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I see where you're going ... Yep. That. My great grandfather would never let us kill a porcupine or grouse because they were slow and "dumb" enough that a person in an emergency situation could kill one and stay alive ... basically leaving the emergency rations on the table. We also seldom hunted right at home, we left the pet yard deer alone though occasionally using the does as live decoys to draw in big "stranger" bucks that wandered by once the rut started. Interestingly enough, as my father has gotten older and less able to roam far distances, he becomes ever more willing to plug a deer on the lawn (legally) ... sort of what we're saying the BF might do as their abilities to hunt afar are taxed by weather, injury, illness, or old age. Y' don't have to think about this too long before you start to realize they're doing exactly what we would, or do, do, when confronted with the same situations, limitations, and opportunities. "Hmmm." Yep. I don't have a right label, but that's the general "flavor." Something capable of our level of intelligence yet very seldom employing even stone-age level of technology. (I say seldom, not never, because they seem capable of borrowing at least some of our tools and understanding how to use them at times.) It's an interesting dichotomy causing some people great heartburn when the binary world view they hold is confronted with something that refuses to fit. MIB

I agree in full, and I'll go you one just a bit further - it hit me that the side of the mountain we were on had tons of deer - and they were there hunting and watering. At our feet was a huge valley with a few large valleys offshooting from the big one, and these things were full of deer. On the other side of the mountain - another really huge valley - lots of water and most likely tons of deer. I got the impression they lived on the steeper side, but came over during the Spring, Summer, and Fall to hunt outside their home valley. The purpose is to not disturb the game close to their lower elevation crib - enabling them more ready access when everything was snowed in. That's done by many outfield settlers in Alaska. They'll go afar to hunt during late Spring through the first snows - and not bother the game closer to their cabin - enabling shorter winter hunting distances. So for them to be seen more frequently on ridges - it may be because they're 1.) skylighted easier, and 2.) they're crossing from their "home" area to hunt the other side of a mountain or ridge - "saving" the game on their side for winter hunts. I hold that these things are some primitive man. Not human - certainly not ape - but a primitive, cave-man-type man. Smart, clever, and thinking.

At this point I've jumped off the migration bandwagon if, by "migration" you mean long distance seasonal travel. I do think they relocate within their range seasonally but it's a much shorter trip, probably 20-50 miles, not the hundreds I used to surmise. So .. why the change of heart? Deeper study of the report data. What I saw was a long, somewhat thin. concentration of reports along a long mountain range. It seemed to end at a location which has a long history. Such a migration, mapped in time, should present a traveling wave of sightings ... and it didn't. Instead the activity "fired off" from one end of the range to another across well over 1000 miles. That's too far for weather change or other seasonal factors to affect all at once as well because the range runs N-S. The only thing that makes any sense is an astronomical trigger, something that appears simultaneously at all latitudes. Further study later also showed that there's a spike of activity at the south end of the area in mid summer, exactly out of phase with the presumed migration. Today I suspect that there are "migrations" up and downhill, changes in elevation to take advantage of resources or avoid weather, but the actual distance traveled is pretty short. This makes a lot of sense because it would mean that the Cascades where I am could have the same general pattern as the Rockies where it's pretty much too far for even a bigfoot to travel to get out of the snow. Interestingly enough, away from the mountains themselves, the number of sightings stays pretty constant year around whether it's 90 degrees or approaching 10 below suggesting extreme adaptation to variable climate ... so long as food is accessible. For now, I'd say there are "bands", for lack of a better word, which stay in the same general area but move up or down in elevation to follow food. It doesn't stop there. Some of the habituators I have worked with say that their local "band" is there most of the year fairly constantly but that at certain times of the year, or sometimes every second or third year, the same small group of traveling 'foots, probably sub adult and young adult males, pass through. They're often recognizable and predictable in their timing. I note that that would be a useful behavioral adaptation for a small, spread out population to keep the genes mixing. I don't think anyone knows for sure, though, that's just my current interpretation of behavior, timing, data, etc. I changed my mind once before, I may change it again. MIB

Ah my friend, gotta be crazy to be here!

Close the thread. Nothing to see here. Move along.