encounters-and-sightings

The Werewolf of Henrico County, VA

Sat, 28 May 2011 03:01:55 +0100

One location of werewolf/dogman sightings outside of the midwest is in Henrico County Virginia of a werewolf that has come to be known as the Werewolf of Henrico County. The story of the werewolf of Henrico County has taken on something of urban legend status, but it’s hard to find true first-hand accounts. Every thing heard about this particular werewolf seems to be something that a friend said. When you finally are able to get through the excitement and whispers, accounts of the werewolf sightings describe a greyish white creature covered in fur that stands upright and “has the face of an animal”.

These werewolf sightings seem to be clustered in Henrico County Virginia in and around the Confederate Hills Recreation Center. It is unclear how often the werewolf appears or what its appearances coincide with.

Possible explanations for these werewolf sightings include a hoax by a local – the sightings are after all in and around a recreation center – it is not unplausible to think that a local teen has pulled out his halloween costume and is trying to pull a prank on the local community. There are those however that deny that it is a prank.

Another plausible explanation to the sightings that has been offered which seems to be more likely is that what is being seen is actually a bigfoot, since the area is also a huge spot for bigfoot sightings. In theory, this would not be the first time a bigfoot has been mistaken as a werewolf or one of the most common U.S. terms "dogman" because of similiar descriptions. From a distance, both bigfoot and werewolves can look pretty similar according to eye witness accounts. In the darkness, a huge upright creature covered in fur looking vaguely human could be mistaken as either. Unless you have a close-up encounter, it could be very difficult to determine which creature it in fact is..

New Yowie Sighting - Australian Bigfoot??

Sat, 28 May 2011 02:41:17 +0100

There are all kinds of alleged creatures wandering around out in the Australian wilderness. There are dinosaurs, the once believed extinct Thylacine, giant spiders, reptiles of shapes and sizes and of course Bigfoot.

Not as well known around the globe as the Yeti of Tibet, the Sasquatch of Canada or the Bigfoot from here in the good old US of A the Yowie has been a staple in folklore from the land down under for centuries.

As a matter of fact the Yowie doesn't get seen too often, due mostly to the fact that Australia has hundreds of miles of wilderness where man seldom ventures to hind in, so likewise he normally doesn't get much press.

A recent sighting, however has sparked new interest in the wild man of the outback .... no not Yahoo Serious .... what? Never heard of him? .... "Young Einstein"? .... it's a film.

Anyway, a motorist, who wanted to only be identified as Dean, was busy Tuesday morning at about 2:30 am on his usual route (Pacific Hwy, north of Grafton) as a truck driver when he spotted something strange.

“I reached the top of the hill and I was coming around the sweeping corner to the right when I noticed something a lot larger than a kangaroo in the middle of the road – my headlights weren't on it yet but it was a bright night and I saw what looked like a large person stooped over, with a big overcoat on,” Dean explains.

“At the time I thought ‘you silly old thing, what are you doing in the middle of the road at this time of the morning', but next thing I knew my headlights started to light it up and it took one giant step off the road, it went from standing up like a person to going down on all fours and then it disappeared into the scrub in about three bounds.”

The eyewitness described the creature as being well over 6-feet tall and covered with jet blck hair or fur.

“It had an almost sort of a square, shaggy block head sitting straight on its shoulders – I'm a pretty big guy but it made me absolutely awe-struck how huge its body was – it had its arm up against a tree and it had about a foot of hair hanging from under its biceps.”

The sighting has left the eyewitness rather rattled and wanting desperately to come to terms with what he saw.

“Anybody who knows me knows I'm the ultimate realist but this was an awe-inspiring moment, it's definitely made me a believer,” Dean adds.

Since his encounter Dean has been in contact with local Yowie investigators who believe his story is legit.

Field Trips To The Jersey Devil's Turf

Sun, 20 Mar 2011 07:07:10 +0100

An Encounter of The Jersey Devil:

As a native of Cape May County, I’ve had the typical right-of-passage trip to the Pine Barrens, the legendary home of the Jersey Devil. This Jersey girl went to Cape May County Technical High School, which sponsored trips to the Pine Barrens for good grades in certain classes. I was one of the fortunate students to go three times during my four year career at CMCT.

