Another Previously Unknown Creature Options

[chrisandclauida2]

touch me for story

picture following story. we all know what it means everytime a new animal is found. it shuts people up for at least a while.


GENEVA (Reuters) - Environmental researchers are preparing to capture what they call a new, mysterious species of carnivore on Borneo, the first such discovery on the wildlife-rich Indonesian island in over a century.

Swiss-based environmental group WWF said on Monday its researchers photographed the strange animal, which looks like a cross between a cat and a fox, in the dense, central mountainous rainforests of Borneo.

"This could be the first time in more than a century that a new carnivore has been discovered on the island," said the WWF in a statement.

The mammal, slightly larger than a cat with red fur and a long tail, was photographed twice by a camera trap at night.

Locals and wildlife experts who viewed photographs of the animal, which has very small ears and large hind legs, said they had never seen such a creature before and were convinced that it was a new species, WWF said.

Researchers hope to confirm the discovery by setting cage traps to catch a live specimen, but warn that Indonesian government plans to clear the rainforest to create the world's largest palm oil plantation may interfere with plans, WWF said.

The proposed plantation scheme, funded by the China Development Bank, is expected to cover an area of 1.8 million hectares, equivalent to about half the size of The Netherlands, said the WWF, formerly known as the World Wide Fund for Nature.

The potential new species of carnivore in Borneo would be the first since the discovery of the Borneo ferret-badger in 1895, the WWF said.

Pictures of the animal were first taken by WWF researchers in 2003, the photos kept unpublished by the WWF as research continued. The WWF decided to make public the photos with the release of a book about Borneo, to be published on Tuesday.



© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.

Attached image(s)

 

[Mel.Skahan]

the photos kept unpublished by the WWF as research continued

that World Wrestling Federation is still going ????


I did not know

[chrisandclauida2]

just for giggles crypto zoology is the study of undiscoverd animals. this one is discoverd thus it shouldnt be in the crypto forum,. technically that is

[FootDude]

Hmmm... Very interesting

The WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature)was the reason the World Wrestling Federation had to change its name to the WWE. They were sued...

http://www.capitalresearch.org/news/news.asp?ID=129&t=1





This post has been edited by FootDude: Dec 6 2005, 02:55 AM

[tollstoi]

just for giggles crypto zoology is the study of undiscoverd animals. this one is discoverd thus it shouldnt be in the crypto forum,. technically that is

you mean, once sasquatch is discovered this forum is dead?

[ludo]

In this BBC report there's a photo of the little fellow. Quite a tail he's got on him.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4501152.stm

"You don't find new mammals that often, and to do so must be extraordinary," said Callum Rankine, head of the species programme at WWF-UK.

[Nlneff]

The interesting thing is that this animal has been apparently been seen by no one, including the local natives, but has been caught on game cam twice, with fairly high quality shots, not perfect, but better then any blobsquatch I've seen from the last 20 years.

Cases like this would be useful in considering possible Bigfoot evidence, i.e. the likelihood that Bigfoot would be seen repeatedly in a area but not captured on game cams.

[chrisandclauida2]

you mean, once sasquatch is discovered this forum is dead?

pull your head out. simple definations.just my opinion but this is not an unknown or unaknowledged creature anymore thus should not be considerd crypto. i never said anything about sassy. we dont discuss sassy in the crypto forum on this site anyways. once the rest of the world catches up and the proof is accepted it will make no difference on this site where it is discussed. this is of interest to those on this site cause everytime a large[ie non amphibian or ameba] animal is discoverd in this world where those detracters say big creatures cant go unnoticed or with no bones found, it shows they are wrong and there will be new stff found for the foreseeable future. so if i have anything to say about sassy it will be in clear syntax so you will have no difficulty in putting words or thoughts into my mouth or head.
edit to remove possible words phrases or ideas that could be interpred as an attack by those who look for hidden meanings in others statements.

just ignore me im in a foul mood lately. i even had to lock up my guns to keep from shooting all the stupid people in the world.

This post has been edited by chrisandclauida2: Dec 6 2005, 08:09 AM

[ludo]

The interesting thing is that this animal has been apparently been seen by no one, including the local natives, but has been caught on game cam twice, with fairly high quality shots, not perfect, but better then any blobsquatch I've seen from the last 20 years.

That is an extremely good point. This is a photo of a newly discovered mammal, and for once nobody can argue about whether its just a shadow or a rock.

[photowriter]

I always love finding new species. You are so right in saying that people all of a sudden are more interested and accepting of the possibilities...for about a week and a half.

[dinosaurman]

I think it was CGI'd.

Not

[chrisandclauida2]

I always love finding new species. You are so right in saying that people all of a sudden are more interested and accepting of the possibilities...for about a week and a half.

yep isnt it amaizing we get the ivory billed pecker and this little bastard put in the alive and here colum all with word of some person and a picture or two. if it were only so easy for sassy.

[BobZenor]

I think it looks like a tree kangaroo. It seems to match up pretty close to this one. The front arms splaying way out look kangarooish. I don't know if they are normally found on Borneo but they are from Indonesia. It could still be a new species.

