King Kong, Gigantopithecus & the Missing Link

[Stacy Dohm]

From the Teeth of the Dragon - Gigantopithecus blacki
by Eric Pettifor


In ancient Greek mythology a hero named Jason yoked two fire breathing bulls and plowed a field. Into the furrows he sowed dragons' teeth from which sprang men (Hamilton, 1942).

The Chinese have for centuries sold 'dragons' teeth and bones to be ground up as a medicinal. These bones are actually ancient fossils. In 1935 G.H.R. Von Koenigswald discovered a fossil tooth in an apothecary shop in Hong Kong (von Koenigswald, 1952). Since then 3 jaw bones and over a thousand teeth have been recovered, not only in apothecary shops but in situ as well (Ciochon, Olsen, & James, 1990). They are the remains of an extinct ape, Gigantopithecus blacki. There are sites where Gigantopithecus blacki remains occur along with Homo erectus, such as at Tham Khuyen in Viet Nam, and in the Hubei and Sichuan provinces of China (Ciochon et al., 1990). At Tham Khuyen the remains of a potential competitor for bamboo, a proposed major food source of Gigantopithecus blacki, were found as well: the giant panda, now extinct in Viet Nam (Ciochon et al., 1990). Gigantopithecus teeth from Wuming, China have been dated to the middle Pleistocene, around 400,000 B.P., by faunal association. Homo erectus was in Asia by that time and may have played a role in the extinction of Gigantopithecus (Ciochon et al., 1990)
Appearance
According to Ciochon et al. (1990), Gigantopithecus blacki was 10 feet tall and weighed 1,200 pounds. This is speculative, since it is with some uncertainty that one reconstructs such a massive creature from a few jaw bones and teeth, however many. The way they arrived at this picture was first to estimate the size of the head from the jaw, and then to use a head/body ratio of 1:6.5 in order to determine the body size. For comparison they cite a head/body ratio of 1:8 for the Australopithecus afarensis specimen known as 'Lucy'. The more conservative ratio for Gigantopithecus was arrived at out of consideration of the massive jaw as an adaptation to the mastication of fibrous plant matter (probably bamboo). Gigantopithecus was probably proportionally a markedly big jawed creature. For the head shape they based their assumptions on the orangutan, since evolutionarily they place Gigantopithecus on the same line as the orangutan, finding a common ancestor for them both in Sivapithecus. However, the orangutan could not serve as a model for the body, since it is unlikely that a 1,200 pound ape would be as arboreal. Therefore they chose the largest primates known, the gorilla and the extinct giant baboon Theropithecus oswaldi, as their models for the body. They gave Gigantopithecus an intermembral index 108 (gorilla at 120 + Theropithecus at 95 divide by 2 = 108 rounded up - very scientific!) (Ciochon et al., 1990).

Since Ciochon (et al, 1990) with aid of Bill Munn (Hollywood monster maker/dinosaur reflesher) were interested as well in building a very impressive life size model we would be wise to consider the dimensions with some caution, and note that they represent the biggest Gigantopithecus that could be built rationalized from the actual remains, and that it is a male. Females may have been half the size of the males, since the teeth fall markedly into two distinct size groupings (Ciochon et al., 1990), as I will discuss later in terms of sexual dimorphism and what inferences have been drawn.

Elwyn L. Simons and Peter C. Ettel (1970) paint a somewhat different picture. They trace Gigantopithecus back to a dryopithicine origin and their corresponding reconstruction is essentially a giant gorilla, 9 feet tall, weighing 600 pounds. It is not nearly as attractive as the giant orangutan/gorilla cross created by Ciochon et al. and Bill Munn (1990)

[Stacy Dohm]