Each time I went on this trip, my canoe was followed by a heavy footed thing. With each step I heard branches snap under its feet (hooves?). Once every ten minutes or so I could hear deep beastly growls that to this very day give me the creeps. Being in a canoe and on a class trip didn't afford me much opportunity to flee in terror, so I stuck it out – for three years. Every year it was the same.

During my sophomore year I was pretty confident about my canoeing skills, so I didn’t look over my shoulder much. I went canoeing with a friend of mine when we came across a bag that had been torn open and gone through. Around it were prints on the ground that looked something like a horse's hoof, only bigger. Then I heard it, the cry that still haunts my dreams: part human, part beast, and full of anger, pregnant with pure hate. I nearly flipped the canoe! We left, leaving whatever it was out there behind – or so I thought.

But it followed us. Every time we stopped or paused, it got closer to the river. We pushed on. Then worse came to worst, as we tipped the canoe. I heard the thing running behind us, and thought for sure we were dead. Then we righted our canoe and got into it as fast as humanly possible. We finally made it out to safety, sun-fried to a crisp, missing all of our valuables and most of our clothes, but never happier to be on shore. We packed up our bus, and left.

As we were leaving, I rested my head on the window and saw a little cottage. I looked at it until the bus was about to pass it and saw a woman. She looked back at me, and I could see her skin was torn and bleeding. After the bus passed, she vanished. Scared me so badly I wouldn't go into the woods for a year.

-Kellie

Hellhound, Dogman, or something else?

Sun, 20 Mar 2011 08:58:11 +0100

The following depiction was emailed in this week, and it goes as follows:

Romulus, MI - 1978

This happend to me a long long time ago...Dont recall much of itI recall very little of this because I was so young at the time. My family, however, seems to recall it very well. To this day I still have a hard time getting any information out of them about it. Whenever movies like the exorcist or Cujo come on someone would always say something like, "Do you remember way back at the farm house when you where a kid?" Then they would look at each other and say something along the lines of "yeah that was really weird" and it would always be left at that. Over that last few years I've pressed my mother and uncle for as many details as I could get out of them. It's been like prying a dirty family secret or something.

When I was around 7 years old, I lived on a farm house with my mom, her boyfriend, and my uncle. We had chickens, rabbits, and the usual assortment of farm cats. We had a few acres of land out back and your typical old rickety barn. Our house was set back off from a major road and had a decent amount of woods bordering the property with a major airport just up the street.

We had this really strange dog creature that would hang around the property. I say dog "creature" because this thing was far to big and intelligent to be a stray dog. The dog was very big...as large as a big Grate Dane. It was black and had the upper body of a German Shepard and the lower body of a Doberman Pinscher and it had VERY pronounced red eyes. I'm told it also had a very musky scent to it. Im not saying it was a werewolf or a Dogman, but it was very "WEREWOLF LIKE". The dog would frequently stalk the edge of the woods on our property in the day, and it seemed to have no fear. My uncle would yell at it or throw things towards it to try to scare it off but it would simply rear up on its hind legs like a ram and charge at you for a short distance. We would frequently find dead chickens or rabbits after thunderstorms. We knew it was that dog thing because it would leave huge footprints in the mud and claw marks on the window ledges.. Sometimes we would find the screens ripped from our screen doors and windows. It would never outright attack us, but it did seem to enjoy taunting us and harassing us.

Now, this is where the story takes another strange turn and I do not recall any of this. Though, my family swears by it. One summer night my mom had left the window open in my bedroom at night so I could sleep. She was on her way to the bathroom and passed by my room and heard me talking to someone. She said she got pissed because it was way after my bedtime and figured I was up playing . She said she opened by bedroom door to tell me to cut it out and get to sleep. When she opened the door she saw me standing in my bed and I had apparently wet my pajamas, I was talking towards the window. I wasn't screaming or freaking out but seemed to be transfixed and talking in a low voice towards the window. She said I didn't even pay attention to her coming into the room or the lights coming on. When she looked towards the window, the dog had its two front paws pushed through the screen and was looking through the window at us and making a low growl. Its eyes glared red from the light of the room. (note the windows of this house where about 5 feet from the ground so that might give you an idea on size.)
She immediately freaked and said she threw a beer bottle at it to scare it off. She said she closed the window and closed the blinds.

