Not Enough Wilderness In Midwest To Support Bigfoot?

[hiflier]

Hello Urkelbot,

Who said they were endangered?

[Guest DWA]

Can anyone name a species of an animal, not bigfoot, that has a range that encompasses a continent and all it's biomes. But at the same time so rare it would be considered endangered? Even the black bear doesnt have that kind of dustrubition and its much more successful than Bigfoot.

But who needs reality when you can have fantasy. People claim they saw Bigfoot so it must be so.

First time for everything right?

 

OH.

 

Homo sapiens.

 

Second time for everything, right?  And gosh, a primate too.

 

(OK, fine, we went from should-have-been-wiped-out-by-huge-predators, to ubiquitous, and we are only endangered (and oh we are) by our own stupidity.  Technicality.)

 

Um.

 

Who said they were endangered?  John Green says no way.  I'd tend to agree with him.  They may be thin in some parts of the country (so are we).  But endangered?

 

Naaaaaaah.

Any pop estimate that comes up with that is using only reported sightings.  For anything like this, count on it, reported sightings are a tiny fragment of actual encounters.

Edited October 26, 2013 by DWA

[Incorrigible1]

Let me join in the fun: Bigfoot are known to ride unicorns across the plains of Nebraska.

[Guest DWA]

Well, now, let's talk a little more about that bird.  Nebraska raises BIG chickens.

[Guest]

There have been sightings in both the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Indian reservations- both of which are very close to the Nebraska border. Pine Ridge is *on* the border). Again, there are enough sightings in the area that Finding BF deigned to do an episode there.

 

Unless you have been there and seen it, you may not realize how wooded it is! At any rate the area is not heavily populated- there being places in Nebraska where the population density is the lowest of anywhere in the lower 48.

 

However there is a pretty well-known BF sighting that was apparently caught on an Indian Casino security cam in Oklahoma. In this case the casino and reservation are well out on the flats with no woods at all- similar terrain to Nebraska. There is a Bigfoot Show podcast from several years ago that focused on this sighting. 

Using Finding Bigfoot to support your case doesn't sway me at all.  If they were actually doing research it would be one thing, but all they do is say "Dude, you totally saw a Bigfoot.  It's a known fact that they like to play a little Keno on Friday nights at the local reservation casino. Let's throw them a rave." 

 

I'm not sure where you get Nebraska has the lowest population density in the lower 48.  Sure, if you extrapolate it down, there are places with zero people living there.  By that same logic, you could say my spare bedroom has the lowest population density in the lower 48.  No one has been in there for months, at least. 

 

Maybe the sasquatch were just as ellusive and did their best to avoid humans a mere 100-200 years ago like they do now. <?>

 

The lack of overwhelming reports from a sparse number of early settlers shouldn't be a massive surprise.

So now lack of reports is evidence to support existence as well?

[Guest DWA]

Using Finding Bigfoot to support your case doesn't sway me at all.  If they were actually doing research it would be one thing, but all they do is say "Dude, you totally saw a Bigfoot.  It's a known fact that they like to play a little Keno on Friday nights at the local reservation casino. Let's throw them a rave."

 

The Bigfoot Show is not "Finding Bigfoot."  It's Brian Brown's (bipto) podcast.  NAWAC is very interested in the OK video Salubrious cites; they examined and have up on their site photos from OK for which I haven't seen a suitable alternative explanation.  And as to BFRO:  "Finding Bigfoot" isn't research, it's TV.  But to go to an area because one is aware of a concentration of sightings?  Well, BFRO would be aware of it, and the TV show (and all the other drama they apparently generate) isn't their sum and substance.  Barackman, for one, is positively slumming on that show; I take him rather seriously.

 

I'm not sure where you get Nebraska has the lowest population density in the lower 48.  Sure, if you extrapolate it down, there are places with zero people living there.  By that same logic, you could say my spare bedroom has the lowest population density in the lower 48.  No one has been in there for months, at least. 

 

Well, lowest or not, there is a LOT of NE "with zero people living there."  Last couple times I've been there, I considered possibly moving there; and I can assure you there is NOTHING else about NE that would make me consider that.

 

So now lack of reports is evidence to support existence as well?

 

Well, I thought he was saying that to expect - from a relative trickle of settlers with much else on their minds - reports of something that has been viewed as mythical since the very beginnings of European settlement of this continent, and considering THAT proof of non-existence, ain't exactly Science either.