Sexual Dimorphism

Simons and Ettel (1970) do go into greater detail regarding the mandibles, however, and speculate that the size differential between two of them (Mandibles I and III) reflects sexual dimorphism. The way that the teeth fall into two distinct categories was discovered by Charles Oxnard, an Australian anatomist, when he analyzed 735 Gigantopithecus teeth. All teeth from the first incisors through the third molars occurred in both groups in equal numbers (Oxnard, 1987, cited in Ciochon et al., 1990). Furthermore, the size differential is greater than that occurring in any living primate including both gorillas and orangutans. Ciochon (et al., 1990) note that in living species this usually indicates competition between males for multiple females, but go on to note Oxnard's argument that the equal numbers of males and females suggests general promiscuity free from competition. "The resultant increased proportion of females pregnant at any one time under such a system (perhaps almost all of them), together with harsh environmental conditions, including fierce predator pressure, could combine to produce small inter- or intra-sexual selection, but strong sex-role differences and therefore strong sexual dimorphism." (Oxnard, 1987, cited in Ciochon et al, 1990). This sounds good, but does not address the fact that even in species with marked sexual dimorphism and sexual competition, males and females will be born in more or less equal numbers and can reasonably be expected to leave behind equal numbers of teeth. It seems that this is an instance where complex social behaviour is difficult to determine solely from physical remains, especially remains as regrettably incomplete as those of Gigantopithecus. If there are analogies to be made with living primates exhibiting marked sexual dimorphism, equal numbers of surviving male and female teeth cannot be a factor in the analysis.

Geographical Distribution

Geographical distribution is likewise sketchy, since the majority of remains are from one site, Liucheng Cave in Liuzhou, China, though there have been other finds in Viet Nam and in China, so that we may define south east Asia as the range of Gigantopithecus blacki. A separate species of Gigantopithecus, Gigantipithecus giganteus, was found in northern India, but this specimen predates Gigantopithecus blacki by about five million years, and there is some controversy as to the exact nature of its relationship. Simons and Ettel (1970) place it as directly ancestral to Gigantopithecus blacki, while David W. Frayer (1972) argues that it is ancestral to the Australopithicines, only to be refuted by Robert S. Corrucini (1973) on the basis of multivariate analysis and so on. Physical remains for this species are even rarer than for Gigantopithecus blacki and the opportunity for speculation and statistical gamesmanship is correspondingly greater.

Locomotion

Ciochon et al., (1990) speculate that given its size Gigantopithecus blacki was a ground dwelling ape, probably a knuckle walker, though it could just as easily been a fist walker, the exact nature of its locomotion is impossible to ascertain from mandibles. Given its mass it could not have been a gibbon-like brachiator.

Diet

When considering diet, the teeth can provide us with stronger clues via analysis of opal phytoliths.

An alternative technique [to analysis of wear patterns and other conventional methods of ascertaining diet] based on the identification of opal phytoliths found bonded to the enamel surfaces of the teeth of extinct species allows for identification of the actual plant remains eaten by an animal prior to its death. Thus the vegetative dietary preferences of an extinct species no longer have to be inferred but can be demonstrated directly through the identification of phytoliths, the inorganic remains of plant cells, on the teeth of extinct species.

(Russell L. Ciochon, Dolores R. Piperno, and Robert G. Thompson, 1990)
In an analysis of 4 Gigantopithecus teeth, Ciochon et al. (2) (1990) identified 30 structures which were "indisputably phytoliths" on two of the teeth. These thirty broke down into two categories: the vegetative parts of grasses, and the fruits and seeds of dicotyledons.

Prior to the phytolith study Ciochon was pursuing a theory of massive bamboo consumption on the part of Gigantopithecus using analogy to the penchant of other megaherbivores to depend upon a single or limited number of plants. Creatures the size of Gigantopithecus would need a source which existed in abundance. The most likely candidate is bamboo. Further, the teeth seemed to point in that direction as well:

The molar teeth of Giganto are low-crowned and flat, with very thick enamel caps. The premolars are molarized: that is, they have become broad and flattened, and thus resemble molars. The canine teeth are not sharp and pointed, but are rather broad and flat, more like what one would expect premolars to be; the incisors are small, peglike, and closely packed. These observations, combined with the massive jaw morphology, make it really an inevitable conclusion that the animal was adapted to the consumption of tough fibrous foods by cutting, crushing, and grinding them.

(Ciochon et al., 1990)
Ciochon et al., (1990) then go on to compare this morphology with that of the giant panda, another bamboo eater, and infers a diet of bamboo for Gigantopithecus.