My mom told me that for about a week after that I acted very strange. Like the way the kid acted in the movie the shinning. I would say things like " we don't want you here", "Our ghosts are food" or "God thinks your bad". The house cats would freak out whenever I was in the room. If anyone tried to pick one of the cats up, they would attack anyone that came close to them. For some reason I would take sewing needles or anything sharp I could find and pick my fingers till they would bleed then finger paint all over the walls with the blood. The house also had a very strong "septic tank" smell to it for a few days. Lights would burn out and pop and weird things would just happen. Understandably my mom and my uncle where really freaked out. My mom would just get mad at me and yell at me to stop acting so weird and talk normal.

Anyways about a week or two passed, My uncle was out back working on his truck when he saw the dog out at the edge of the woods making its way in towards the rabbit pen. At this point he was tired of dealing with it and went into the house to get his 22. Apparently he fired at it and hit it in the rear. the dog turned and ran into the woods. We didn't see it anymore after that. More or less, everything cleared up, We didn't have anymore weird smells, the cats relaxed and I started being a normal 7 year old kid.

For a long time I didn't take to much of this seriously. My mom was a child of the 60's and did more then a fair amount of partying. I always just figured she smoked something or maybe drank a bit to much. The dog could have just been a dog, the house was old so it may have had bad electrical, and I might have just been a weird kid reacting to my moms partying. But over the years when I asked other family members, they would all vouch and say that " yes something very weird was going on with you. There was a strange dog out in those woods.". My Aunt and Grandparents had all spoken in some way or another about it. My uncle would always make jokes about how if I didn't behave the dog in the woods would come and get me.

The only thing I recall was that weird dog in the window or out in the field. I always recall its eyes. You could see it's eye's out in the woods sometimes at night. I have bad dreams about it from time to time and this is what prompted me to really find out what I could. When I asked my mom about it over the holidays, her response was "Why do you want to think about that and how do you remember anything, anyway?"

(For a size comparison do a Google search on a Great Dane named Gibson the SIZE of that dog fits the description.)

Well that's my story and I'm sticking to it!

Re: That is a very interesting encounter that you and your family had. Has anybody else reported a sighting? Would you consider this being as paranormal or a cryptid?

It happened so long ago I'm not sure if anyone else reported it. I think I was around 7 when that happened. I hardly remember much of it except seeing the dog out in the fields and my mom always rushing me in the house. I'm 39 now so that gives you a idea how long ago it was. I was going to try to get more detail from my mom but she passed away over a year ago so I was never able to ask her more about it. That story I sent you was originally written 2 years ago I believe. I personally would have just wrote it off as a large dog but the rest of my family is adamant about it.

The area that it happened is all changed now. Its actually right down the road from where I live now. A car rental business sits on the spot that used to be the farm house. and what was the field out back is now a shipping center. Very little of the area is the same anymore.

As for what I think it was? I cant honestly say one way or another. If I had to guess I would say it was just a big wild dog, but for the fact of the "possession" for lack of a better term that I was told happened to me, I would have no idea what to think of it. I recall nothing about me being weird or any of that. When I look at the story as told to me, it has very strong aspects of both paranormal and Cryptid. But like I said, I recall very little of it and most of it could be skeptically explained away.

Michigan Dogman Sighting - Reed City, MI / 1993

Sat, 12 Mar 2011 03:55:04 +0100

The barn near Todd Lake where Courtney saw a dogman-like creature in 1993. The red circle indicates where the creature was standing.

The area around Reed City, Michigan, seems to be a hotbed of activity with regard to sightings of the dogman. The latest report comes over a decade after it occurred, but the witness seems quite credible and in unshakeable in her story. Her name is Courtney, and her encounter took place during the winter of 1993-94.

Courtney was a teenager at the time, and was sneaking cigarettes behind her parents' home, near Todd Lake northeast of Reed City. The sun was setting on a clear, cold winter day. Courtney was facing a large abandoned barn on the property next door. Through a hole broken in the siding, she saw what she thought was "a piece of old farm machinery," just inside the building.
She watched for a few moments, but the object didn't move. Then a deer or some other large animal snapped a branch in the woods nearby. Courtney's attention was diverted, and she turned her head to see what had caused the noise. In her peripheral vision, she noted that "the farm machinery moved too." When she looked back, the setting sun was silhouetting the object in the barn. She froze in place when she realized that she was looking at a tall animal. It turned its head back and looked straight at her. It was, in Courtney's words, "at least 6 feet tall if not more. It was dark colored. It had a dog like appearance; pointy nose and really big pointy ears."

