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I've heard something a couple times that .. just didn't fit. Once it was like kids giggling but moving at crazy speed through brush without any thrashing or crashing. I'm at a loss. One was like 3 pre-teen boys yelling back and forth. As they got nearer my location, they also got closer to each other. They passed me, in brush, at about 75 yards. They seemed to be within arms distance of each other but were still yelling. That was weird. In the middle of that was another sound which reminded me of elk "cow talk." Couldn't see them through the brush. Sounded like a tonal language .. sort of like my Japanese neighbor. Big question: what three pre-teen Asian kids were doing up there alone. No cars but mine at the trailhead, 5+ miles, 1700 foot climb, 500 foot drop .. bit of snow on the ground. Doesn't make much sense. One .. I thought was a younger girl "shushing" a dog just around a sharp corner in the trail ahead of me. Basically came around the corner expecting to want to step off the trail and give them space so I didn't get bitten. There was nobody there. Nobody ahead, nobody behind, nobody to the sides, empty woods and trail. Again .. I'm at a loss. I think there's a psychological thing going on here. I think this happens to a lot of people, but if it does not fit into a nice pigeonhole, we don't know what to do with it so it gets forgotten by normal people, it's only weirdos like me who don't sweep inconveniences under the mental carpet so as not to have to deal with discomfort of uncertainty. I don't think not remembering means it hasn't happened to you, it means you didn't have a comfortable category to put it in so you swept it aside and have "forgotten". MIB

There is very good reason to define them as different species. No male Y chromosome Neanderthal DNA exists today. Why? Because male hybrids were sterile. Females at least some where not. Just like mules typically are sterile, but not always. Does it make sense than Bigfoot would have speech and not fire or stone tools? It doesn’t to me. I would chalk this one up with the fish trap. Does Bigfoot have a hyoid bone? We have no idea until we have a specimen.

Don’t feel bad, many of us Canadians still can’t even board a domestic flight (or get our jobs back). Should you ever make the trip, you’re welcome to stay on our property in Prince George.

Not as spiffy as NorthWind's fancy new truck, but I've got new wheels (again lol). I'm the happy owner of a new-to-me Ford Escape. Looking forward to fixing her up a bit. We took her on our adventuring yesterday and she did well. She's big enough to camp in, just in time for our upcoming night squatching adventure in 2 weeks (stay tuned!). Welcome "Indigo", or "Indy-go!"

The Yentna region is a great investment. It's still remote enough to be like the old Alaska, but the Mat-Su Borough is planning to open it up more. https://www.susitnarivercoalition.org/west-susitna-mining-rd Lots of private property opportunities. Still lots of bears, both black and brown.

The Yentna. I’ve looked at property online up there. I think it’s remote properties Alaska. But the Yukon would be cool too. But they are not going to open Canada to me anytime soon. And I cannot afford the ferry rates. They have a sockeye snagging season on the Kootenay this fall we are gonna check out.

Here's another admirer of your rig. It wouldn't be as practical here in Alaska with our limited number of accessible backroads, but that would be the ultimate for western U.S. backroads. I'm jealous!

Valid point. This would make Neanderthals a different species, and a lack of the mystery sasquatch marker (if, indeed, there is such a lack) in the native American gene pool would indicate that sasquatches are a different species. There is plenty of testimony and even recordings of sasquatch chatter that sounds like speech, and testimony that indicates that they speak to each other. Limited tool manufacture and tool use is not a factor in species identification, in my opinion. They simply don't need specialty tools. Throwing rocks and using crude clubs appears to be all they need. AFAIC, the fish trap is evidence of a poacher, not a sasquatch, but a crude fish trap is entirely possible, easy to manufacture, and leaves no endurable archeological evidence. Regarding hyoid bones: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyoid_bone Caribou have hyoid bones. I can't remember if moose and bears have one, but I believe they do.

This shows the big problem I have with BFRO. They only release 1 in 15 cases (~ 7%). Put them all out there and let the people decide. OK, they can hold the ones they are actively investigating or seem promising. If they do not feel that a report is credible, then put a flag on it saying so, but let the people at least see it. Maybe, just maybe, someone else in that area had a similar experience and could help collaborate it.

No question the $1,000 price tag is very attractive. If I were looking again, I'd look at the price point where it jumps up to get additional specs or features. Then I would decide whether the additional investment is worth it or not. No right or wrong answer as we all have our own criterion. Looking at the specs, I would assume the native (base) magnification is 1x and you can digitally zoom to 4x. Without having really looked at any thermals lately let's compare it to a Pulsar Axion XM30F. The resolution is only 320x240 compared to the BFRO S243 of 384x288. The native magnification is 3x and you can digitally zoom 4x for a total of 12x. The key feature here is a the native magnication of 3x. You're seeing a resolution of 320x240 at three times size that you see something at 384x288. To see the same image size with the S243, you'll need to digitally zoom the optical zoom of 1x which then begins to degrade the image quality. With that said, you have to consider your field of view (FOV). The higher the native magnification the more narrow the view. You have to determine whether a vide FOV is important. For me, I am always in a forest and am looking for something peeking behind behind a tree or crawling on the ground. I want as high a native magnification as poossible so a small heat signature will be seen by me. This comes at the cost of having to move your thermal left and right more than if you started with a wider FOV. I think the XM30F prices out at around $1,500 which is a 50% increase in cost. Worth it? That's for each buyer to assess for themselves. Moreover, I arbitrarily chose the Axion XM30F model and there are many others to consider as well. Here is a video where he explains base magnification and then shows videos using different base magnifications. You can see how it plays, or doesn't play, into the scenarios you expect to be in when using your thermal imager. The 50-yard test is at 3:30 and the 100-yard test is at 5:00.