While bamboo is a grass, the phytolith analysis does not technically either confirm or deny this theory, since it is not capable of defining the type of grass the phytolith came from. What was surprising to Ciochon was the suggestion of fruit in the diet of Gigantopithecus. Ciochon et al (2) (1990) have identified the fruit as belonging to a species in the family Moraceae or a closely related family and state "Judging from the present frequency of dental phytoliths in Gigantopithecus, fruits may have constituted a significant portion of the diet," and go on to note that the high sugar content of this type of fruit may be responsible for the high incidence of cavities in Gigantopithecus teeth (11%).

The results of this study are reported in less complete and less technical terms in the book Other Origins (Ciochon et al, 1990), and in a review of that book Jeffrey H. Schwartz (1991) notes that a great deal is being drawn from the analysis of four teeth, upon only two of which were found phytoliths, with the greatest concentration on only one. Clearly a larger sample of teeth need to be similarly analyzed, but reading the report it is difficult not to share Ciochon's (et al. (2) 1990) excitement at the findings and for the employment of this technique in paleoanthropology in general.

[Stacy Dohm]

Extinction

Ciochon (et al. 1990) propose three factors as being potentially related to the extinction of Gigantopithecus blacki and all are interrelated: dependence on bamboo, the giant panda, and Homo erectus. Bamboo is prone to periodic die offs, the exact reason for which is unknown. The giant panda was contemprous with Gigantopithecus blacki and may have been in competition with it for the same food source. The final straw, however, may have been the introduction of Homo erectus into the region. All three creatures, panda, Giganto, and Homo, may have been fond of the sprouts of the bamboo as a food source (as are living pandas), which means that plants would have been consumed before they had a chance to reach maturity and reproduce. Further, Homo erectus may have been using bamboo for tools. In archaeology it was traditionally assumed that Asia was a cultural backwater during the stone age due to its lack of sophisticated stone tool kits like those found in Europe, but this attitude is changing as consideration is given to the wide variety of uses of bamboo, not only in theory, but as witnessed in practice in Asia through historical times into the present. Likewise, there is much debate around Homo erectus' proclivity for hunting, but another possible factor in the extinction of Gigantopithecus blacki is that it may have been hunted. Ciochon (et al., 1990) believes that it was likely a combination of factors, with the entry of Homo erectus into Gigantopithecus' range upsetting an already delicate balance. No one factor was likely absolute. For example, if Homo erectus had monopolized the fruit supply it would have left Gigantopithecus blacki with no back up when a periodic bamboo die off occurred. This coupled with competition from the giant panda and sporadic hunting could have been enough to reduce breeding populations of Gigantopithecus below viable levels. (Ciochon et al., 1990)


The Myths
Some suggest that Gigantopithecus blacki did not in fact become extinct, and continues to exist as the Sasquatch and the Yeti. Gigantopithecus blacki could have crossed the Bering Land Bridge, the same way humans are thought to have entered the New World (Geoffrey Bourne, 1975, cited in Ciochon et al., 1990). So far, though there have been many alleged sightings, no indisputable physical evidence has been recovered. One is led to suspect that the question of Sasquatch (and related entities) is more for comparative mythology, cultural anthropology, or psychology, since an actual creature the size of Gigantopithecus blacki existing in numbers sufficient to qualify as a breeding population would not only leave physical remains, but would have an observable effect on their environment.


An old Sherpa once observed: "There is a yeti in the back of everyone's mind; only the blessed are not haunted by it."
Lama Surya Das, A Yeti Tale
formerly at http://www.dzogchen.org/yeti/ytale1.html
Conclusion
We have cast the dragon's teeth, and something has sprung up. Is it a giant with the pleasing features of an orangutan and the impressive body of a gorilla? Perhaps it is a mega-gorilla, a prototype King Kong. Perhaps it will turn out to be something really surprising. One thing, though, is clear.

We need more data.


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http://www.wynja.com/arch/gigantopithecus.html

[Stacy Dohm]

In The News
Bigfoot believers
By Theo Stein, Denver Post Environment Writer
Legitimate scientific study of legend gains backing of top primate experts

Sunday, January 05, 2003 — Edmonds, Wash. — After enduring decades of ridicule, Bigfoot researchers are enjoying support from some of the world's most respected scientists in their efforts to prove the hulking creatures of legend are no myth.