Edited October 26, 2013 by DWA

[GuyInIndiana]

So now lack of reports is evidence to support existence as well?

 

No. It simply proves nothing, in any context, for either side of a debate.

 

 

Well, I thought he was saying that to expect - from a relative trickle of settlers with much else on their minds - reports of something that has been viewed as mythical since the very beginnings of European settlement of this continent, and considering THAT proof of non-existence, ain't exactly Science either.

 

Broadly, sure.

[Incorrigible1]

An estimated 350,000 westward-bound travelers traversed the Great Platte River Road between 1841 and 1866. Those numbers are not a "relative trickle."

[Guest DWA]

You're right.

 

THAT'S A VERY LITERAL TRICKLE.

 

How many saw massive birds?  Can't confuse those with a human either (which probably happened with the two hundred or so sasquatch sightings that undoubtedly occurred).

I don't understand why they haven't been tracked after snowfall. Out west a creature could hold up in areas that have no snowfall like the Pacific coastal bush. Or they could take advantage of altitude and reside in vast forests beyond the reach of snowmobilers, skiers, snowshoers. How would they do that in the midwest? How would they not leave tracks in the snow that outdoorsmen could find and follow? It would seem, given the amount of snow and relatively tame topography, someone would have followed tracks to more evidence.

Two BFROers (can't remember names) went back day after finding a trackway in snow to check on it.  An SUV was parked in the tracks with its oblivious occupants playing around it.

 

Most people won't think twice about such tracks.  Some hunters might.  Most won't report it.  And that of course is presuming they even find them.

Oh, and most people - even the most experienced wildlife biologists - won't follow tracks far enough to find more evidence.

Edited October 26, 2013 by DWA

[salubrious]

I'm not sure where you get Nebraska has the lowest population density in the lower 48. 

 

It doesn't- Wyoming state-wide has the lowest population density in the lower 48; what I wrote was that **portions** of Nebraska have population densities that are the lowest in the lower 48. I suspect most of those places are in western Nebraska.

[Branco]

An estimated 350,000 westward-bound travelers traversed the Great Platte River Road between 1841 and 1866. Those numbers are not a "relative trickle."

And, had any of those travelers actually seen a BF, they would have reported it to ..............? Cell phone service was a dud. No hills for towers.

 

I bet the Nebraska Bigfoot clans enjoyed watching that migration. Probably watching the show from behind those three cottonwood trees - now a state forest - trying to figure out why everyone was migrating in the wrong direction. (The vast herds of unicorns were probably more entertaining to the travelers anyway. Daytime grazers I bet.)

[hiflier]

Hello All,

 

That plays out to an average of about 1,200 a month over the 25 years between 1841 and 1866. California in it's recent past had a migration into the state of 1,000 a DAY. If the routes didn't take the people through the "Three Cottonwoods National Forest" that Branco mentioned? Well, then..... 

 

But it's all speculation really. There COULD have been as many as FIVE cottonwoods which would have hidden an even larger population.

Edited October 27, 2013 by hiflier

[southernyahoo]

Hello All,

 

That plays out to an average of about 1,200 a month over the 25 years between 1841 and 1866. 

 

That would be about the most boring parade. You'd see a covered horse drawn buggy about once per hour with two or more people in it. 

[hiflier]

Hello southernyahoo,

 

Yep.....<YAWN> I imaging there were times when thousands crossed in a week just to make the Continental Divide before winter set in though. I don't belittle the flat terrain WRT Sasquatch being relatively scarce but I do consider the argument for "no" to be a bit weak. It's as I've seen written. A skeptic ALSO has the burden of proof to bear as well.

[Guest]

It doesn't- Wyoming state-wide has the lowest population density in the lower 48; what I wrote was that **portions** of Nebraska have population densities that are the lowest in the lower 48. I suspect most of those places are in western Nebraska.

Yes, I know what you posted.  But you can extrapolate everything down far enough.  It's like those that say "if West Virginia were flattened out, it would be bigger than Texas."  Yes, it would, unless Texas were flattened out too.  And then the argument goes on, about what scale do you flatten it to?  It can go on indefinitely.

 

I hold true to my statement that my spare bedroom is the most unpopulated place on this planet.  You could make the same argument for places in Central Park in NYC or parts of Antarctica as well.  You are talking about fairly small tracts of land without human inhabitants.  Try tracts of land larger than states and then tell me which holds better habitat.