Attached image(s)

 

[FootDude]

The interesting thing is that this animal has been apparently been seen by no one, including the local natives, but has been caught on game cam twice, with fairly high quality shots, not perfect, but better then any blobsquatch I've seen from the last 20 years.

Very interesting point Nlneff

[Huntster]

...This is a photo of a newly discovered mammal, and for once nobody can argue about whether its just a shadow or a rock.

Give it a little time. If this is truly a new species, the blob-seers, zipper-seers, hoax advocates, alien advocates, etc., et al will all show up for the party.

[paysonfear]

not perfect, but better then any blobsquatch I've seen from the last 20 years

Better than ANY Bigfoot picture in the last 20 years, period.

[Saskeptic]

I think it looks like a tree kangaroo. It seems to match up pretty close to this one. The front arms splaying way out look kangarooish. I don't know if they are normally found on Borneo but they are from Indonesia. It could still be a new species.

Great find, Bob! I agree that it's premature to label this animal a "carnivore" and it could very well be a tree kangaroo.




When new finds like this surface, it buoys the sas-believers to tell the sas-skeptics "See? There are new animals out there left to be discovered."

That's true, but the skeptic in me then thinks "Yeah, but these tend to be small animals with very small populations and really limited ranges. AND these things actually _have been_ clearly caught on camera. In sasquatch, we've got a BIG animal with a huge range and a much larger population (than, say, Ivorybills), yet we still can't get a convincing image of one from the field. What's up with that?"

Even folks who accept the PG film as genuine sas-footage must wonder why in the subsequent nearly 40 years with more people looking, more cameras in the hands of average Joes, game cams, more sas encounters, etc, there hasn't been any image of a sasquatch that comes close to being anything more than a blobsquatch.

For the believers out there, doesn't it bother you a little that a population of large creatures to which are attributed literally thousands of encounters with humans throughout North America since the mid-1960s has failed to produce a scrap of conclusive photographic evidence?

For comparison, this small creature that no one seems ever to have recognized as part of the Bornean mammal fauna shows up _first_ on film.

Same with Ivorybills - there have been, arguably, 10 bona fide encounters with the species in the last two years, and one of those yielded compelling video evidence. This is a 10% success rate in photographs from sightings for an incredibly wary, exceedingly rare species in rather inaccessible habitat. Is "they're smart and nocturnal" really enough to justify the abysmal rate of photographic evidence from encounters with sasquatch? Even if only a 1% success rate could be realized (i.e., an order of magnitude more difficult to photograph than an Ivorybill), we'd have 10 compelling images for every 1000 encounters.

This isn't a "nail in the coffin" factor in my sas-skepticism, but the disconnect between the number and distribution of reported eyewitness encounters and the lack of photographic evidence from those encounters certainly plays a big role.

~The Saskeptic

[Huntster]

...Even folks who accept the PG film as genuine sas-footage must wonder why in the subsequent nearly 40 years with more people looking, more cameras in the hands of average Joes, game cams, more sas encounters, etc, there hasn't been any image of a sasquatch that comes close to being anything more than a blobsquatch....

I don't.

I think they're on their way to extinction, have been for a long time, and are damned near there.

I believe there are much fewer of them today than even 40 years ago.

...For the believers out there, doesn't it bother you a little that a population of large creatures to which are attributed literally thousands of encounters with humans throughout North America since the mid-1960s has failed to produce a scrap of conclusive photographic evidence?...

Nope.

I go into the woods a lot. I rarely took a camera, because they just can't take the abuse. I just bought a digital waterproof camera just about a year ago. Now that I carry it around and even take pictures with it, I see the debate regarding the recent photo taken with a similar Sony Cybershot. A photo of a sasquatch with this camera is a complete waste of time.

Why bother?

[Nlneff]

it bother you a little that a population of large creatures to which are attributed literally thousands of encounters with humans throughout North America since the mid-1960s has failed to produce a scrap of conclusive photographic evidence? 

For comparison, this small creature that no one seems ever to have recognized as part of the Bornean mammal fauna shows up _first_ on film. 

Well said, and its sobering to do a little comparision.

Last 20 years. apologies for formating.


............................................Borneo animal. .... Bigfoot
Sightings.........................................0 ...............1000's
Native history of contact?................No ...... .......Yes
Habitation Claims?...........................No ..............Yes
Range...........................................limited .... .....North America
Size..............................................Small Cat .......Small dinosaur
number of credible photos...............2....................0

(credible meaning distance and clarity comparable to the pictures from Borneo)

There is a disconnect here.

A excellent method of study would be to find a rare, shy, remote animal that shuns humans, and then compare the quality of photographic proof to the number of reported sightings. A good test subject would be something like the snow leopard (or for a closer example, wolverine). Almost extinct, remote, shy etc. Yet there are crystal clear photos, excellent videos etc of it, along with horrible photos and blob leopards that no one ever bothers to show anyone. But the important thing is that the photos represent a sampling of the quality of sightings. Granted the sampling may be skewed as it takes time to set up and snap a photo, but just as there are quality encounters, there are quality photos/video etc.