 Richard Noll of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization photographs a site in the North Cascades, northeast of Seattle, last month. Noll and colleagues discovered an imprint near a mudhole where the Skookum Cast was recorded two years ago. The persistence of reported sightings of Bigfoot-type creatures in North America and elsewhere has convinced leading researchers on primates — including Jane Goodall, made famous by her studies of chimpanzees in Tanzania — to call for something never seriously considered before: a legitimate scientific study to determine whether the greatest apes that ever lived persist in the world's moist mountainous regions.

Skeptics, who include those in the scientific mainstream, scoff at such ideas. They say reported Bigfoot encounters, tracks and other evidence are either hoaxes or mistakes, and that people who believe such nonsense are soft-headed.

But dedicated amateurs and a smattering of professionals are trying to change that attitude. Using accepted scientific methods, they believe they can show at least some of the claimed evidence for Bigfoot — footprints, hair, voice recordings and a 400-pound block of plaster known as the Skookum Cast — are authentic traces of a rare giant primate.

Recently they have received support from a handful of the field's top experts.


Daris Swindler, for example, is not the typical Bigfoot believer.

When he retired in 1991 after more than 30 years at the University of Washington, Swindler was an acclaimed expert in the arcane study of fossilized primate teeth.

His book, An Atlas of Primate Gross Anatomy, went through several printings and was among the standard references in the field.

So it comes as a surprise to some of his peers that Swindler believes that the Skookum Cast, discovered by amateur Bigfoot researchers in 2000, is a genuine record of a hairy giant that sat down by a mudhole to eat some fruit.

"Daris said that?" asked Russell Ciochon, a prominent paleoanthropologist and professor at the University of Iowa. "He's an important figure. But I still don't think Bigfoot exists in any form."

Mythical giant apes lurk in the traditions of nearly every Native American linguistic group and in legends handed down through the ages from Europe and Asia. Each year, Bigfoot or similar creatures are reported by hundreds of hunters, hikers, motorists and others from central Asia to the central Rockies. But no one has provided the minimum proof required by science: a type specimen or remains that researchers can pick up, measure and argue over.

Nevertheless, Goodall is intrigued.

"People from very different backgrounds and different parts of the world have described very similar creatures behaving in similar ways and uttering some strikingly similar sounds," she said. "As far as I am concerned, the existence of hominids of this sort is a very real probability."

George Schaller, director of science at the Wildlife Conservation Society, has spent 40 years studying rare animals in remote places, including pioneering studies of Central Africa's mountain gorilla, which Western scientists first discovered in 1903.

Schaller remains troubled by the fact no Bigfoot remains have been produced, nor have any samples of feces whose DNA can be chemically poked and prodded to unlock the identity of their maker. And he is mindful of hoaxing.

But he, too, considers Bigfoot an open question.

 "There have been so many sightings over the years," he said. "Even if you throw out 95 percent of them, there ought to be some explanation for the rest. The same goes for some of these tracks."

"I think a hard-eyed look is absolutely essential," he concludes.

The most common evidence allegedly left by these animals are the footprints: big prints in remote locations, some deeply pressed in sand or gravel firm enough for a grown man to pass without leaving a trace. Some footprints, like those Ray Wallace's family claim he left near Bluff Creek, Calif., in the late 1950s, are hoaxed. Many more are too vague to be conclusive. But a few are so detailed and anatomically accurate that they baffle the experts.

"Either the forgers are spending an awful lot of time on this, or there is reason to give this evidence another look," said primate researcher Esteban Sarmiento of the American Museum of Natural History. "I think a serious scientific inquiry is definitely warranted."

Skeptics argue that large mammals, particularly great apes, simply aren't discovered anymore. Not true, says Russell Mittermeier, vice president of Conservation International, who has co-authored scientific papers describing five new primates.

Since the 1990s there have been several spectacular finds, he said, including the antelope-like spindlehorn from Vietnam and a South American peccary thought to have gone extinct thousands of years ago.

"I'm not one to pooh-pooh the potential that these large apes may exist," Mittermeier said. "I guess you could say I'm mildly skeptical but guardedly optimistic. Whoever does find it will have the discovery of the century."

Words of encouragement like these are music to Bigfoot researchers' ears.

