Top Ten Cryptozoo Mystery Pix 2006
Posted by: Loren Coleman on December 16th, 2006
CryptoZoo News’ Top Ten Mystery Photographs of 2006
1.
What mystery fish or whatever is shown on this antique postcard produced between 1904-18?
2.
What did researchers Klindt’s & Dianna’s remote cam catch on April 30, 2006, near Mt. Hood, Oregon, USA?
3.
What was the "Maine Mutant" photographed by Michelle O’Donnell in Turner, Maine, in August 2006? (This one turned out to be 100% dog.)
Images #1, #2, and #3 may be clicked on to make them larger.
4.
Was this new photo taken around August 15, 2006, at Lake Nahuel Huap, really the famed Argentinan Lake Monster, Nahuelito?
5.
What are we to make of this photo of a mystery carving of an alleged Stegosaurus stenops on an ancient Cambodian temple at Angkor Wat? (See more photos of this, including close-ups, here.)
6.
How would you feel if you had filmed the first live Indonesian coelacanth underwater, as a Japanese team did at the depth of 170 m, 17, at 8:30 am on May 30, 2006, off shore Buol, about 350 km west from Manado, Sulawesi Island?
7.
Mystery tracks showing up in Johor, beginning in January, 2006, still beg the question: Were they from a Malaysian Bigfoot, rhino, elephant, or something else?
8.
Nothing is there, and then something is there, in October 2006, right? What was the long thing on the bottom of Loch Ness that is seen near the rocks?
9.
In mid-November 2006, was it an American bobcat, Canadian lynx, Eurasian lynx or African Caracal being seen in Warner Park, Nashville, Tennesseee?
10.
Why was a giant squid in a Japanese parking lot in July 2006?
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To find the master list of all links to every 2006 lists created at Cryptomundo about the top cryptozoology stories, the top Bigfoot stories, top mystery photographs, best cryptozoology books, best cryptofiction books, top creepy fossil discoveries, gifts, passings, top cryptids, and more, please click here.
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 wish we had a better Sasquatch photo year, instead of men in Monkey suits in the Everglades. I did like the old ‘DEAD’ bigfoot photos posted earlier, but nothing “fresh” for 2006.
Hard to believe, with all the cameras and camcorders out there, that these are the BEST of the year’s images…
But it illustrates just how difficult it is to be in the right place at the right time with right gear and the right frame of mind… to point and click!
Maybe next year, or the next…
Thanks for these interesting photos, Loren. This site is simply the best available for cryptid-oriented folks. I would like to see you host a show on television regarding your favorite cryptids.
Personally I like # 2 because it doesnt make wild claims and does appear to show an upright creature,which by the look of the furis not a bear. If any bigfoot photo is real this is the one that would get my vote as most likely.
# 9 is a Lynx nice photo.They arent that easy to photOgraph in the wild as a rule.
As for the squid inthe parking lot, Maybe teher wa sno parking on the street at the fish market 🙂
The Johor photo GRRRRRRRRR PLeeeese
I still don’t see anything in the eighth photo. Too much vegetation in the way to make anything clear. The interesting photo is number five. Why would the ancients carve a picture of a Stegosaurus on a temple if it wasn’t of importance or of a visual record? Number four looks totally fake. It almost is like someone took a dinosaur toy they can get at Walmart or elsewhere and just put it in a pool and made some waves for effect.
The coelacanth photo lends some hope that even extinction is not permanent. Photo number two is interesting, but what if it’s just the back of someones head and not the upright walking of some unknown biped? And lastly, photo number one, in my view, could be a giant eel. What if it’s a shrieking eel? I won’t even make a comment on photo 3, 7, & 10 because, while interesting, they show things that we all know what they are. Number nine is most like a Bobcat, I’ve seen plenty of them up here of late.
Looks like a slim year of interesting photos, some not so interesting, and some that are just absurd and not worth our time talking about, (the monkey man in the Florida swamp comes to mind).
