Yeren Search Relaunched
Posted by: Loren Coleman on October 10th, 2010
Xinhua, CNN and other media are reporting:
Scientists in China’s Hubei Province have announced they are looking for additional members for its special team tasked with tracking down the creature.
The Hubei Wild Man Research Association (HWMRA) is recruiting researchers internationally to join the group’s search in the Shennongjia forest region.
Luo Baosheng, vice president of the HWMRA, told Xinhua that the organization is comprised of more than 100 scientists and explorers who have been chasing the ape-like animal for years. The last time a organized search took place was in the early 1980s.
“Most importantly, we want the team members to be devoted, as there will be a lot of hard work in the process,” Luo told reporters. Team members are also expected to be in good physical health and preferably 25 to 40 years of age, he added.
The search for the phantom, known as the “Yeren” or “Wild Man” in China, will cost at least $1.5 million U.S. dollars, according to Wang Shancai, a member of the the group and an archaeologist with the Hubei Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology. The group is seeking funding from various companies and institutions, Wang said.
Chinese researchers have been searching since the 1970s. There have been more than 400 reported sightings of the half-man, half-ape in the Shennongjia area. In the past, explorers have found inconclusive evidence that researchers claimed to be proof of Bigfoot’s existence, including hair, footprints, excrement and a sleeping nest.
Witnesses say the creature walks upright like a human but is much taller, and is covered in hair head-to-toe….
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.
As long as the explorers don’t report that the Yeren desires freedom, has a distinct religious philosphy, wants to reproduce without restriction, and feels entitled to the fruits of its labor they all should be able to avoid seious jail time.
Having visited this area of China for an episode of MonsterQuest, I came away convinced that the Yeren does exist. I am also encouraged that the Chinese take the accounts very seriously indeed, and are mounting a real effort to prove its existence .I wish them the best of luck in their search.