I carry a years old Zoom H2 digital recorder. It is good enough and moderately priced. Early in my field work I missed an incredible opportunity to record a couple of approaching BF because I fumbled turning the recorder into record mode. I heard the BF whooping at each other as they traveled in my direction. I thought it did not start and pressed the record button a second time which took it out of record mode. I missed recording the whoops back and forth, the thud of when the nearest went into a crouch, and the rapid wood knock that the nearest made to warn the other. Learning from that experience I decided to pack mount the recorder and have it recording in a moderate sample rate where I could record all the time I was in the field. It is mounted on top of the pack right on a camera mount screw right behind my head. I get some pack noise but not much breath noise with it back there. I run it in stereo mode which helps trying to figure out where a noise came from when I wear earphones for play back. Because of the hours of recording I normally restart every couple of hours to have shorter files. I also use a digital visualizer to be able to find an sound of interest when I play back. Talking to yourself after a sound event helps to find the segment of interest. Most external mikes of good quality have their own batteries which increases the chance of battery problems. So I prefer to use the integrated recorder mikes. I figured that would cover pretty much everything that could happen but I was wrong. One time I parked at my normal parking place at the hot spot for my research area. My routine was to get out of the vehicle, walk to the passenger side, turn on the pack mounted recorder, then put on the pack, lock the truck and leave. This time I had drunk a DIet Coke before leaving home, had to pee really bad when I got to my research area, walked to the cover of the passenger side of the vehicle which was on the side away from the road, and started peeing. All hell broke loose behind me from the tree line. A BF watching me, took offense to me brazenly peeing in front of it, and did the great ape chest slapping thing. If I had not already been peeing I would probably have wet myself. Anyway I missed that opportunity too. After that I would turn on the recorder before getting out of the drivers seat, leave the drivers door open, walk around, put on the pack then lock up the truck. So my best advice is to run the recorder as much as you possibly can and hope you do not miss something. .

Maiden voyage! (Just on property in Newport) It rides nicer than the K5…

I decided to explore La Ventana Wilderness in Monterey County California in early April. There are only 4 BRFO reports (in the SSR database) for Monterey County in California but I have heard of other non-public reports. I have never visited this wilderness area before. Attached below is a Google Earth image snip with the 4 BFRO Reports plotted (3 orange dots and 1 yellow dot) to put in the context the route I took. I went backpacking into the Ventana Wilderness via the route shown in the attached map. It was a 3 nights and 4 days backpack. The first night was spent at Vicente Flat campground which was next to a creek. The campground had lots of people ~15. The second night was spent at Goat Camp (a beautiful location with creeks north and south and view of the ocean). Only saw 3 other people there. On the 3rd day, we took a long day hike to Cone Peak and back, and spent the last night at Limekiln creek. This is not a campground, but we crashed on a wash on the creek (see photo). We saw no large wildlife (deer, coyote, etc.). Did not even see squirrels! Saw snakes, bluebirds, and numerous other birds. I used my audio recorder the first 2 nights, and there were plenty of barred owls and other type of owls. No unusual sounds were detected. On the 3rd night by the creek, the creek sound was too loud to record anything so I did not record. I took my big thermal imager and tripod all the way up to Goat Camp and back and did not use it. I did not use it because my strategy was to keep it in my tent off until I heard some anomalous sound. Then I will turn it on, scan the area and mount it on tripod. Neither I nor my buddy (who does not believe in BF nor cares about looking for it) heard any weird sounds during all 3 nights. I did this trip because I wanted to explore deep into the Ventana wilderness and see the different ecosystems. We saw diverse types of vegetation (chaparral, cypress, live oaks, redwoods, sugar pines) and also grass and lupine meadows. There was plenty of water in those creeks up there. I saw no sign of BF in all in the areas we visited. I don't know if BF is still present in the coastal areas south of Monterey. This wilderness area gets lots of visitors in the spring (after rainy season and before the hot summer). The whole trail had poison oak all along the way. We took Tecnu and washed every time we thought we touched the plants. While I did not get any rash while I was there, I did get hit with a poison oak rash on my left arm after I got home. Whole left arm is full of blisters and swollen. Probably won't hike again in coastal areas with poison oak anymore since I am extremely allergic.

Sasquatch is a flesh and blood undiscovered bipedal primate. Either a great ape or a type of human. The answer is obvious. And the only reason the species has yet to be scientifically documented is due to a concerted effort among the U.S. and Canadian governments to maintain the status quo. Neither confirm nor deny existence.

If its not ours, and its not our adversaries? WHO? The tic tac was pulling 1000 g’s, our airframes are capable of 15 g’s. Lets say our super top secret stuff is twice as good? 30 g’s? 😬 Not much of a embellishment. Unless your argument is they are meteorites that turn.