Courtney dashed into her house to grab a flashlight. When she returned outside, she shined it toward the barn door but the animal was no longer there. She walked closer to the barn to look for tracks in the heavy snow. When she didn't see any, she realized the creature might still be inside, and ran back to the safety of the house. She never saw the creature again.

Courtney later talked to a friend who had seen something "the size of a buffalo but the shape of a dog" in the same barn, but at a different time. The girl had been hysterical for days after her encounter. Neither of these witnesses heard of "The Legend" song, or about the Michigan Dogman, until years later.

The Michigan Dogman Sighting - Reed City, MI / June 2006

Sat, 12 Mar 2011 03:43:46 +0100

In June of 2006, a radiology student at Ferris State University in Big Rapids, MI was told by a friend about some strange occurrences near the town of Reed City, about 12 miles away. People had reported some very unusual sightings of a large dog or wolf-like animal near a remote and vacant building. Early one Saturday morning, the student convinced three of his friends to accompany him on an expedition to check it out.

They arrived at the site around 2:30am. Nothing happened for the first 30 minutes, then one of them saw movement in the woods nearby. The crickets went silent. Twigs snapped loudly. One of the students shined a bright flashlight toward the source, and saw something that he termed, “not human.”

The creature seemed to be standing upright, apparently hiding behind a tree. All four students saw what appeared to be an arm or leg, covered in hair “about an inch long.” Just a small portion of the face was visible, and the student reported “The way the eyes set made me think of a human face, I could not see the ears, I remember the mouth to be narrow but I dont recall seeing a nose on the end of the "snout". The animal did not move, but when the light hit his eyes, they returned a yellow glow.

For several minutes, the students were frozen in place. One of them finally broke the silence by requesting that they “get in the car and get out of here.” They drove away, but by the time they reached the main road, youthful bravado took over and they decided to go back to see if they could get a better look.

Arriving back at the building, they shined lights all around, but could see nothing. Just as they were about to leave again, a motion sensitive light on the side of the building went on, and they heard a fast rustling noise moving toward them. The four students scrambled back into the car and tore away.

As the car roared along the country road at nearly 40 miles per hour, one of the students in the rear seat turned to look behind them. In the glow of the tail lights, he saw that a large animal was chasing them, running on all fours. When they reached the main road, no one looked back again.

In an interview, the student described the animal like this, “I don't know if this is a dogman or not, but this thing is NOT human, is NOT natural, and is NOT friendly."

In 2006, The History Channel's Monster Quest sent a film crew to the scene, and the crew reported hearing and briefly sighting a similar creature during the filming.

Black Panther in Louisiana?

Sat, 12 Mar 2011 03:44:24 +0100

"With residents reporting near daily sightings, you'd think we were under attack," one man stated.

Truth is, the myth of the black panther in Louisiana - and throughout the United States - has a long phantom existence, according to physiologists and biologists.

Maria Davidson, the large carnivore program manager for the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries, calmly explained that the only black panthers in existence are black jaguars found in South America and black leopards that live in Asia and Africa.

The North American black panther generally falls under the term "cryptid," a creature whose existence has been suggested but is not recognized by the scientific community and has been deemed highly unlikely. Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster fall under that category.

They also have been called "phantom cats," "alien big cats" (ABCs), and in certain circles, the sightings have been dubbed "panther paranoia."

And while some people, including local law enforcement officials, discuss the possibility of a black cougar in our midst, Davidson assuredly said black cougars do not exist at all. They come only in tawny and fawn colors, ranging from light gray-brown to a brownish orange.

In fact, she said, Louisiana does not have a breeding population of cougars - in any color - and that the last cougar found in the state was in 2009 and that animal was genetically linked to a population in New Mexico.

Last month, two panther sightings were reported, one in St. Tammany Parish and one in Plaquemines Parish. A few days earlier, a man in St. Bernard Parish said he and his wife saw one sitting a block from their garage, staring at them calmly, before darting into nearby woods.