"My whole motivation has not been to convince anybody of the existence of the animal, but to convince them that there's a body of evidence begging for further consideration," said Idaho State University professor Jeff Meldrum, whose expertise in primate locomotion led him to become one of the few academics openly researching Bigfoot tracks.

"This is immense," said author John Green, who has tracked Bigfoot reports for almost half a century from British Columbia and investigated some of the most famous sightings and track finds. "The possibility that there could be a real animal behind it just didn't occur to scientists 20 years ago."

The flap over recent claims of Bigfoot hoaxing has not deterred Swindler. But the lack of a body plus the acknowledgment of at least some hoaxing adds up to too many questions for Ciochon.

Like that of Swindler, Ciochon's work focuses on fossilized primate teeth, but of a very special species: Gigantopithecus blacki, the giant Asian ape of the Miocene epoch, which lasted from about 24 million to 5 million years ago.

Most Bigfoot supporters advance Gigantopithecus, or Giganto for short, as the likely ancestor of Bigfoot, if not the hairy beast itself. It's a tantalizing but entirely unproven link that drives Ciochon to distraction.

Ciochon thinks his study subject, which co-existed with the human ancestor Homo erectus for hundreds of thousands of years, may well be the archetypal inspiration for the "boogeyman" and other nocturnal monsters that populate the traditions of aboriginal cultures from Nepal to North America.

But he vigorously rejects any suggestion that Giganto, which he thinks was a specialized, bamboo-eating vegetarian, could persist today.

And he worries that the hotly contested grants that fund his work overseas may go elsewhere if the stigma of the shambling sasquatch of Native American lore attaches to his study subject.

"My biggest problem is there's no evidence, other than conjectural hair and these footprints, some of which we know are faked," Ciochon said.

"If someone finds a skeleton, I'll be there in a nanosecond," he said. "But that's what it's going to take to get me to change my mind."

"There are so many problems," agrees Swindler, who six years ago told a USA Today reporter to count him among the skeptics.

But as he examines the Skookum Cast on a rainy December afternoon in this Seattle suburb, Swindler points out landmarks in the lumpy landscape: a hairy forearm the size of a small ham, an enormous hairy thigh, an outsized buttock, and a striking impression he feels confident was made by the Achilles tendon and heel of a creature that is not supposed to exist.

"Whatever made this was very well adapted to walking on two feet," he said. "It's not conclusive, but it's consistent with what you'd expect to see if a giant biped sat down in the mud."

Swindler hopes that his assessment of the Skookum Cast, and a Discovery Channel documentary set to air Thursday, will generate support for further research.

The key, Schaller said, will be finding dedicated amateurs willing to spend months or years in the field with cameras. "So far, no one has done that," he said.


 
It was a group of dedicated amateurs that discovered the Skookum Cast. A team of volunteers from the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization had spent two days in Washington state's Gifford Pinchot National Forest, putting out pheromone-basted plastic chips during the day and blasting sasquatch calls at night in an attempt to attract an animal.

On the second night, researchers heard a powerful reply to their broadcasts, said Richard Noll, an aerospace toolmaker who has spent 30 years researching the mystery. The next morning, Noll was stunned to realize that an unusual impression of a large animal on the edge of a mudhole near their camp could have been left by their elusive quarry.

"An elk will gather their feet under them when they get up," he said. "But there are no elk hoofprints in the center of the cast."

Meldrum and Swindler concur there are only two logical explanations for the cast: Bigfoot and elk. And they have also ruled out elk.

John Mionczynski, a wildlife researcher who has spent 30 summers studying bighorn herds in Wyoming's Wind River Mountains, has his own reasons for believing in Bigfoot.

On a moonlit summer night in 1972, he backhanded an animal he thought was a bear as it sniffed at a bacon stain in his tent, then watched as the silhouette of a giant, shaggy arm with a broad hand at the end swept toward his tent, collapsing it on him.

"That hand was three times as wide as mine and had an opposed thumb that stuck out as plain as day," Mionczynski said.

He spent the rest of the night huddled by the fire with a revolver in his hand as the creature lobbed pine cones at him from the dark woods behind his tent.

"That pretty much eliminated bears," Mionczynski said.

