Orang-Pendek Update

Here's the latest news on the Center for Fortean Zoology's newly-completed expedition to Sumatra in search of the Orang-Pendek. This report comes from the Australian office of the CFZ, which played an integral role in the quest to find the mystery beast.

A Bigfoot/UFO Gig

This just in from Stan Gordon:

2011 Pittsburgh PA UFO-Bigfoot Conferences Feature Nationally Known Speakers

A two day paranormal extravaganza is coming to the Pittsburgh area October 22-23, 2011, at the Westmoreland County Community College, in Youngwood.

The events are sponsored and organized by the Pennsylvania Chapter of the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) and the Pennsylvania Bigfoot Society (PBS).

For two days the public will have the opportunity to learn about the ongoing UFO phenomena and Bigfoot mystery. UFO sightings continue to be reported over Pennsylvania and around the Pittsburgh area.

The Keystone state has a long history of reported encounters with large hair covered man-like creatures. Recent reports of a Bigfoot sighting and recordings of strange animal sounds from Fayette County will be among the topics covered.

Both national and regional speakers and investigators will provide illustrated lectures on both topics. The PA MUFON UFO Conference will be held on Saturday.

The six speaker line up for Saturday will include Stanton Friedman, who will speak about Roswell and MJ12, Stan Gordon, who will discuss Historic UFO and Bigfoot cases from Pennsylvania, John Ventre, the PA MUFON State Director, who will speak about 2012, and David Twichell talks about UFOs and the Bible. William Konkolesky discusses UFOs over Michigan and Roger Marsh presents UFO Witness Theater.

On Sunday, the East Coast Bigfoot Conference makes its return to the area. The event, which was organized by PBS Director Eric Altman, will also feature six speakers.

This line up of lectures will include presentations from nationally known researchers including Dr. Jeff Meldrum, who will discuss “Sasquatch: the Global Phenomena”, Steve Kulls, “Primate Habitation in Relation to Bigfoot Research”, Stan Gordon, who will cover, “Mysterious Creatures of Pennsylvania”, and Eric Altman on “Bigfoot in Pennsylvania”. Dave Dragosin discusses Bigfoot witness sketches, and Billy Willard talks about Bigfoot in Virginia.

There will be displays, information booths, book signings and vendor tables outside the auditorium and open to those who attend. The events will begin both days at 10:00am and continue until 7 pm. Pizza and soft drinks will be available for purchase during the scheduled lunch breaks. Saturday evening dinner with the speakers.

For details and more information call John Ventre at 724-836-1266 or visit http://www.mufonpa.com

Head-Games

Something weird has been going on in our back-garden (or, back-yard, as it's called in the US!) for some time now.

And, it's probably a good idea to bring it to people's attention, as it's still on-going.

About three weeks ago, I found a decapitated mole in the grass, which I thought was kind of odd, and which Ken Gerhard saw when he came to visit shortly afterwards. Then, about two weeks ago, I found a large, skinned bone on the lawn - yep, picked entirely clean of meat.

But, there was far more - and much worse - to come, as the photo above shows.

Last Saturday morning, me and Dana were sitting outside when D suddenly gave out a huge scream and pointed to a paved area about eight-feet from where we were sitting.

As the photo graphically shows - and as became clear when I went over to take a close-up look at it - it was the head of a possum, which had clearly been pretty savagely torn or bitten off.

And, it was made all the more strange by the fact that this is the precise position the head was in when we found it. In other words, I didn't carefully position it for the photo. In fact, handling the ant-infested head was the very last thing I wanted to do!

The culprit? Well...I'm not sure...

But, what I can say for sure is that twice in the past year we have seen a Coyote in the street outside our house. The first time was in June of last year, when we came back from my mum's funeral in England and it raced across the road in front of us, around 8.30 at night.

The second time we saw it was during a very violent thunderstorm in May or June of this year, when - again - it was racing along the road outside our home.

Plus, although we live in a city (Arlington, Texas, just outside Dallas and Fort Worth) behind our house is a huge stretch of field that extends for hundreds of feet (both length and breadth-wise). The ideal place for a predator, perhaps.

I'm inclined to think the Coyote was the culprit (and that the mole and the bone issue were part of its actions too), but if you have any other ideas, let me know...

Casting Orang-Pendek

Here's the latest news on the expedition to Sumatra in search of the Orang-Pendek, which includes an interesting photo of a certain aspect of the quest that I mentioned a few days ago.

Winged Humans/Flying Humans

It's debatable whether or not sightings of winged humanoids fall into the category of Cryptozoology or some other realm. But, given the fact that my new article for Mysterious Universe on such things makes a brief reference to Mothman and Owlman, I'll go ahead and post the link here!

Mystery Animals of the Northern Isles

As you may know, CFZ Press has an on-going series of books called Mystery Animals of the British Isles.

Well, there's an excellent new addition to the series, which has just been published. This one is written by Glen Vaudrey and covers the Northern Isles.

And you can find my review of the book at my latest Lair of the Beasts column for Mania.com. Here's the link.

An Island Monster

My latest post at Mysterious Universe - on a certain infamous blood-sucker...

Orang Pendek Info

Jon Downes has an important update on the current expedition to Sumatra in search of the Orang Pendek.

Jon has received the following, important message from team member, Richard Freeman:

"Hi Jon, Great news, we have a cast of the very first orang-pendek hand print ever recorded. Found by John Didmus, casted by Andy Sanderson. We all are getting copies. We also have hair found close by."

More news when we have it!

Bigfoot TV

Last weekend (as I noted at this post), me and Ken Gerhard headed up to Oklahoma, where we were both speaking at the first, annual Cryptid Fest, held at the McGee State Park.

