JKH: In most cases the folks who lost the fruit didn't make a effort to track the animals. Had they done so they would have found a path of footprints and dropped fruit that led to the spot in the woods the fruit was eaten, usually by and entire family of the animals. One elderly woman sat on here porch in Clarke County Alabama late one afternoon and watched as, "A big red hairy ape stole an arm full of apples off our tree and walked back into the woods, and didn't hardly pay any attention to me." She told me she saw other smaller animals like the "ape" milling around in the edge of the woods bordering the yard as the big one was stealing the apples. It was a very rural area from which generated several sighting reports. I think two of those reports, from along the same road, were included in the book.
Thanks for the kind comment.