Cascades Carnivore Project - How Do They Miss The Bigfoots?

[Guest Kane2002]

I feel the reason that they miss BF is because there are **** few BF and they are scattered. On another post DDA gave pretty good reasoning why he felt there were fewer than 200 in the State of Washington. I echo his thoughts.

Edited May 4, 2011 by Kane2002

[Guest CaptainMorgan]

Hi Kane,

I tend to agree with your statement, although we really don't know to what extent if any they migrate or have territories. These numbers are probably in constant flux.

If in fact there are a few as 200 (or as many) creatures across an entire state, then the population density in relation to vastness certainly has merit.

Hows things in Snohomish? You gettin in the woods yet?

Edited May 4, 2011 by CaptainMorgan

[Guest]

Why wait? You thought Kit's false premise was ok. I think you have the cart before the horse here. Make a statement re bigfoot and game cams based on a premise. People will chime in if the premise isn't kosher. It doesn't need to be ridiculously complicated. It just can't be false. That's all.

OK, if we set the premise that the "bigfoot" described in the sum of anecdotal accounts in the BFRO database accurately reflects what bigfoots are and where they generally occur, then we can say the following about such creatures:

* they are large, hairy, bipedal primates without any obvious material culture

* they occur in rural, usually forested, areas across the U.S. and southern Canada, perhaps reaching their greatest abundance in the Pacific Northwest (> 1100 reports from WA, OR, and CA)

*they are omnivorous

*they at least occasionally approach human settlements and suburban areas

Is this a false premise? If so, help me craft what is a "true" premise about bigfoot.

[Guest Kane2002]

Hey Cap, Snohomish is pretty quiet. It has been a long time since the scream. I have been out a few days in between rain squalls looking for shrooms and tracks. The schrooms are late this year, and no tracks. We need a few more days of sunshine to warm up the ground. The swans and snow geese have left Fir Island for the Northlands and the rivers are still running pretty full. To much water for my kind of trout fishing. I did get some nice photos of coyote tracks in the snow that I will post here sometime in the near future.

Back to the no game photos of BF. I really think that most of the BF people see are young males looking for their own stomping grounds and mates. Like most young males I feel they are driven out by older alpha type males and are on their own. As they pass through a few people spot them but then they move on. That may explain their erratic actions. No set patterns. Dumpster diving? Why not, maybe they are hungry. Actually it seems that few females are seen. How many since Patty? Since the males don't stick around to long they miss the photo opps. Just my thoughts.

Edited May 4, 2011 by Kane2002

[Guest]

OK, if we set the premise that the "bigfoot" described in the sum of anecdotal accounts in the BFRO database accurately reflects what bigfoots are and where they generally occur, then we can say the following about such creatures:

* they are large, hairy, bipedal primates without any obvious material culture

* they occur in rural, usually forested, areas across the U.S. and southern Canada, perhaps reaching their greatest abundance in the Pacific Northwest (> 1100 reports from WA, OR, and CA)

*they are omnivorous

*they at least occasionally approach human settlements and suburban areas

Is this a false premise? If so, help me craft what is a "true" premise about bigfoot.

I'm surprised that you aren't smellin' what I'm cookin'. But if you feel comfortable relying on the BFRO database to describe a sasquatch then fill your boots. But I'm out. A legit premise, however, does not rely on the BFRO for anything. JMHO.

[kitakaze]

On what basis were they "strategically placed"? Was care taken to ensure a viable sampling of remote areas as well as human-accessable ones?

They most certainly did not shoot their entire effort in the foot by going where it was easiest to get to. From the Forest Carnivore Monitoring on the Gifford Pinchot National Forest: Year 1 and 2 Progress Report...

