Your Sighting..... Would You Forget?

[daveedoe]

December 31 1989 a Sunday at Soda Peaks Lake in the Gifford Pinchot NF. Temp there about 28 degrees, right a 12 PM light hazy overcast. With a good friend eating lunch. The lake was partially, 3/4 frozen over, very light patches of dusty snow  Was not a sighting was something opposite side of the lake making a grunting guttural sound getting loader each time, nothing I've ever heard before or since, got out of there after about 20 minutes of the vocals. Have the time date and location etched in my mind. Hows that for memory? 

Same friend and I cross country skiing close to Goat Mt near Goat marsh skiing through  an old gravel pit on trail came across a track-way crossing the trail went up the side of the pit towards Goat Mt, same year about a month after the Soda peaks incident. Probably not as intense of feeling as the SP Lake incident so date was not remembered and the other was on New Years eve. 

Edited December 2, 2016 by daveedoe

[FarArcher]

3 hours ago, daveedoe said:

December 31 1989 a Sunday at Soda Peaks Lake in the Gifford Pinchot NF. Temp there about 28 degrees, right a 12 PM light hazy overcast. With a good friend eating lunch. The lake was partially, 3/4 frozen over, very light patches of dusty snow  Was not a sighting was something opposite side of the lake making a grunting guttural sound getting loader each time, nothing I've ever heard before or since, got out of there after about 20 minutes of the vocals. Have the time date and location etched in my mind. Hows that for memory? 

Same friend and I cross country skiing close to Goat Mt near Goat marsh skiing through  an old gravel pit on trail came across a track-way crossing the trail went up the side of the pit towards Goat Mt, same year about a month after the Soda peaks incident. Probably not as intense of feeling as the SP Lake incident so date was not remembered and the other was on New Years eve. 

 

 

Well done.

 

If history were up to me to record - we wouldn't know who, when, where, or how anything happened.

[ShadowBorn]

As far as date and year my mind is not right there. But my sighting I cannot forget. I can remember how the weather was and that there was no moon when my sighting happened. It was raining that day and then the night was dark with clouds covering. It was dark and I can remember what I saw that was beyond the gate berrier. How it stood like a pine tree, I knew that I was in deep at that time. I never kept track of all my encounters and when I started it was just a personal belief thing that I had to find the truth.

daveedoe

Liked what you shared !

[Branco]

On 12/2/2016 at 7:48 AM, Redbone said:

Since I don't think "eating' was an animal activity actually involved in the Fulton County story, I have since  corrected the SSR entry.

 

 

He was probably hunting with a slug barrel on his shotgun and the investigator may have just used the wrong term.

There's another huge inconsistency with that report though. Searcy Arkansas (the town) is NOT in Searcy County as the new report suggests. It's in White County. I'd like to know where it really (allegedly) happened so we can classify it correctly. I know people that know the investigator... I may try to get some clarification.

There is other conflicting data in the report that is not a part of the investigator's published portion. I e-mailed a note to a curator (C. Curtis) after I first read it. If you are a member of the BFRO, look at the complete data about the location description given by the witness vs the GPS coordinates.

There have been many BF reports from White County, and that county has a lot of ideal habitat for them, but......? 

Edited December 4, 2016 by Branco

[gigantor]

I think we should distinguish between being able to immediately recall the date and time of your sighting, vs being able to think about it and come up with an accurate date/time.

 

The issue is about accuracy of the reports. One may not be able to spit out the date/time on demand, but when submitting a report, it is reasonable to expect the witness to do a little homework and come to a determination which is fairly accurate.

 

The witness can certainly look back at his/her activities around the time of the sighting. IMO, the inability to provide a date within a couple of weeks at least, makes the report  suspect.

 

 

[wiiawiwb]

On 12/1/2016 at 5:42 PM, BobbyO said:

My one was 20 plus years ago now, I have no idea of date, time or even actual location and never have done whilst I have been as heavily interested in the subject as I am now, since my early 20's.

 

People's brains are wired differently, mine back then just didn't even think in that manner and I still haven't submitted a report to this very day which is absolutely outrageous given what I try to do day in day out, I know.

