2009 “Champ Video” Compared To Swimming Animals
Posted by: Loren Coleman on June 2nd, 2009
The following is mookiebone’s video of something in Lake Champlain at Oakledge Park, Vermont, taken on Sunday, May 31, 2009, at about 5:30 am Eastern. No claims have been made that this is the Lake Champlain Monster or Champ, although my information is that the media is investigating this as a “Champ video.”
Furthermore, in many ways, this video fits into the overall more mammalian description of Champ that I deduced from my investigations, and have spoken of in The Field Guide to Lake Monsters, Sea Serpents, and Other Mystery Denizens of the Deep.
Please note, if video’s embedding has been disabled, find the video here.
Compared to an “unknown animal” taped swimming across a small river, March 31, 2007 in Northern Maine.
Other known animals swimming in creeks, rivers, and lakes.
UPDATE
The name and background of the 37-year-old individual who took the footage has been revealed and enhanced enlarged photos have been added to the greatly revised posting, “Media and Others Take Closer Look At ‘Champ Video’” of June 3rd. Please examine those images, and leave comments there, if you wish.
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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.
What’s interesting when you compare the “Champ” video and the video of Moose and Deer swimming is that the moose or deer always keeps its head well above the water. The object in the Champ video seems to almost completely submerge at several points (ex. 1:27). If it’s a non-aquatic mammal like a deer or moose, it is really struggling to swim and keep afloat.
I doubt it’s a deer or moose, but it could still be a beaver or some other aquatic mammal. Hard to tell without anything to use for scale.
There is also a vertical stationary object in the water that the moving object swims in front of at 0:45. What is that? A post of some kind? This could help give scale.
It is also hard to judge what this object might be without a sense of how deep the water is. Could the moving object be walking on the lake bed at some parts of the video when it is highest out of the water?
After watching the videos of the moose (mooses? meese?), I have to say that I think the Champ video most closely resembles a swimming moose. I’m dismayed that the video seems to show the animal swimming toward shore but then it ends right before it would have reached shallower water. Convenient? I don’t know. I’m just saying…
Something seems to be breaking the surface of the water well behind the object. I would have though this was floating debris or a very tired, desperate large animal trying to get to land. The trailing humps, I think we can call it that, are just too weird. Who knows.
Actually, moose are quite adept at swimming and submerging. Reportedly they can dive up to fifteen feet to feed at the bottom; think grazing under water.
Yes, knowing the depth (or depths?) would help. It looks like it was trundling along in the shallows and then hit a deeper spot.
I agree with Scarfe, the “post”, buoy or whatever the object swims by should be measured to give us some scale. The water depth can easily determined with any fish finder / sonar unit. This would give us some actual data.
After viewing these comparison videos, I think the subject of the “2009 Champ video” is a young deer. There aren’t any antlers visible, and it seems not to be a very smooth swimmer. Maybe it is an inexperienced swimmer. It seems to struggle to keep its head above water through most of the video, and only appears to completely submerge near the end of the sequence, very briefly. Also, as others have pointed out, it seems to be swimming very decidedly toward shore. As for the brief glimpse of some other body part breaking the surface well behind the head, could this be one or both of the fully extended back legs? Again, it does not appear to be a confident swimmer, so I’m ruling out otter, beaver, or other mammals which are quite at home in the water, and don’t mind swimming under the surface.
Eirman- Plural for Moose is Moose, just like Deer-Deer. On that note, my personal favorite incorrect Moose Plural is “moosen”
My vote is still for Moose.
It just doesn’t look like a deer or other cervidae to me. If I had to vote I’d go with some sort of reptile, like a monitor. But it could be biased because I just got a savannah monitor and have had monitors on the brain.