Methods

Presence for distribution and occupancy estimation was determined by the detection of a carnivore at a remote survey station. The study areas were overlaid with a grid system of four-mi2 survey units based upon Aubry and Jagger (2006). One to four survey stations were located in each unit containing high quality habitat. Station locations were based on a variety of criteria including locations of anecdotal sightings, topographical features that favor wildlife movement such as ridgeline saddles and game trails, and desirable habitat such meadows, talus slopes, cliff bases, and riparian areas. Where practical, stations were situated near locations of surveys conducted on the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in 1997 and 1998 (McCreary 1997, Patt and Burtelow 1998). Each station was baited, scented, and equipped with a remotely triggered camera for photographic detections and a hair snagging device for DNA sampling (Figure 1). A variety of remotely triggered film camera models were used including the Highlander Photoscout, StealthCam, Moultrie Feeder Game Cam, and Trailmaster, and the Wildview Xtreme digital camera from February to November.2008. These yielded varying degrees of reliability. Camera models we switched to Reconyx (PC85, PM75, and RC55 models) and Cuddeback (NoFlash and Capture IR models) only starting in December 2008. These are reliable cameras that yielded a high number of good quality digital photographs and video. Various bait was employed including Canada goose, chicken, fish, road-kill deer, and winter-killed elk, and Caven’s Gusto and Violator 7 call scent lures were used. Bait was usually wrapped in chicken wire to reduce the speed with which it was eaten. It was wired to tree at a height of 2.5 to 3.0 feet. The tree containing the bait was located ten to fifteen feet from that with the camera. The hair snagging device was a belt of wire brushes affixed around the tree four to six inches below the bait (Figure 1). Hair from carnivores attracted to the bait was snagged on one or several brushes. Hair samples were collected by unscrewing brushes from the snagging device and storing them in separate envelopes with desiccant. Potential Cascade red fox samples were sent to the Veterinary Genetics Laboratory at the University of California, Davis and potential wolverine samples were sent to the Wildlife Genetics Laboratory at the USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station in Missoula, Montana. In addition, we opportunistically followed wildlife tracks and collected scat samples. These samples are currently being stored frozen for future analysis.

They are going where the animals are, which is where Bigfoot is going to be if Bigfoot wants to eat.

Lucky them...how long did it take to get the giant squid on film? DECADES of a lot more intensive effort than this. And there are likely a LOT more giant squid than BF.

We've had specimens of Architeuthis examined by scientists since the 1860's. It's a terrible analogy.

Researchers limited in the amount and type of ground they can cover.

You seriously need to come out of the insulated reality your desire to believe in Bigfoot creates for you. Look at this video of the real wildlife work that biologists do...

http://www.opb.org/programs/ofg/segments/view/1532

These people are in helicopters going wherever they need to go to find the animals. They go all over the mountain ranges spotting for footprints. If Bigfoot is there, it is going to be found by these people.

No, it's safe to say that: 1) they probably haven't been caught on game cameras and 2)the possibility that they may have been but the photos withheld cannot be ruled out either.

This is the sort of irrational insular paranoid thinking that arises in belief culture when the facts threaten those beliefs. For the CCP and GP Task Force cool and rare animals are good business. This is a conservation effort. Animals like Wildy here...

...bring public interest and also increased funding with it. Bigfoot being real would be a dream come true for wildlife biologists and the thinking that they would surpress such evidence as the images we see for rare animals like Wildy is simply irrational.

If/when the circumstances are right they MAY approach human civilization. The one or ones hanging out around my friend's house in the mid-lat 00s were probably drawn in by a water source.

By the anecotal evidence, Bigfoots regularly go into human civilization year after year and never once has this led to a holotype for Bigfoot. It's as unreal as paranormal Bigfoots.

[Guest]

I'm surprised that you aren't smellin' what I'm cookin'.

I can smell it, but it smells stale 'cause I've been asking for years for somebody here to serve me up something fresh along these lines. If the premise I described is false, then by all means suggest additions/deletions.

[Guest]

I can smell it, but it smells stale 'cause I've been asking for years for somebody here to serve me up something fresh along these lines. If the premise I described is false, then by all means suggest additions/deletions.

I have, you just ain't smellin' it.

[gigantor]

It does not matter, because the forest monitoring efforts are documenting all the large mammals in the area, including the ones that don't eat meat...

Kit, where did you get this pic from? it certainly is NOT from the Gifford Pinchot Task Force web site. It seems to be from some blog...

And do you dismiss all the reports of Bigfoot sucking down deer livers, raccoons, marmots, fish, throwing pigs, horses, cows, etc?

Yes

[Guest Kane2002]

Well I think Sas is sincere and is on the right track with his suppositions. The problem with us adding anything is that we know so little. I would like to add that in most of the alleged BF tracks recorded their toes are splayed out. So we can assume he/she does not and has not worn shoes. Or cowboy boots. Or footmall cleats. Also it seems most of the sightings are of male BF. So to me that says they are young males out looking for love and a new home. Can we add solitary? So do they smell bad? How many female and how many family units have been seen? There have to be females but where are they? Ok, Sas how about adding

1. Never wears or has worn shoes.

2. Horney.

3. Solitary.

4. Females and young stay hidden.

5. Smells bad

Dumpster divers? Naaaa

[Guest]

I feel the reason that they miss BF is because there are **** few BF and they are scattered. On another post DDA gave pretty good reasoning why he felt there were fewer than 200 in the State of Washington. I echo his thoughts.