 

 

At best guess it was in 93/94, we used to vacation out of season and normally in Spring or Fall.

 

As for location, I think I nailed it once but couldn't be sure, I lost all my research on it however. It's on the to do list again.

 

It's amazing how memory works, or doesn't work, for that matter. The one thing I would have bet the farm one is that a person remembers the location.  Once there, it comes racing back like a video run quickly in reverse. Interesting.

 

On 12/2/2016 at 2:27 AM, Redbone said:

Locations I know, but I can't remember dates and times. I've never had an encounter like this though  so it's hard to judge. I keep notes and audio so I can look things up when I need to.

 

Here are the pictures that are missing form the BFRO report:

 

One thing bothers me about this report is the Dracula canine teeth depicted in the drawing.

 

It is not possible that some BF have flat canines and others have pointed Dracula-style ones. They are one or the other for all BF.

 

So how do we account for them in this report?  BF lineage from Romania? BF last name is Tepes?

 

Edited December 4, 2016 by wiiawiwb

[MIB]

gigantor -

 

I'd more or less agree.   I can't always remember the year, I can definitely remember the season.   Couple examples from personal past.  

 

First, the track find.   I think it was 1974 but it could have been 1975.   In the spring of '74 we had a huge flood, not as big as 1964, but big.   I remember the river lapping at the road shoulder about 4 inches below pavement level at a particular spot on the road.  That extended period of high velocity water ripped many of the willows and alders out so the river banks were fairly defoliated.   The plants on the clay bank above the tracks had not started to grow back.  It was late summer / early fall because the original purpose of the trip was to pick huckleberries which were in season and, because I was eating too many my great grandfather sent me back to the boat to go fly fishing instead.   The tracks were found in a "scunge" layer .. moss, sand, silt, etc and inch or two thick on top of a wide flat rock shelf.   That scunge had been underwater the day before and was still wet, it had not yet been exposed to sunlight.   In that crook in the river, the sun hits that shore about 11:00 am.   In mid-late August, the river usually takes a big drop as the side creeks finally dry up.    Based on all that, I reverse-engineer the date as the 3rd week of August, 1974.   It could equally have been the 3rd week of August 1975, but likely no later and certainly no earlier.

 

Dating my first sighting is similar.   It was deer season, the purpose for being where we were was to meet my aunt who we'd dropped off high on the mountain to walk down through a traditional family hunting area.  That puts it in early October.   My cousin, 3-1/2 years older, was legal to drive.   I was not.  That gives us a 3 year window.  My sense is I was at the younger end of that window so it was probably 1976 but possibly 1977. 

 

The only events I have issues putting a date on are ones where I spent so much time with the other people involved that I can't remember which trip it occurred on.   In the case of details, you should either remember or know you don't remember, you should never mis-remember.   In other words, someone botching the weather, moon or none, etc in a report is a huge red flag.

 

MIB

[Celtic Raider]

On 04/12/2016 at 2:18 PM, wiiawiwb said:

One thing bothers me about this report is the Dracula canine teeth depicted in the drawing.

 

It is not possible that some BF have flat canines and others have pointed Dracula-style ones. They are one or the other for all BF.

 

So how do we account for them in this report?  BF lineage from Romania? BF last name is Tepes?

 

 

Probably fear of the observer magnified the image in their mind and then when recreating or describing the image these features were probably enhanced due to popular culture or the mental image of a snarling animal baring their canines. Maybe even artictic license? Maybe the animal actually had pronounced canines, to me it's not much of a problem unless they are sabre like, the ones noted above are only slightly pronounced.

 

I myself have very flat canines apart from one on the bottom right but my much smaller friend has very pronounced canines - so much so that he's often accused of having fake teeth in around Halloween time! I don't think this is an issue.

[spacemonkeymafia]

I've been an amateur researcher since 2005. I've had many a good adventure. I can remember everything about every one except the exact time. The season and weather is easy, but not the time of day. 

My precious time off work I prefer NOT to watch the clock.

My first thought never has been OMG NOTE THE TIME!

My attention has been what my eyes, ears , and adrenaline were telling me.

