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Here is something that may help clear all of this up for you folks. I emailed Dr. Meldrum earlier today regarding his comment that sparked the 1 in 10,000 debate. I asked him if he could elaborate a bit more about his comments about the 1 in 10,000 sightings reports are likely to be true. The following is what he wrote back to me ---- I said something to the effect that the animal most likely to be misidentified as a Sasquatch is probably a bear. In an unrelated comment on estimates of population size, concerning the rarity of Sasquatch, I indicated that there could well be 1000, perhaps even 10,000 bear for every one Sasquatch in a given state, e.g. Idaho. That was a bit of hyperbole -- Turns out Idaho has about 20,000 black bear (http://www.blackbearsociety.org/ bearPopulationbyState.html).I have suggested Idaho may have 50-75 sasquatch by my rough estimate. So that's what, 250-400 bear for each Sasquatch? The point is, Sasquatch are in all likelihood very rare and an encounter with more common wildlife is more likely and must be discounted objectively, before concluding an encounter with a Sasquatch. Hope that clears things up. Jeff Meldrum, PhD Professor of Anatomy & Anthropology Dept. of Biological Sciences Idaho State University 921 S. 8th Ave., Stop 8007 Pocatello, ID 83209-8007 It clears it up nicely for me.

In my rather short time in the BF community, I have become wayyy more skeptical. I find myself dismissing everything I see posted.But I get reports privately from people that have nothing to gain, do not want to go public...and they are 100 percent sure of what they saw. That, along with reports like Art's, makes it impossible for me to be 100 percent certain they do not exist. But those types of encounters are few and far between (meaning sighting from people I trust to be telling the truth-period - and there are others here). We are constantly bombarded with blobsquactches, outrageous stories, stumpsquatches, conspiricies....And I agree with what others have said. If someone posts a blobsquatch, then gets upset when questioned about it - that's a big red flag, IMO. You present evidence of what you think is bigfoot, to a group of your peers, what do you expect? Pats on the back? Evidence HAS to be scrutinized. If that upsets the poster, then the evidence can't stand on it's own. If proof ever does show up (a body found, etc...) I hope it's by a completely unknown to the BF Community. Well, except for maybe WVFooter, Gigantor, Nathan...

Thanks Explorer, I so sorry, but the cabin and mine area are is pretty sensitive archaeologically and just plain dangerous to get to so that I can't reveal its location in a broadcast format. The area would get run over and, frankly, I think someone would get really hurt. All I can say is that it is, in fact, in Ape Canyon. I say that because there was one piece of documentation that pointed to the idea that the cabin was actually in the next canyon to the South. However, it was a small lead and proved to not be the case. marc

What is most instructive here is that the above "quote" is actually an excerpt from the article, and not a direct quote from Dr Meldrum. Whether this was understood by dmaker when he started this thread is something I can only speculate about. Context is key in cases like this, and as Meldrum's email to Wingman1 shows, there was no context because he never made the "quoted" statement to begin with.Soooo... Five pages debating a statement that was never made. Bigfootery is nothing if not consistent.

Four of us just got back from 3 days on the Mountain with the Fall AC field work. Got the perimeter of the cabin much better defined. Metal detector found a bunch of metal in a tree near the cabin (=/- 55" Douglas Fir). The metal was deeply buried, so who knows what it is. The signals were somewhat at the base of the tree and more about 7 feet above ground. Strange. The mine location was investigated. I feel that we may have it pinned down, although there is no opening in the rock wall, except for a small 8" diameter hole, that seems to blow, indicating a void behind it. I'm thinking that the mine collapsed on its own or with earthquakes from the eruption. There is no opening this up, even if it were legal. The rocks are bigger than a volkwagen. I have an interview planned next month with a man who visited the mine in the early 1970's. Hopefully he can verify the mine location for us marc

For next year I'm going to make a few minor adjustments to my plan in post #43. 1) Instead of waiting on the huckleberries in August. I'm going to go in June/July when the water level is high and reaches the edge of the forest. And the waterfowl and their young are hiding in the brush. 2) Instead of aiming my FLIR in the direction of the power knocks I've heard before. I'm going to aim it at the meadow where I saw a bigfoot this past summer and use a different curiosity bait. 3) I'm not going to do any knocks, whistles, or calls. Just be quiet and watch the forest/waters edge during the day. 4) Keep my camera fully charged and with me from the time I wake up to the time I fall asleep. 5) If I see a bigfoot again I will not chase after it, especially at dusk. I will stay at my camp site and out of sight.

The problem isn't skeptics, it's the lack of evidence. The problem with a belief system based solely on sighting reports is apparent when you ask yourself what you don't believe. If you truly feel that Sassy exists because of unverified sighting reports then you also believe in Chupacabra, UFOs, Elves, Fairies, Dogmen, Jersey Devils etc, etc. You can't argue for the existence of Sassy solely on the strength of a sighting database yet argue against the existence of Ghosts, Wendigos, Skinwalkers, Lizardmen, Alien abductions or the like which also have their own databases. If you don't require hard evidence you believe in stories. If your belief in Sassy is rooted in the strength of an unverified database you and your arguments for existence are not relevant. You will never advance the field, you will never prove anything, you will always be disappointed in the outcome of discussions. Science and skeptics have the high ground - they admit that Sassy is possible yet unproven. Understand that although a few scientists believe in Sassy the vast majority do not and never will without verifiable samples. There has been a lot of testing recently and none of the samples returned any positive results. That doesn't mean it's impossible for Sassy to exist but it does mean that whatever sighting report the sample was collected from is suspect. It should raise even more doubts about the database itself - there is no other logical conclusion. It's frustrating to believers and skeptics alike to have hoaxers and con artists operating in this field. It's even more frustrating to have an interest in the subject and be open to the possibility of an unknown creature but have to wade through thousands of posts which argue for the existence of a creature solely on the basis of anecdotal stories alone. We all know stories don't prove existence, we all know stories will never prove existence, and we all know that anyone who continues to argue for existence based solely on stories isn't even relevant to the discussion. The problems in this field aren't caused by skeptics, they are caused by believers who don't, can't, won't get with the program. Stories won't do it, it will take evidence.