Here’s cheers to this year and next, may they bring even more photos of the unknown, and maybe some that will finally put to rest that which we search for.
Wait, I do have a comment on photo number seven. It looks like someone stepped in white paint as they were trying to get to the jungle behind them.
In other words, it was a verrry slooow year.
I’d have to award the prize for dumbest mystery pic to the “Maine Mutant.”
Is a closeup of the stegasaurus-looking temple carving available?
I hadn’t seen #5, the alleged Stegosaur carving before. Interesting. The first thing should be to rule out a Photoshop job.
I’ve updated the blog to include the link to more photos of the temple carving as it seems to be of special interest. See more photos of it, including close-ups, plus previous comments, here.
very interesting pixx
The stegosaurus picture is the “hands down best” of 2006 (if it is legit) although I just saw a bizarre amphibian picture of something caught in Bolivia that looks like a huge tadpole, the biggest I have ever seen. Maybe it’s a new species of amphibian. There was a sasquatch picture displayed on coasttocoastam.com a couple days ago that looked compelling as well due to the fact that it was on a high peak on a snow topped mountain all alone. The winds were blowing pretty hard so it seemed possible that the guy snuck up on it or visa versa and got himself a once in a lifetime shot. For some reason the picture just seems real to me. It’s the kind of shot you would think someone could legitimately stumble upon. His or her email communications were short and concise and not full of the typical 3 BS setup comments, “I never really even knew about bigfoot before”, or “I used to be a skeptic” or “I feared ridicule”, you know what I mean.
The C2C photograph was a recycled one of two by the same individual who shared them at sites late in 2005. I did not deem them as 2006 material because of that.
🙂
The “Steggy” carving #5 stands out as the best of the listed pics. Can’t wait to hear what the final verdict on that will be. Hopefully 2007 will be more productive. Good luck!
Doesn’t anyone think the #2 picture is just an extreme closeup of a curious horse? I see the eye, the mane, and the beginning of the ear.
#4 looks real. The stego. pic is awesome. Yeah the silver star mountain bigfoot pic is one of a series that BFRO had(HAS?)up and may be the real deal. Nothing beats Patty tho’. I think it’s about time someone came up with something on that level or above. There is tons of interest nowadays and less places for cryptids to hide. I fear one thing tho’-the average joe tends to be a lazier more synical creature than 40 years ago…
Picture number 6 is not a coelacanth. It is a HUMAN BEING! Buy my doc to find out more.
OK, one guy’s impressions of them, from top to bottom:
1. Intriguing, not conclusively solved.
2. Horse
3. Dog
4. Hoax
5. Intriguing, still a mystery
6. Really cool
7. Does not look primate.
8. Likely debris
9. Out of place cat, probably lynx (?)
10. “Well, officer, when the army scared Godzilla, he dropped his snack and it landed right beside my car…”
Matt Bille
Of the 10 presented, my favourite one was number 2. But I’ll have to do some catchup reading on some of these which I missed. The stegasaurus looks interesting!
Now – what were all the options for number 2 again? Moose, horse, dog, bear, deer, bigfoot, man in a party costume?
It’s a shame that Johor didn’t rank. I mean, the photos that were, which were not, which were illustrated, then leaked, then fake? Or was that the other way around? 😀
Of course Emmerichs’ thylacine was another now-you-see-it, now-you-don’t – but long-time readers will know that’s a favourite of mine.
And Loren – if you want to take up Richard’s suggestion for a television show, then get in touch next time you’re in Aus… we can make a documentary 🙂
Second guy’s impression
1. Bony saltwater fish from Nicaragua
2. Deer
3. The most famous dog of modern cryptozoological times
4. Did we decide if “Inexplicata” was a real place? 😀
5. New to me, looks good. Could be a pig in front of a plant. The “bony plate” pattern appears as leaves around all the other panels.
