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Photo credit: Lyle Laverty

Even though critics scoff at footprint findings of alleged sasquatches, footprint evidence is still the best evidence we have of an undiscovered primate in the forests of North America. As much as some unenlightened individuals try to fake them and make fools of researchers, researchers can tell the difference.

A real print is easily spotted...by a trained eye. A living, fleshy foot makes distinct marks on the surface. The motion of dozens of bones, ligaments, and tendons move in a fluid motion and create what is known as compression lines in the inner edge of the track. And also there are dermal ridges, that are like the fingerprints of the feet. These lines on the bottom of the feet that look just like the fingerprint lines on our fingers cannot be faked. Combined with the sequential movement of a real, fleshy foot, these can be easily seen by the experts.

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Here is a new video posted by NV TV. The story, reportedly, is that this guy filmed a bigfoot cross the road and gave a little chase after it. But the "bigfoot" makes some grunt/scream types of sounds and some say it bluff charges the cameraman. It was shot at night, so the visibility is pretty bad but you can see a figure run across the road.

For me there are several problems in the video. First the video was reportedly filmed in 2016 but it looks like it was filmed with a cell phone from 1990. The video is even in HD but still looks pretty pale and dull. The dark figure also makes several "across the road" runs. I just don't see a bigfoot doing this, normally they would run across the road and keep on going or hide. But this figure runs across the road a few times. Once you see the figure, it appears to be very human looking. Its not bulky or muscular and had the proportions of a human and not a bigfoot. The sounds the "creature" makes sounds very human to me.

Of course, my opinion probably does not mean a lot to some folks and that is fine, but here have a  watch of the original video for yourself and let us know what you think.
 

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Below is a new video from Alaska. It was reportedly filmed by tourist who was filming the glaciers. According to the report it was filmed in November of 2016. The video quality is pretty good but you still can not really tell what this might be. Some have suggested it was a dragon but I don't think so. Some have suggested it was some kind of whale, which sounds feasible.

You can see a total of six humps or spikes sticking out of the water. Some believe that one end is the head and the other end is the tail but in reality they may not even be connected at all. The video seems a bit weird to me and I wonder if it has been manipulated or edited in some way.

Here is the video, what do you think about it?




Thanks
~Tom~


 
This post by Thomas Marcum, Thomas is the founder/leader of the cryptozoology and paranormal research organization known as The Crypto Crew. Over 20 years experience with research and investigation of unexplained activity, working with video and websites. A trained wild land firefighter and a published photographer, and poet.



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I'm not even sure where this photograph comes from, I mean geographically, but I think it comes from within the United States. It seems some are suggesting it is the Lizard man of Bishopville, but I'm not sure about that. The Bishopville lizard man is said to be some type of reptilian cryptid from South Carolina and it has been well researched and documented.

As for the above photograph, reportedly someone took a picture of this odd looking figure as it crossed a river. They supposedly described it as being some type of lizard man, but it kinda looks like a dogman or werewolf type of thing, but I guess it could be a lizard. The photo is blurry and out of focus. The figure is bipedal and has a humanoid looking body with a dog (ish) tail.

I personally think the image is a photoshopped fake and that the story is probably not real. So, I took some time, but not much, to zoom in on the figure and try to clean it up a little.

After that, I ran the original image on some software that looks for signs that the image is a fake or that it has been manipulated with some type of photo editors.

The image showed or matched several photo editing softwares. These included: GIMP, Paintshop Pro, and paint.net. It also appears the original image, which I will assume was just of the river, was taken with an Olympus camera.

In the end the software concluded that there was a high probability that the image was processed and/or edited. I tend to agree and think the image is a fake. I do however think there is something to the Lizard man reports from South Carolina.



Thanks
~Tom~


 
This post by Thomas Marcum, Thomas is the founder/leader of the cryptozoology and paranormal research organization known as The Crypto Crew. Over 20 years experience with research and investigation of unexplained activity, working with video and websites. A trained wild land firefighter and a published photographer, and poet.


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Enhanced still frame from the video

The following video comes from Telmark in Norway. Not a lot is really known about the video but there appears to be at least one if not two figures in the video. Some think these could be possible bigfoot while others say they could be extraterrestrial.

Here is what is known about the video so far. 

A woman or man was reportedly filming a very foggy forest area early one morning when they noticed one or possibly two bipedal figures standing in the fog. They do not appear to be shocked or frightened by seeing the figures. The two figures are at a good distance away and can barely be made out. Some say the heads are much too large to be humans, this could be why some assume it is some type of alien.

Here is the video.

