’ is captured!
Peace
John5- Thank you for your thoughts too, and I appreciate the in depth frame by frame analysis you did on this. Always a pleasure to discuss these things with others who share the same interests. I agree with what you said before that if sasquatch is really out there, with all of the cameras now being put out, it is only a matter of time before some really decent footage comes along. Let’s hope more conclusive clips than this come our way in the near future.