So, if you're ever in Louisiana for some good ole' deep southern cuisine, be sure to have your camera handy in case you happen to have any unexpected visitors show up.

Bownessie - Lochness of England?

Sat, 12 Mar 2011 03:44:49 +0100

The Internet has been buzzing about a recent photograph allegedly depicting a monster surfacing in a British lake. As Eric Niiler of Discovery News noted, "The latest entry in the lake monster sweepstakes is making a bid for glory [is the] 'Bownessie' of Lake Windermere, England....Tom Pickles and Sara Harrington, work colleagues who were kayaking at the lake as part of a team-building exercise, snapped this photo of the possible sea creature with a mobile phone. It appears to show a multi-humped black object moving through the water from left to right."

When the news broke, many people were surprised. Not just that a dark, multi-humped monster had supposedly been photographed on a lake, but that it wasn't at Loch Ness.

Most people know about Nessie, the denizen in Ness, one of Scotland's many lakes (or "lochs"). Reports of something odd in Loch Ness only date back to the 1930s, and a famous 1934 photo of a silhouetted, serpentine head and neck helped propel Nessie into international stardom (unfortunately the photo was later revealed to be a hoax).

The lake has been searched for nearly 80 years using everything including cameras, divers, sonar, submarines, and dolphins, yet no real evidence has been found.

"If you're interested in lake monsters, you needn't go all the way to Europe," Daniel Loxton told Discovery News.

Loxton, editor of Junior Skeptic magazine and co-author of an upcoming book on lake monsters, says that "every human culture has stories of water monsters, and besides, Europeans brought their own monsters with them to North America. European-style monsters manifested early in tributaries of the St. Lawrence river, and then along the coast of Maine. They were reported in lakes Erie and Ontario. Today, monsters are said to haunt dozens of other lakes across Canada and the United States."

Here’s a sample:

Crescent Lake is a picturesque body of water in northeastern Newfoundland near the small town of Robert’s Arm. Robert's Arm is gorgeous, with walking trails snaking over lush green hills and around the placid lake. The lake, deep and cold, is allegedly home to a lake monster known as Cressie. As you enter the town, a life-size(?) model of Cressie greets visitors.

Quebec's Lake Memphremagog, which extends down into north-central Vermont, is said to be home to a lake monster, Memphre, with reports supposedly dating as far back as 1816.

In British Columbia's Lake Okanagan, there supposedly exists the Ogopogo monster. It is said to be dark, up to 70 feet long, and have a series of humps. It is the world's second most famous creature after Nessie, and like many lake monsters, native Indians are said to have described the beast in their legends and myths.

America has its share of reputed aquatic beasts as well, including Lake Tahoe's Tessie. But the best known lives in Lake Champlain, which forms the border between Vermont and New York. "Champ," as the creature is called, has allegedly been seen by hundreds of witnesses and is anywhere between 10 and 187 feet long, has one or more humps, and is gray, black, dark green, or other colors.

The small town of Port Henry, New York, is the self-proclaimed "Home of Champ" and has a large wooden board that records monster sightings. The best evidence for Champ -- in fact, for any lake monster -- was a 1977 photo taken by Sandra Mansi showing what appeared to be a dark head and hump in the lake. Later investigation showed that the object was almost certainly a floating log that looked serpentine from a certain angle.

All these monsters have at least one thing in common: a lack of good scientific evidence.

The Lake Windermere "Bownessie" photo seems likely to be a hoax; in fact Loren Coleman, Director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine, has his suspicions: "The evidence brought forth is only as trustworthy as the people bringing it to us. What do we know about Tom Pickles and Sarah Harrington, who saw the creature during their company's team building exercise? How is this all tied to a fundraising effort they were in the midst of conducting and desired to obtain publicity for? I'm not saying they are not to be taken seriously, but UK investigators should do some background checks."

Coleman notes that previous lake monster photos have many explanations. "Some are unexplained. Some are fakes and hoaxes. Some are garbage bags. Some are otters. Some are humans. Some are other known animals."

With the caveat that "unexplained" does not mean "unexplainable," whatever the images of "monsters" in Windermere and other lakes truly are, they are probably accounted for on this list.

The Launch - 03/11/2011

Fri, 11 Mar 2011 22:53:04 +0100

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