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Thanks to my recent subscription to Amazon Prime, I finally get to watch some long overdue bigfoot documentaries and movies. I know some of you may not like the fact that we do movie and book reviews, but it can be important in pointing people to films or book with good information or at least worth the price of admission.

With that said, last night I watched Bigfootville. This is a straight forward bigfoot documentary with witness interviews, skeptic voices, and field research. The film quality is pretty good but not HD as this film is a little older. Don't let the fact this film was made in 2002 put you off, it still has a lot to offer.

The film takes place in rural Oklahoma were numerous reports of a 9 foot tall hairy man have been reported. During the course of the film there are several witness interviews and some investigations. During a night investigation, which included 2 witnesses who had a previous sighting in the area, there is some activity that is pretty interesting. Some rocks are thrown and a dark figure is seen by everyone in the group. One of the witnesses was really emotional about returning to the area, he was nearly to the point of tears. It seems his reservations about returning to the area were on target.

The witnesses who tell about their sightings, all come off as being authentic and truthful. It seems pretty obvious these folks seen something that was out of the norm for the area. Another very interesting part of this documentary is listening to the local Native American tribe talk about it.

Now, a few things about the film bothered me. The overtones the first quarter of the film had me frustrated. It was leaning strongly to idea that all bigfoot sightings were fake and the witnesses liars or just mistaken on what they saw. One big wig anthropologist by the name of Russ Tuttle had me ready to scream at the TV. He was one of those people who spout the old lines of "You seen a bear" and "It was just someone pulling a prank", "there is no evidence of bigfoot".
There was also a wildlife guy who made a statement I have heard many people say and it goes something like this: "I've been in the mountains all my life. I have never seen or found any evidence of bigfoot, there is no such thing." But thankfully I held on and the program improved and got to witness testimony and investigations.

The good news is you can actually watch the movie for Free as it is on youtube. If you have some time I recommend you give it a watch.


Overall, this is a very good bigfoot documentary. I was unable to find this title on DVD, it appears it is unavailable, so Youtube or Amazon is the only way to watch it I guess.


Here is my final rating.
Rating: 3 out of 5    



Thanks
~Tom~


 
This post by Thomas Marcum, Thomas is the founder/leader of the cryptozoology and paranormal research organization known as The Crypto Crew. Over 20 years experience with research and investigation of unexplained activity, working with video and websites. A trained wild land firefighter and a published photographer, and poet.



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Deep in the mountains of western Pakistan lives what some call "The Big Hairy One". It is a bigfoot type of creature that is said to abduct women. It is known by many names but the one that seems the most accepted is the Barmanou. The term Barmanou is used in several Pakistani languages including Khowar, Shina, Hindko, and Kashmiri.

The proposed range of the Barmanou covers the Chitral and Karakoram Ranges, between the Pamirs and the Himalayas. This places the Barmanou between the ranges of two more-famous cryptids, the Almas of Central Asia and the Yeti of the Himalayas.

Explore more information about the Barmanou in our latest episode of The Crypto Files.
[Episode 26]

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I finally got around to watching the documentary film Minerva Monster. This film is about a continuing series of bigfoot sightings and activity in a small town in eastern Ohio. The film mainly focuses on one family and their years of activity behind their house. The film also brings in other sightings from the area and numerous interviews.

According to the documentary, a local family had a sighting of the creature near their home and being frightened called the police. From there the whole event kind of snowballed and the area and the family was thrust into the spotlight. The story made local and national news headlines. Every bigfoot hunter and rubbernecker from all over came to the area. There were even times when the family was harassed by skeptics.

According to the family the creature kept coming around the family's property, it would throw rock and make tree knocks. The family tells about many sightings and encounters with the beast. They talk about finding huge footprints and finding bedding areas.

There were many things I like about this little film. I like the fact that the local police officer who was called to the house, is actually interviewed extensively during the film. The newspaper reporter covering the story way back in the 70's, is also interview extensively. The production and film quality is high level. It was a well done production.

Throughout the course of the film, other witnesses and more recent sightings from the area are added in, but the central story remains around this one particular family. Bigfoot researcher Paul Hayes is also featured in the film and he tells about the sighting he and his son had of a bigfoot.

Overall, it was a pretty good little film, just realize it is not a film about going out and looking for evidence. It is mostly interviews and people telling about what happened. There are some photographs presented from the central story but not much. This is the aspect of the film that I was a little disappointed in. I wish there had been more photos from the police investigation or family presented.