6. Fish never cease to amaze me 🙂
7. Ho hum.
8. Not enough resolution in the image. Why can’t it just be a big fish (if not debris)?
9. A cat is a cat is a cat.
10. Where else was I supposed to park it?
Oh heck, here’s my impression.
1. A known fish in such a position and photographed in such a way as to make it seem like a cryptid.
2. Blobsquatch. Could be any animal with fur. Or someone’s wig.
3. Dog. Duh.
4. Hoax.
5. Interesting, but could very well be an artistic, mythical representation.
6. It’s a HUMAN! Seriously, very cool pic.
7. A splatter of mud that bears a superficial resemblance to.. a splatter of mud.
8. Debris, fish, or a thousand other possible explanations other than a large underwater monster.
9. Wonder where it came from?
10. Who drives a squid to work? Honestly?
Just to let you guys know, the stegosaurus is fake AND old. It’s got something to do with getting people to visit somewhere or other. Travel agency type scam. I will look on the other computer to see if I still have it bookmarked in my “scams” folder. Positively fake though.
I still say the “stegosaur” is some known animal, a rhino or pig maybe, stylized (as all the carvings look to be, for example the one at the column’s base) and against a leafy background.
Aside from that, the anatomy’s all wrong for a stegosaur anyway.
If memory serves me correctly, #2 was suppose to be an elk. I remember that because that was the first story I responded to here. I must have missed #9. Looks pretty big to be just a bobcat or lynx. Almost like someone crossed a lynx with a mountain lion. I absolutely love #5. It’s small things such as this that makes most people think. The rest were interesting, but to me either not that important or too simple to believe people would get worked up over it (#3–it’s a dog).
I can testify to the difficulty of trying to get good images of novel events on short notice, no matter what equipment you have.
While driving through a wooded area at midnight, on our way back from July 4th fireworks, we saw what may have been a cougar, not officially acknowledged to be here in New York’s Catskill Mountains. It appeared to be picking up prey from the side of the road. There was enough of a cognitive dissonance to have us keep on going for a few hundred yards, at which point my visceral reaction that this was anomalous led me to tell my husband to stop and turn around.
I had a digital camera and camcorder down at my feet in a bag. It was enormously difficult to get them up, out of their cases, and set to the right settings to film in a pitchblack car, in the few seconds I had available. I found myself fumbling and nervous, like one of those nightmares where you just can’t do what you need to do fast enough.
The animal had gone by the time we got back, so I didn’t have a second chance to try. I can see how hard it is to get any image at all under those circumstances, let alone a good one.
I was watching the movie “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” the other day and there was a great line in it concerning photos. Some government guy says that we have all these cameras out there, so why don’t we have any pictures? And another guy says that even with all the cameras and camcorders out there, why is there never any footage of a car crash actually happening? It was a great exchange and it made me think. These events often happen at very inopportune times and are over very quickly, not to mention people are in a state of shock when they see them. I am not a photographer, but from what I understand, most good wildlife shots are done by pros carefully waiting for an opportune shot of a species they fully know to exist and be lurking in the area. And even then, there are a whole slew of bad shots to get just a few good ones. I was out camping once and took a digital camera picture of a bear and know what it looked like? A blobsquatch. Or blobbear. I was so shocked to come across one and by the time I could get ready for another shot, it was gone. I gather a lot of people carrying cameras out there are the same way.
Mystery Man and Carol – my sentiments exactly. As I wrote on my site, and as Col Bailey has written years ago… it should be no surprise if the first genuine photo of a thylacine (in our case) should come from the fortunate tourist who happens to be in the right place at the right time.
It’s not as easy as you think.
For example, I know Tiger Quolls are still prevalent on mainland Australia. I’ve never seen one in my life. Neither a koala in the wild. Nor a platypus. Only one wombat, and I ran over that one. Two echidnas. That’s not a great record, is it? … and there are plenty of those animals about.