Where is Bigfoot now? The cycle…
Posted by: Rick Noll on May 3rd, 2007
Does it seem that there hasn’t been any good Bigfoot track ways found lately? Have we gotten so good at looking at this type of evidence that the preponderance of new finds have people not wanting to come forward with their pictures, tracks or casts of them? We now can look at these tracks and casts and tell with reasonable certainty if they were or were not of human manufacture?
In the past, large finds of track ways seem to have been laid down at random. What was going on in the Bossburg, Washington area (for now forget about Ivan Marx) that left over 1,000 tracks with all the tracks found at Blue Creek mountain, California? Would it be prudent to make a simple spread sheet for each of the large finds and place columns next to them of seemingly unrelated activities to see if maybe we were wrong and that there is a really is a pattern?
Logging, road construction, road building, harvest time, good substrate for tracks, Bigfoot researchers in the area, dynamite explosions, floods, drought, time of year for latitude, forest fires, holidays, fish runs, human behavioral changes with new laws, who knows.
Of course quantification for relatedness has to be determined… spatial and temporal distance limits for instance. A new road punched through an area may not mean Bigfoot suddenly gets seen more on that newer road… but maybe 20 miles away on an older road it use to cross easily and unseen things are now changed. What if the area is only occupied partially during the year? A road punched through in summer may not affect anything until fall.
A study area size is determined by a lot of these factors and you sometimes just have to take a WAG as to what to include and what not to include. A contiguous area can be just as hard to work as a patchwork or mosaic. I like both for each has its advantages.
About Rick Noll
Rick Noll has been actively searching for the Sasquatch since 1969 and continues his pursuit with extended field trips into the Pacific Northwest's most remote regions. Rick has worked with Peter Byrne, René Dahinden, Grover Krantz, John Green, Jeff Meldrum and the BFRO during all this. He helped with many documentaries on the subject including Animal X: The Skookum Expedition and Sasquatch: Legend Meets Science.
Rick, good to see you back on Cryptomundo, and great to see you write some thought-provoking columns that can inspire a lot of discussion ad debate. I really enjoy reading your columns. It does seem that tracks are way too easy to fake these days, with the advent of the Internet, that information to fake tracks is easily accessible. Even footprints with dermal ridges are easy to fake if one has patience and ingenuity. Back 50 years ago, that information was not out there, so I would say that except for the Ray Wallace controversy, tracks were a little more credible back then. Once again, great column, Rick.
Maybe with all the big feet we see on humans these days, with 18″ Nikes being the norm for the NBA, we just aren’t impressed with big footprints. Heck, now I’d think some kids from the local high school football team were just out running around.
Or after watching our fascination with its footprints, and noting the growing human traffic in those areas, caught on; each generation now careful not to leave clear prints.
I believe he’s on vacation at the Oregon Zoo.
I think most of the lower number of findings has something to do with the crazy weather. I’m not going to start preaching global warming–that’s actually old news for me, but I do believe it will effect both humans doing the sighting, as well as the Sasquatches out there just trying to survive. Of course it doesn’t help that much of their habitat is gone. Here in California, the construction and real estate businesses have been just horrible. Rent is way to high along the ocean so everyone moves into the foothills and mountains. Again, I think the one thing established about Big Foot is that they like to be left alone. On occasional encounters, they might be more curious than the humans, but still cautious. On other sites dedicated to Big Foot, I have read about encounters in places 10 to 20 years ago where then it was mostly open foothills, but now the area looks like downtown L.A. I also wouldn’t be surprised if the growth in human population hasn’t pushed Big Foot to the farthest points possible up mountains and desolated forests. That would mean 2 reasons they haven’t been seen: 1) they finally found someplace people will leave them alone or 2) They are endangered. Pushed up into areas not too hospitable for something that large. They have always seemed to be intelligent enough to find the easiest food, but if they are forced up where there isn’t much, well…
One unexpected bonus of a goverment bent on slashing budgets:
Forest Service roads have washed out in many places, with no budget for repair.
Some areas are going wild again because we are not fixing those bridges and roads.
Less people, more reclaimed habitat.