So, if you would like to watch a film about a family who has had numerous sightings and encounters with bigfoot, then this film might be right for you. Please be aware that the first of the film is pretty slow on the bigfoot front. It is mostly historians telling about the town and how it's grown over the years.  While many will find the first part of the film boring, just hang with it, after it gets into the bigfoot stuff it is much better.

Here is the official trailer


During the interviews there are a lot of different details given about the area and the sightings. I was unfamiliar with this story and its long history, so I enjoyed learning about it. 


Here is my final rating.
Rating: 3 out of 5    



Thanks
~Tom~


 
This post by Thomas Marcum, Thomas is the founder/leader of the cryptozoology and paranormal research organization known as The Crypto Crew. Over 20 years experience with research and investigation of unexplained activity, working with video and websites. A trained wild land firefighter and a published photographer, and poet.


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I have not said very much about the "Russian Yeti Runs Across Road "video for a few simple reasons. One reason is that I really have not taken the time to actually study it over. But today I thought I would play "Johnny come lately" and give the video a little inspection. I know my opinion will not change anything or carry much weight but it is a slow day for me, so, why not?

First, let me be up front and say I have a hard time trusting videos of bigfoot from Russia. It seems they have more hoaxers than we do here in the USA. I also think that it is better to inspect these types of videos with a skeptical approach.

So, the first thing I did is grab a still frame from the video. I wanted to zoom it in, adjust different aspects of the image and see if I can gather any more details about the figure. I know this is a difficult task because of the almost all white snowy backdrop. During this process, I really could not get any real useful information about the figure itself. One thing I noticed in the video and the still frames is that there does not appear to be any eye shine, but maybe it just did not look directly at the camera.



 Another problem about analyzing this video or a still frame from it is that there is nothing in it that can give you a sense of scale. This makes it almost impossible to determine the height of the figure.

In my opinion, I think the figure looks rather small. I make that assumption based on the width of the road, it appears a bit narrow. We do not know what type of vehicle they are driving but if you just take any average car or truck, you are talking about something 5-6 foot wide. This road is not much wider that the auto they are driving. It appears to take the figure 3 or 4 running steps to cross the small road. If the road is 10 foot wide and it takes 3-4 running steps to cross it, then the strides would easily fall within human range and average size, in my opinion. Of course, this is all speculative on my part. It could also very well have been a young yeti.


We can see that the figure is moving at a pretty good speed in what appears to be fairly deep snow. But is it moving faster than a human could move? I don't think the speed appears to be something superhuman but we really can not be definite on this conclusion.

According to the description under the video, this was some nature sight seeing tourist out for a drive. But a line towards the end of the description could be rather telling, here is that line: "..The folklore of this particular region of Russia, the Republic of Bashkortostan, tells stories of Shurale, a tall hairy creature that tickles his victims to death."

The only thing I can find or think of that supposedly tickles its victims to death is the Mahaha. The Mahaha is said to live in the Arctic and to be a demon. The description of the Mahaha is nothing like a bigfoot or the figure seen in this particular video. I'll be the first to admit, I do not know very much about local Russian folklore in the region of the Republic of Bashkortostan, so, it may be a true statement in the video description.    
 
Now, with all of that said I still think the video is interesting. I do think it is most likely a prank/hoax but we really need more information to really make a solid conclusion. I know whenever a video of this nature is posted online, you will have some who accept it as real and some who reject it as a hoax. It seems you can't get either side to change their minds either way. So, knowing that and knowing my opinion will have no real effect, I invite you to watch the video for yourself and make up your own mind.

Here is the video.




If anyone would like to provide their thoughts on the video, feel free to post in the comments. Tell us what you like about the video or what you do not like.

Thanks
~Tom~


 
This post by Thomas Marcum, Thomas is the founder/leader of the cryptozoology and paranormal research organization known as The Crypto Crew. Over 20 years experience with research and investigation of unexplained activity, working with video and websites. A trained wild land firefighter and a published photographer, and poet.


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Many cultures have a belief in shapeshifting in some form. Shapeshifting is the ability of a being or creature to completely transform its physical form or shape. The Aswang reportedly has the ability to combine various elements from different creatures.

In this episode of The Crypto Files, we take a look at the Aswang and explore some of the characteristics and behavior of this cryptid.

Here is the episode (ep. 25)

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I often chuckle when people start talking about critical thinking. Many people think they’re critical thinkers,including me at times, until I correct myself, because it’s harder to think critically than one might imagine.

According to the Foundation For Critical Thinking, critical thinking “is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In its exemplary form, it is based on universal intellectual values that transcend subject matter divisions: clarity, accuracy, precision, consistency, relevance, sound evidence, good reasons, depth, breadth, and fairness.”