Mionczynski is working on a contraption of tiny hooks and barbed wire that he intends to place near seasonal foods he thinks sasquatch depend on. He hopes the snare will let him get a DNA sample.

North of Seattle, Noll is collaborating with Owen Caddy, a former Ugandan park ranger who studied chimpanzees in the mid-1990s.

For the last 18 months, they've scoured certain sandbars on a north Cascades river, documenting more than 30 suspected sasquatch footprints they believe were made by a mother and two young. They hope to identify the animals' food sources and travel corridors, then set out a picket line of infrared camera traps.

"I feel the animal is out there, and I don't hedge on that," Caddy said. "I've found physical evidence myself, and I'm confident in my analysis of it.

"Something is making these tracks, and it's not people."

The Scientists
Jane Goodall
A world-famous primate researcher and author, she revealed, in studies of chimpanzees in Tanzania's Gombe National Park, surprising behaviors in humanity's closest living relative. Goodall has won numerous international awards for her contributions to conservation, anthropology and animal welfare. Currently affiliated with Cornell University, she serves as the National Geographic Society's explorer-in-residence.

George Schaller
International science director for the Wildlife Conservation Society. His pioneering field studies of mountain gorillas set the research standard later adopted by Goodall and gorilla researcher Dian Fosse. Schaller's 1963 book, The Year of the Gorilla, debunked popular perceptions of the great ape and reintroduced "King Kong" as a shy, social vegetarian.

Schaller's studies of tigers, lions, snow leopards and pandas also advanced the knowledge of those endangered mammals.

In 1973, he won the National Book Award for The Serengeti Lion: A Study of Predator-Prey Relations, and in 1980 was awarded the World Wildlife Fund Gold Medal for his contributions to the understanding and conservation of endangered species. During the past decade, he has focused on the little-known wildlife of Mongolia, Laos and the Tibetan Plateau.

Russell Mittermeier
A trained primatologist, herpetologist and biological anthropologist, he has discovered five new species of monkey, including two last year. Mittermeier has conducted fieldwork in more than 20 countries around the tropical world, with special emphasis on Brazil, Guyana and Madagascar.

Since 1989, Mittermeier has served as president of Conservation International, which has become one of the most aggressive and effective conservation organizations in the world during the last decade. His publications include 10 books and more than 300 scientific papers and popular articles.

Daris Swindler
Emeritus professor of anthropology at the University of Washington, Swindler is a leading expert on living and fossil primate teeth and one of the top primate anatomists in general. His book, An Atlas of Primate Gross Anatomy, has become a standard reference in the field. A forensic anthropologist, Swindler worked on the Ted Bundy and Green River murder cases along with hundreds of others.

Esteban Sarmiento
A functional anatomist affiliated with the American Museum of Natural History, Sarmiento focuses on the skeletons of hominids. In 2001, he participated with George Schaller in a search for Congo's Bili ape, a possible species super-chimp reported by natives but unknown to Western science. Sarmiento has also studied the Cross River gorilla, a critically endangered subspecies on the Nigeria-Cameroon border whose population is thought to be numbered in the hundreds. He has taught in the U.S., South Africa and Uganda.

From: The Denver Post, 5 January 2003.

http://www.rfthomas.clara.net/news/bfbelievers.html

 
 

[Mark of Australia]

Wow ,great post Stacy  ,that story of Mionczynski was scary ....if true .   As far as I am concerned ,if his story is true then it was a Big Foot.





"Big Foot" is an alleged species of ape/man- like creatures, that have been seen by credible witnesses in the wilds of the North American continent, and all over the world, often leaving huge footprints, hair samples behind.

Big Foot has been spotted in every state of the Union, except Delaware and Hawaii. There are organizations all over the country that keep track of various information gathered on the Big foot sightings and personal experiences with this creature. There have been so many sightings of this elusive creature, including castings of its actual footprints that the evidence of its existence is very strong.