If there were 200 wouldn't they be in-bred, developmentally f'd up things by now? There has to be a population great enough for diversity. How do you explain the "large enough" population, over 49 states and Canada, without a large enough population to be caught on a camera trap? There must be a fine line between population that offers diversity and low enough population not to be captured (on film or otherwise).

[kitakaze]

Kit, where did you get this pic from? it certainly is NOT from the Gifford Pinchot Task Force web site. It seems to be from some blog...

If you had read the OP, you would see that there is a joint effort with the GP Task Force and the Cascades Carnivore Project. The image you are seeing was taken at the Section 3 Lake survey station on the east side of the Goat Rocks Wilderness and is taken from the CCP website. See for yourself...

http://cascadescarnivoreproject.blogspot.com/

Section 3 Lake, BTW, coincidentally happens to be the area where Roger Patterson claimed to Yakima film developer Duane Anderson to have photographed a Bigfoot in the early 60's.

So your preconceived notion of Bigfoots is that they are herbivorous and dismiss all reports where they are observed preying or scavenging. On what basis do you do this? Also, why is Bigfoot's physique not consistent with a herbivorous great ape such as the mountain gorilla?

[Guest]

They are going where the animals are, which is where Bigfoot is going to be if Bigfoot wants to eat.

1) Based on HUMAN reports of animals, meaning areas where humans have access.

2) Animals move about. All your "traps" show is that no bf moved into camera range. That is all they will EVER show unless someone get's lucky and gets a shot of one.

You seriously need to come out of the insulated reality your desire to believe in Bigfoot creates for you. Look at this video of the real wildlife work that biologists do...

http://www.opb.org/programs/ofg/segments/view/1532

These people are in helicopters going wherever they need to go to find the animals. They go all over the mountain ranges spotting for footprints. If Bigfoot is there, it is going to be found by these people.

There is no guarantee of that. Many many people set out to document the giant squid and failed before someone finally did it.

This is the sort of irrational insular paranoid thinking that arises in belief culture when the facts threaten those beliefs.

Personal attack.

For the CCP and GP Task Force cool and rare animals are good business. This is a conservation effort. Animals like Wildy here...

...bring public interest and also increased funding with it. Bigfoot being real would be a dream come true for wildlife biologists and the thinking that they would surpress such evidence as the images we see for rare animals like Wildy is simply irrational.

Fish and Wildlife politics are funky things. By your logic, there is no reason to deny the return of the Eastern Mountain Lion, the N American Jaguar, the predations of reintroduced wolves on livestock, etc.

All of which is 100% KNOWN to be true and documentable by people NOT in the employ of the various Fish and Wildlife services. And continuously denied by those who ARE in thier employ.

By the anecotal evidence, Bigfoots regularly go into human civilization year after year and never once has this led to a holotype for Bigfoot. It's as unreal as paranormal Bigfoots.

Yes, because 80 year old Grandma is gonna rush right out and "bag her a monkey" with her frying pan when she looks out the window and sees one in the back garden...

[Guest]

If there were 200 wouldn't they be in-bred, developmentally f'd up things by now? There has to be a population great enough for diversity. How do you explain the "large enough" population, over 49 states and Canada, without a large enough population to be caught on a camera trap? There must be a fine line between population that offers diversity and low enough population not to be captured (on film or otherwise).

I have to point out (again) that trail cams ARE picking up interesting photos, but they get tossed right out by the usual Skeptics when presented.

[Guest CaptainMorgan]

If there were 200 wouldn't they be in-bred, developmentally f'd up things by now? There has to be a population great enough for diversity. How do you explain the "large enough" population, over 49 states and Canada, without a large enough population to be caught on a camera trap? There must be a fine line between population that offers diversity and low enough population not to be captured (on film or otherwise).

Hi Ace, that's a good question. I'm not convinced that BF have a permanent home per say.

Isn't it likely they would roam around in constant search for new food sources? They go up in altitude, they go down in altitude. They go North, South, East and West. They travel through extremely thick brush and under cover of thick canopy, and sometimes none at all. They go to Canada, Oregon, California . . . who knows.

Sometimes along the way they might find new mates. Sometimes breed with siblings or perhaps even offspring. Would this make them mutants?, we don't know.

What are the odds they will stumble right in front of our strategically placed game cams? Dunno.

I mean, we put the trail cam RIGHT THERE --> () why can't they just walk in front of the $#@! thing?

So 200ish per state in some ever changing flux and intermingle . . . is that enough?

.