A Quick Question For Those With Personal Experiences

[Twist]

I could BF rocking a set of New Balances when running in the woods. 

[norseman]

So your going to dress as a giant tennis shoe and try to capture him with a butterfly net?

 

Darn....why didn't I think of that!?

[Twist]

It takes a certain kind of special to come up with such a fool proof plan! 

[7.62]

On ‎12‎/‎9‎/‎2016 at 1:12 PM, SWWASAS said:

I think those with well trained dogs are at a great advantage in the field.   Their nose and eyesight is a great advantage to alert you that something is in the woods.     Of course a squirrel might be just as interesting or more interesting than a BF to a dog.          I think it important to be able to control the dog because if they should charge a BF it might be very dangerous for them.   I have had the feeling I was being watched many times in the field but had nothing at all to reinforce the feeling.    A dog staring into the woods would have been very informative.   At least it would give you some idea of where to look. 

That's what exactly happened to me while hiking in Maine. Now looking back maybe I should have  pursued deeper in the woods but at the time Bigfoot never crossed my mind.

Not that I wasn't a believer or disbeliever just that I never gave it much thought back then.

Only after I had gotten back home it crossed my mind. At first I thought black bear but we ran into bears before , not in Maine but camping off the Kancamagus in the White Mountains . He wasn't afraid of them . This time it was fear and then it kind of transferred over to me so I turned around and headed back to the trail.

 

One thing we never ran into was a cougar , so could it have been? who knows

Anyways this thread is fascinating to read .

[MIB]

I wouldn't think it would be cougar.    My father's last two dogs, the earlier a springer / lab mix, and later her replacement, an irish setter, had no particular fear of cougars.    Either of those dogs would chase a cougar as quick as they'd chase a bear.   Both of them came back missing scalp with deep claw marks at least once.   The response you describe doesn't sound like a response to a cat.

 

MIB

[Guest DWA]

Took me a long time to find out what was up, but the tracks were so deep. 

 

We were traveling off-trail, and cut an old logging road bed (not a current road, any more than we were on a trail) with these tracks in it - left right left right, clearly a biped, but three-quarters of an inch to an inch deep, in soil we weren't denting with lug-soled boots and heavy packs.  They were clearly old, no separate toes or other detail visible, filling in with pine duff.  But clear, to us, that a biped made them.  On a bright sunny day, in midafternoon, the forest was so dark that I couldn't take a hand-held shot (old film SLR, no tripod, this was 1986).  And I thought, who do these photos even go to?  (Not the USFS.)  So I skipped it.  In subsequent years, I even started thinking:  truck ruts.  They HAD to be truck ruts.  Or something.  They were just so deep!  It was years before I found out that deeper imprints than human were a standard feature of sasquatch trackways.

 

I still wish I'd at least tried for those pictures...

[salubrious]

On 2/25/2017 at 1:59 PM, Twist said:

One thing that has always bothered me about supposed BF encounters is this idea that they are silent even when running.  What about a BF, a flesh and blood creature, would give it the special ability to move quickly or run in a forest littered with debris and sticks?  Physical beings break sticks and ground coverage as they move quickly, these are 7' tall creatures estimated at 500, 600, 700lbs +.  They still find a way to not rustle branches, trees, step on sticks that crack...etc etc.  

 

On 2/25/2017 at 2:35 PM, Twist said:

 I get that and don't dispute they can be silent when stalking or moving slowly and deliberately.  I question a large animal RUNNING through a dense forest without making a noise.  How do the not move tree branches, step on sticks, slip on a log that looks solid but is actually rotten etc.  

 

 

I've attended primitive survival classes where we were taught to do just exactly that. Its not how heavy you are- its how **aware** you are that makes for silence. Having done that, its easy to imagine that someone who grew up doing that is at a whole different level with this survival skill.

[Sasfooty]

The one that ran by me sounded like a horse running. I could feel it in the ground, as well as hearing it. Since he made that much noise running over open ground, I don't see how there could be less noise in dense forest.

[Guest DWA]

1 hour ago, salubrious said:

 

 

I've attended primitive survival classes where we were taught to do just exactly that. Its not how heavy you are- its how **aware** you are that makes for silence. Having done that, its easy to imagine that someone who grew up doing that is at a whole different level with this survival skill.

I once was following a young bull moose into the woods in Baxter State Park in Maine.  I was so close I could count the flies on his butt...then he dematerialized.  I mean, he was just suddenly gone, no sound, no nothing.  Just gone.

 

Nothing metaphysical about it, though.  I was distracted by all sorts of stuff in trackless woods I wasn't used to; the moose wasn't.

 

Most of the big-noise encounters mentioned in reports appear to be standard-issue threat or displacement displays. But many quiet departures are reported, not too surprising for something that knows the woods much better than you do.

[salubrious]

Moose are really good at hiding in plain sight. If they have even the slightest amount of cover all they have to do is stop moving and they become nearly invisible and literally just like that. And they are very good at being perfectly still if they think its important!

[Guest DWA]

...and if a moose can do that...and it's not incredibly surprising that numerous sasquatch reports describe an animal that appeared to the witness to be "freezing" to avoid detection.