[guyzonthropus]

Lovin' the screen name!

[Patterson-Gimlin]

Probably not. After all I would explain it away. 

[Guest DWA]

On ‎11‎/‎30‎/‎2016 at 10:25 PM, MIB said:

No, I can see that.   My first sighting was some time in October and it was probably 1976.   That's my best guess calculation from surrounding details, not something I remember specifically.   The last one ... I had to look it up, I was off by a day.   It was the first saturday in October, 2013.   I thought it was the 6th but the calendar says that would have been the 5th.   9:30 - 9:45 am if I remember right.

 

On one hand, it's amazing what we can get used to and not really pay much attention to side details, on the other hand, when something is pretty traumatic or intense, a sort of auditory exclusion / tunnel vision can occur where we don't really notice the details.

 

I worry more when someone remembers too much side detail it would not be normal to remember.   The number of pancakes they ate, exactly how many cars they passed on the road, how many sodas they drank the night before ... stuff that looks much like they're adding irrelevant detail to give the appearance of precision. 

Exactly.  I'm not talking about a sighting here, but the tracks were in June 1986 sometime, mainly remembered because, well, I was in northern CA on a one-week backpack then...and I am, you know, pretty sure it wasn't May...OK, no more than a twenty side bet...

 

The inverted trees, whatever caused them and I'd be willing to bet against most any possibility other than the one for which the same thing has been reported, was...um...a few years ago sometime.  Spring, maybe.  (These trees were inverted, in a pond, and so 90-degree ramrod straight that whatever you think caused it, didn't.) This stuck out in my peripheral vision, going sixty in a place I'd never given a sideward glance before.  THAT straight, roots up. Sizable trees, couldn't get to them from the road to measure, but no human does it without heavy equipment, no marks of same anywhere in the vicinity or on the trees.  And no human has a reason to do it.  And...spring, I think.

 

I find it a rather surprising thing that people do this, really.  I even try to go light on the five-flapjacks people.  There are reasons anything that sticks in your mind sticks, and it is different for every person and every experience.  Never judge without evidence.

[salubrious]

On 11/30/2016 at 10:17 PM, bipedalist said:

Your point taken, I tend to disagree.  He rolls up on a mother BF on a gravel road and it sits still to within ten feet of the bumper?!

 

Hello?   Don't think that could happen.  Gravel roads equal noise.  Maybe a freeze reaction to keep youngun' from running into car path? Corrected to see that it was the youngun; in the road yet mother waited for truck to stop before the scoop and run.   Still hard  to figure.   Had property in area he had inherited and was visiting but can't remember date?  Still doesn't jive to me. 

 

 

I saw two in a manner very much like this only they are on US hiway 62 in Colorado at the summit of the Dallas Divide. I have no doubt they heard me coming; I was driving a 76 Chevy Blazer with a hopped up 350 V8 with dual exhaust, cams and so on. Plus it was dark so they were literally sitting in my high beams. They also took up the entire lane so I had to drive around them. They were easily within 8 feet of my bumper and much closer than that from my passenger side window when I went around. That was in September of 1990, Saturday night of the 2nd weekend. I didn't tell anyone about if for at least 11 years.

 

Now why they behaved in that manner is a mystery to me that I will take to my grave. It makes no sense especially in the light of how they are allegedly rather surreptitious. 

[bipedalist]

My major point is,  he couldn't remember the date, or double-back and figure it out: trust me it doesn't take much if your world is rocked (and, your feet are firmly planted on the ground when it happens) ......I've been there too.

 

Not taking anything away from your sighting, Salubrious. 

 

But, honestly or with highest fidelity, I am majorly blown away that some people can't even remember the "year", but that is just me, because at the time, I was on a mission!

Edited June 3, 2017 by bipedalist

[Twist]

Doesn't surprise me at all.  I remember and have pictures of me going to Mexico. Probably around 1995-1996.   The only time I've been there, the only time I've dove off a waterfall, and the only time I've come close to drowning via rip tide / current.  A lot of firsts and events I distinctly remember in my life yet I do not know what year exactly it happened.  I also do not remember the exact year of my possible BF experience.  Yet I still have the memories.