Also known as "Sasquatch" by the Indians of British Columbia, "Oh-mah-ah" by the northern California Huppa tribe, "Skunk Apes or Napes" in the southern United States, as "Seehtiks" in the Cascades, "Memegwico" by other American Indians, Yetis in Alaska/ Asia, and Almas in Russia, these creatures have been described as being between 6 and 9 feet in height, that walked gracefully, in an upright position, in smooth strides with knees bent. Weight of the creatures seen has been estimated to be between 300 to 600 lbs. They have muscular bodies, massive shoulders, and are covered with short to long hair. Their facial features are human, and the skin on their faces, hands and feet, which are distinct and human-like, are dark and leathery. Their heads, which are peaked at the back, sit right on their shoulders. In some sightings Big Foot has a jutted chin, heavy brow ridges, a receding forehead, and large, square white teeth. The female of the species has large breasts.

Family groups of these creatures and individuals as well have been sighted and described so often in the Oregon - Washington area that there are Big Foot Informational Centers in both Oregon and Washington, that keep track of all the sightings and evidence of this undiscovered species, thought by some to be a homonid that avoids human contact, keeping to themselves in their wilderness habitat, areas that have enough wildlife and vegetation to support them. Go to http://www.ratsnest.net/bigfoot/library/index2.htm to find out more about Big Foot in the United States.

There are several theories as to what species Big Foot should be cataloged under, when its existence is proven without a shadow of a doubt to the scientific community. Some think that Big foot is a hominid. George Karras - http://www.ratsnest.net/sasquatch/aboutsasquatch.htm (Northwest) "One thing we know for sure is that all known apes (Pongids) have a divergent large toe while Bigfoot does not. Bigfoot's tracks indicate that its foot more closely resemble the feet of Hominids such as Homo erectus or Homo sapiens (modern man) and hair samples that can not be positively identified more closely resemble Human hair than the hair of Apes or any other known animal. It is my opinion that Bigfoot is not Human but it is closer to Human than any animal alive today."

As mentioned above, Big Foot like creatures have been sighted throughout the world in wilderness areas. Dr. Myra Shackley, a professor of archaeology at Leiscester University is convinced that Big foot is a pre-hominid Neanderthal man, a predecessor of modern man, who supposedly was exterminated by Cro -Magnon man.

In the Altai Mountains of Mongolia, wild men known as Almas have been seen and known about by the area people for years. When people first settled this region, it is told how they drove the "WILD MEN" out of the immediate area. Dr. Myra Shackley actually went to the Altai Mountains and gathered evidence of the existence of these wild men known as Almas.

A Professor Porshnev investigated the case of a female Alma, described as having ape-like features and covered in hair, who was captured by the Altai Mountain people in the mid-nineteenth century. Called Zana, she eventually was domesticated and could do simple tasks such as grind corn. She loved grapes and wine, and after drinking heavily, would crash out for hours, which explains how she became pregnant several times. Her children, being half modern man, could talk and were rational human beings. The last of her children died in 1954. Professor Porshnev however interviewed her grandson, who had dark skin and Negroid features. His jaw was so strong that he could pick up a chair with a man sitting on it with his mouth.

Other theories about these strange creatures have been proposed as well.

One theory is that apes have escaped from captivity. Perhaps, chimpanzees and gorillas, pets of Slave traders escaped and survived in the bottomlands of the United States.

Another theory, believed by Loren Coleman is that these creatures are Apes from the "supposedly prehistoric family of the pongids, the Dryopithecinae," a species that was highly successful in living in both "temperate and subtropical areas." They could have come from Asia during the Pleistocene era. (Mysterious America book by Loren Coleman.)

Other creative possibilities include linking these creatures to UFO sightings. (Mysterious America book by Loren Coleman).


http://www.coverups.com/bigfoot.htm

[Stacy Dohm]

Hey Mark, glad you liked it and thanks for your contribution.

Did you ever see this film on the Patterson-Gimlin Bigfoot film that Jen posted in another thread?



It's not in color, but it is pretty cool!

[Mark of Australia]

Hi Stacy ,
     
Yes I have seen that footage before in colour. But this version is good because they have adjusted it frame by frame to keep the image steady .The cameraman  didn't hold it very steady in the original.

In a documentary about it , One expert on the human gait said that it was very convincing and that it is good evidence for Big Foot , either that ,or an extremely skillful hoax.

That sort of made me reconsider the whole Bigfoot issue. I consider it worthy of serious study to the point of going on expeditions to try to find Bigfoot.