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Dunno, but there was a lot of reference to his incredible strength, viciousness, and willingness to fight. That entire chapter of Sykes book clearly shows that he was impressed. His thought of an unknown line of Africans leaving the Dark Continent over 100,000 years ago, migrating east, and sparsely populating wild areas where the competition with us was lower makes all the sense in the world. That would have given small populations of them at least two or three Beringia openings to migrate to the New World in small numbers.

In The Nature of the Beast Sykes starts off with a chapter on "the last Neanderthal". It's a fictional imagination of the death of the last Neandeerthal man. He explains that this reality has captures his imagination, he always wanted to write a book on the subject, and this new found interest in extant hominins us his expression of that last Neanderthal. I believe we are living during the era of the final decline and extinction of sasquatches. This decline has been ongoing, but the point of no return is imminent. I'm guessing that the species has perhaps a century or three left worldwide. I also believe government knows this and is simply letting it happen. It's similar to the new attitude toward forest fires; let it burn and focus on saving structures if possible. Let nature run its course. Of course, since these creatures might be able to successfully mate with us, their full extinction can be averted, but the Zana story shows that her hybrid children are so close to being like everybody else that they're just considered strange people, which we have aplenty anyway. Government might have already stored their dna, anyway. I've heard conspiracy theories of UFO crafts and extraterrestrial carcasses and live prisoners at facilities at Area 51 and Wright-Patterson AFB since the early 1970's, so who knows? When you're talking about government, nothing can be discounted. The discovery of the gorilla in 1856, combined with the Darwin publications of 1859 and 1871 of On the Origin of Species and The Descent of Man, pretty much deflated the balloon you're thinking of. The Scopes Monkey Trials culminated the revolution started by Darwin with the transfer of power government acquired from religion in 1925; primary education. From that point forward, some 95 years now, there has been no looking back. In essence, religion is going extinct faster than sasquatches are. An extant primitive human species will be a flash in the religious pan amounting to nothing.

As we see in this area of SW WA, the State owns a lot of the forest to the West of the Gifford Pinchot national forest. . State forest was what was logged and displaced my bigfoot group in my research area. Logging swept through the area and very little was not clearcut. Several very popular hiking, biking, and horse riding trails were completely cleared of timber. No attempts were made to create forested corridors along the trails. Because of the location away from the Seattle area environmental interests, it largely went unnoticed without protest. It was basically a demonstration of state greed. The only place that was not clear cut was a 10 acre patch of forest that was designated Special Forest Management Area. That just happened to be the epicenter of all bigfoot activity in my research area. I asked the state about the area and never received an answer. I can well imagine that if the state knew of the presence of BF in that section of forest, they did not want it known and prevent the logging. If the 10 acre plot was an attempt to protect the BF residents, it was not enough. When the clear cutting ended, the plot was completely surrounded by clear cut and movement in and out of the 10 acre plot had no cover. Within days of the last logging, all signs of BF activity ended. Before that I was finding footprints about every other month and having contact with the family group. I have no idea where they went. I suspect East into the Gifford Pinchot but have no evidence of that. Certainly there is far less logging in the National Forest.

One thing and a couple of events have suggested to me that if the existence of BF is known, and they become a trophy kill for some segment of our society, BF will not simply let it quietly happen. They are near human enough that they will retaliate. No one armed or not would be safe in the woods or anyplace BF are close to. I wonder if some of the missing hunters are missing because they took a shot at BF. The government may even know how BF reacts, and decided that not admitting existence is the best course to take.

I think the two criteria that were important to me are no glow and the distance a picture or video can be captured called the detection range. The FOV angle can be important as well so be sure you know whether it is a narrow or wide focus. My preference is Stealth Cam, and I have the 4K and G45NG models, but I wouldn't hesitate to get a Browning Dark Ops HD. Reconyx is the trailcam of professionals but they are so expensive I didn't see the value for the money spent. As far as preserving the pictures that are taken so they are not stolen or destroyed, I think you have four options: 1) Use a Trailcam metal box with a thick cable 2) Put it 11'+ on a tree or 3) Camouflage it 4) Get a wireless model if it will be in an area with cell service I think options #2 and #4 are the best but I didn't have climbing gear to get up in a tree and there is no cell service where I go. I've never had an issue with bears, although some do, so didn't consider it in my decision. I chose to camo mine because i thought a sasquatch would more likely see the metal box and cable before it saw a camo'd trailcam. As far as camo'ing it, I think you need to identify the exact tree you will put it on and then match the hatch. If it is going on an oak tree, get some oak bark from a downed tree. This website does a pretty good job of explaining various aspects of a trailcam and also offers good reviews. Once you know which models you are interested in, you can get a good deal if you are patient. I got great deals on my StealthCams at Dicks Sporting Goods. https://www.trailcampro.com/pages/trail-camera-tests Here is a picture of a Stealth 4K I camo'd that is sitting next to a chainsaw bear at home. Tomorrow, I'm doing an overnight and it's getting put up in my favorite location. When it is positioned up on a tree with braches of pine needles near it, it is very difficult to see. If I wasn't concerned with night-time videos, I could have put bark over the IR emitters and really gotten it near impossible to see. It's also important to camo the strap that goes around the tree otherwise it will giveaway the location. You can add velcro strips to the strap then velcro on pieces of bark to it.

Formal discovery would be a absolute disaster on so many levels. I've been out in the woods a lot lately and in order to get to some of my destinations I have to backpack part of the way on recognized trails. Lots of families out with their very young kids. Does anyone really think that mom is going to skip along the trail with kiddies in tow if she knew she had now stepped into the area where King Kong really lives? The family ventures into the forest would all but disappear. They would be replaced by the knuckleheads who gotta to git me one of them-thar squatches. The forest would sound like your local shooting range. Then, of course, the government would step in and have to control vast swaths of land in every respect. Forget life as you knew it as it relates to recreating in the forest. It would no longer exist. That, and the unending predation of sasquatches that would commence, are the reasons I want things to stay exactly the way they are. The formal recognition of sasquatches will spell their ultimate demise.

Good thread and good discussion, gentlemen. I have nothing to add right now, but will follow with interest.

The uproar in North America over the discovery of the gorilla in the mid 1850's, and then Charles Darwin publishing On the Origin of Species in 1859 and The Descent of Man in 1871, was in itself like a bombshell. Another existing human species would be almost as Earth shattering as extraterrestrial visitors.

Actually, before I asked I ran a search of the forum using the word "discovery" within thread titles only. There weren't many appropriate threads, and only a couple of short ones even addressed my questions. I don't want to derail this thread with further advances into this subject, but my mind is turning towards either resurrecting one of those earlier threads or starting a new one. Your answers deserve wide, regular, and recurring thought and discussion. However, in short, the preservation of large parcels of public lands for a non-political hominin by a government made up of homo sapiens in the current political environment brings up so many potential political problems that the understanding of why government wants these creatures to remain undiscovered becomes more than obvious.