While we were there, a team from the local Fox News TV channel turned up to do interviews, about our views on Bigfoot, the field itself, witnesses, and even what some believed to be evidence of Bigfoot in the very area we were filming!

Well, the segment is now online and can be found right here.

Mystery Animals of the Northern Isles

Good news! Glen Vaudrey has a new book out right now. It's the latest in the Center for Fortean Zoology's on-going series of titles that fall under the banner of Mystery Animals of the British Isles.

Glen's new book covers the Northern Isles, and here's Jon Downes to tell you more about it:

"Glen's second volume in the Mystery Animals of the British Isles series is now available. As Glen writes in his Introduction: 'My aim with this book is to introduce you to the many wonderful mystery animals that have put in an appearance in the Northern Isles over the years, from the darkest days of the Middle Ages right up to the mdoern day. For those unfamiliar with the term, the Northern Isles is used here to describe the island groups to be found north of mainland Scotland."

If you're in the UK, you can purchase Glen Vaudrey's Mystery Animals of the British Isles: The Northern Isles at this link. And US readers can buy it right here.

Back from the Cryptid-Fest

In the early hours of Saturday morning, good mate (and author of Big Bird! and co-author with me of Monsters of Texas) Ken Gerhard drove up to my home from San Antonio.

The reason: we were both due to speak at the first ever Cryptid Fest, organized by Mike Roberts in the 10,000-acre McGee State Park, in the heart of Native American land near Atoka, Oklahoma.

Since Oklahoma is only a couple of hours' drive from where me and Dana live, all went well - that is, until a certain company whose map-service I had used to get us there took us to an entirely different part of the park, and we ended up getting lost for about an hour amid its tree-shrouded, winding roads and tracks! But, I digress!

When we finally arrived (around 2PM), we were pleased to see that the audience was settled in, and things were progressing in fine fashion: Paula Schermerhorn was speaking on UFOs and ghosts, followed by Amanda Wagaman on a variety of paranormal phenomena.

After Amanda, it was time for Bill Rebsamen, whose presentation was as unique as it was entertaining. Bill discussed a whole wealth of Cryptids, but did so by illustrating them with examples of his own, excellent artwork. And, if you aren't familiar with Bill's art, you really should!

Following Bill, was me, on some of the high-strangeness-style creatures within Cryptozoology, such as Mothman, England's spectral Man-Monkey, Goat-Men, and Werewolves.

Then, Ken gave the headline presentation, on strange, winged-monsters - that's right, those huge and mystifying giant birds that seem to pop up here, there and everywhere from time to time.

Right around 7PM, we grabbed some food, before the next part of the conference began: a night-time quest for Bigfoot. Given that there have been significant reports of the beast from the very location where the conference was being held, this seemed a good and logical idea.

And, although I didn't personally experience anything unusual that day or night, there were those who heard strange noises, found tracks, and even thought they saw dark figures in the woods.

In other words, it was a fine, insightful, informative, fun, and monstrous event!

If you couldn't make this year's Cryptid Fest, I'm pleased to be able to say there will be another one next year - don't miss it!

Bound for Sumatra

The latest CFZ expedition to Sumatra - in search of the Orang-Pendek - has begun. And, as this link shows, this time it's a truly international quest to find the beast.

And here's Richard Freeman's second-of-two posts for England's Guardian newspaper on the creature-quest.

In Search of the Orang-Pendek

The forthcoming Center for Fortean Zoology expedition to Sumatra in search of the elusive and mystery Orang-Pendek is highlighted in today's edition of Britain's Guardian newspaper. The team leaves tomorrow, and as and when news comes in, I'll update you right here.

In the meantime, here's the link to Richard's first Guardian post on the wild thing of the woods...

Mini-Creatures

Over at the Center for Fortean Zoology blog, On the Track, Richard Freeman has an interesting new post that begins thus:

"In North America a number of what have been claimed to be mummified corpses of tiny men or man-like creatures have been uncovered. The most famous became known as the Pedro Mountain Mummy and its story takes us back to Wyoming. In October 1932 Cecil Main and Frank Carr blasted a hole through the wall of a ravine in the San Pedro Mountains, about 65 miles southwest of Casper, Wyoming. They were looking for gold but what they found was even more amazing. Inside the ravine wall was a hidden cavern approximately 4 ft tall, 4 ft wide, and about 15 ft deep. On a ledge in the cavern was the body of a tiny creature mummified by age. It would have been no more than 14 inches in height and was sitting in a cross-legged position. It had strangely protuberant eyes, a low brow, thick lips and large hands. The skull seemed oddly flattened and was covered in a gelatinous substance. This seemed to be blood and brain matter, and a blow to the head had apparently killed the little creature. The tiny body weighed 7 ounces."

And here's the rest of Richard's post.

Wild Men & Green Men

Over at her website, Kithra has a new post on Woodwose and Wild Men - phenomena that play an integral role in the British Bigfoot controversy.

Here's the opening words of Kithra's article:

"In its depiction the Woodwose, sometimes called the Wild Man, is very similar to the Green Man. Both appear in ancient mythology and have their origins in ancient paganism. And, since they became subsumed into Christianity in medieval times, both can often be found as decoration in Churches.

"Whilst the Green Man, a pre-Christian fertility symbol, is usually depicted with the face half-covered in leaves and vines emanating from the mouth, the Woodwose is usually shown as a complete, part human, figure carrying a club with the limbs being leafy. It also often shows a thick beard and wears a cap. The Woodwose may also be shown holding the club in different positions. Sometimes this is on its side and sometimes it is raised. There is a theory that a raised club depicts the figure before it was converted to Christianity, but it’s probably more correct to believe that it was raised to ward off evil spirits."

And here's the link to the complete paper.