This is a great and very thorough definition. And I was happy to see that it now acknowledges the flaw in it that I’ve been talking about for years. The flaw that comes from the humans themselves.

No human, no matter how much they claim to be a critical thinker is devoid of human flaws. We all believe lies sometimes. We all are subject to irrational or uncontrolled thinking at times. We are all slaves to our personal perceptions more often than we imagine. Real critical thinking relies a great deal on our ability to understand and control our own thoughts and recognize when our thinking is flawed. The problem is, the majority of people are unable to do this. And the most dangerous thing is that, all the while, they’ll think they’re doing it. This is why I’m a bit guarded when people claim to be critical thinkers. I’ve known very few.

It's one thing to be able to think. It's quite another to be able to think about what you think. To pick it apart and analyze it and decide if every part of it is useful or not. And it’s quite another thing entirely to be able to decide that maybe what you were thinking before is wrong. That’s where the supposed critical thinkers often hit a snag.

Even the most intelligent people get caught up in the idea of being right. Like being right is the most important thing there is. And being wrong is the equivalent of the sky falling. And the basic insecurities of humanity cloud the discussion before it even starts. Egos get in the way. They often need to feel they’re right and superior in their thinking. So, in order to achieve this, someone has to be wrong. And this is where critical thinking falls apart. Not because of critical thinking itself, but in the failure of the humans to implement it.

There are a lot of people who might roll their eyes at me when I say this, but exercising subjects like cryptozoology and the paranormal is a good practice on the subject of critical thinking. They teach us to think about what we once thought and whether we still want to believe it.

In the worlds of cryptozoology and the paranormal, there is a whole group of people whose paradigms have been forever changed by something they saw or experienced. Something that wasn’t supposed to exist, or something they didn’t believe existed.

Are these people incapable of critical thinking? Not at all. But they are, like every other member of humanity, subject to their own personal perceptions, shaped by an unusual experience. This can’t be avoided. But the important thing to remember is that the group of humans judging this person’s experience and claiming it was a figment of their imagination are also in possession of the same human flaws and personal perceptions created by their LACK of having had the same experience. So is anyone here really applying critical thinking? Not really.

If our personal perceptions get in the way of our analyzing a subject, then we’re not thinking critically. In order to be a real critical thinker, we have to recognize this problem and eliminate perception from our thought processes. We have to have the ability to clear our minds of any preconceived thoughts, beliefs, or ideas that will hinder the process of getting to the truth.
  
That is what critical thinking REALLY is. It’s being able to think about and analyze our own thinking and correct it when necessary. But the hardest part is recognizing when we need to do this. It’s  not an easy task, and I’ve rarely seen anyone able to do it completely. We have to  entertain the idea that we could be wrong, and that’s not easy for many people.  It takes a lifetime of self-reflection and self-analysis in order to even begin to really do this right.

So, are you a critical thinker or not? If you’ve read this article through this far, then I know you’re at least open to the idea. The real success is in implementing it. Which requires critical thinking. It’s hard being human.

Reference: The Foundation For Critical Thinking

*************DF






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This report was submitted to me by our researcher in training Wyatt Zombro. He has done the leg work on this case and interviewed the witness. I will input some of my commentary but the bulk of this work was done by Wyatt. I'm only putting it all together. -Tom


First lets start with the photograph. The picture was taken 3 or 4 months ago in Morgan county West Virginia by Steven. We are only using his first name to protect his identity. Steven took the picture around 12 or 1 o'clock in the day. The circle rainbow stayed in the sky for about an hour. While the picture is beautiful, there is something potentially odd about it.


A rainbow like this does happen from time to time but if you look at the top of the rainbow there appears to be a UFO. As you can see in the zoomed in picture a dark object is towards the top of the rainbow.

During the interview, the witness said he did not notice the unknown object at the time.



  


The shape of the unknown object seems to be in the shape of a fedora or a bell type shape. Of course this could be nothing more than something on the lens but it does appear to be an object that was actually in the sky.





While we can not say just what this object is, or even if it was an actual object, it was worth talking to the witness and attempting to gather more information about it. Thanks goes to Steven for allowing us to use the picture and for doing the interview.

Have there been other reports of UFO's around rainbows? Yes, it seems to happen very often.

Thanks
^Wyatt^




This report by TCC's Wyatt Zombro.Wyatt is a Cryptozoology enthusiast, enjoys being outdoors and exploring the forest. Wyatt researches bigfoot in his home state of West Virginia. Wyatt also has interest in other mysteries such as UFOs and ghost.






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