In addition to the ivory woodpecker example, it would be worthwhile to find out just how many wolverine/snow leopard/insert animal here encounters would be expected to produce a decent photograph.

[Jim Zenor]

I think Bob Z probably nailed that one. The tail, ears, hind legs all look like a tree kangaroo. I attached a picture on Bob's also showing a tree Kangaroo with ears that match the photo pretty closely.

Attached image(s)

 

[Huntster]

...There is a disconnect here....

It doesn't look that way to me.

First, it looks like Bob Zenor has provided as much evidence that the photographed creature is a known animal as "Swiss-based environmental group WWF" has provided that it is an unknown animal.

Maybe more.

So who blew it?

WWF?
Reuters?
Zenor?

...GENEVA (Reuters) - Environmental researchers are preparing to capture what they call a new, mysterious species of carnivore on Borneo, the first such discovery on the wildlife-rich Indonesian island in over a century....

...Locals and wildlife experts who viewed photographs of the animal, which has very small ears and large hind legs, said they had never seen such a creature before and were convinced that it was a new species, WWF said...

...Researchers hope to confirm the discovery by setting cage traps to catch a live specimen, but warn that Indonesian government plans to clear the rainforest to create the world's largest palm oil plantation may interfere with plans, WWF said....

Hmmm.................

Environmental researchers? Wildlife experts?

I'm placing my bets with Zenor.

For the obvious reasons.

[Nlneff]

Tree Kangaroos are found in New Guinea and Northern Australia, a Borneo tree kangaroo would very much be an unknown animal, as well as almost certainly a new species. Bob’s picture of a tree kangaroo is quite good, but the second picture of the critter makes me less sure. The only place I’ve found to see the second picture is here.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4501152.stm, you can only see the second picture by clicking on the video link and watching the newscast. It’s a shot of the animal going away from the camera, and its resemblance to a tree kangaroo is somewhat less, IMHO anyway, particularly the leg. I feel a Viverridae of some kind is probably equally as likely, since they do live in Borneo, although a new species, it also looks vaguely like a Osbornictis piscivora (Aquatic Genet, which is a African species.) The palm civet Diplogale hosei, used to live in Borneo, although this looks a bit different, longer tail, while the other 10 or so Borneo species look somewhat similar, but with different coloration. In any case, it does appear it’s a new animal to the area.

I feel you have missed my point, so I’ll try to restate it. In Borneo, there is no apparent native contact with this animal, whatever it is. No one has claimed to see it in life, in other words human contact with it is the smallest fraction of the contact bigfoot apparently has, no one has been looking for it, and yet these pictures are better then anything that has been produced for bigfoot in the last 20+ years. So we have 2 good pictures with essentially no direct encounters for this, versus 0 good pictures for the hundreds, perhaps thousands of bigfoot encounters in the last 20 years. If you can’t see a striking contrast in the ability on a per encounter basis to get pictures of this critter vs. that of bigfoot, I won’t be able to convince you. I respect your opinion, but don’t agree with it.

I would just restate it would be useful to do some research on rare and obscure creatures to determine how much photographic evidence should be expected for a given number of encounters. How often are wolverines filmed vs. how many times they are seen, how often are snow leopards filmed vs. how often are they seen, etc. This could be used to give a general guess on the likelihood of bigfoot activity in a area if attempts to get photos with game cams etc fail.

[Huntster]

...I would just restate it would be useful to do some research on rare and obscure creatures to determine how much photographic evidence should be expected for a given number of encounters. How often are wolverines filmed vs. how many times they are seen, how often are snow leopards filmed vs. how often are they seen, etc. This could be used to give a general guess on the likelihood of bigfoot activity in a area if attempts to get photos with game cams etc fail.

I strongly agree with that.

...I feel you have missed my point, so I’ll try to restate it....

Actually I bypassed your point. And I think you bypassed mine (which, I will admit, was coyly presented). I'll be more blunt:

I would trust and believe just about anybody before I'd believe an "environmental research" organization.

This article makes me want to declare a newly approved 500 square mile clearcut in Southeast Alaska in order to get those clowns up there to photograph a sasquatch. (That would be the only way to get them interested, if that would even work...............They certainly didn't try these tactics up here in the past, probably because their other tactics were very effective, and without the risk of skeptics tearing their photos apart).

...In Borneo, there is no apparent native contact with this animal, whatever it is. No one has claimed to see it in life, in other words human contact with it is the smallest fraction of the contact bigfoot apparently has, no one has been looking for it, and yet these pictures are better then anything that has been produced for bigfoot in the last 20+ years....

Okay, I'm a cynic, but is there any proof that these photos were taken on Borneo?

Sorry, I've been lied to by such folks before. Once, shame on them. Twice, shame on me.

[Saskeptic]

Re: Sasquatches

I think they're on their way to extinction, have been for a long time, and are damned near there.

I believe there are much fewer of them today than even 40 years ago.

Hey Hunster,

So do you discredit reports that continue to pour in from outside the PNW? Sassy seems to be alive and well in NM, OK, TX, AR, KY, PA, FL - the list goes on. The creatures seem to use numerous habitats. On what do you base your assertion that they're on the brink of extinction? If I accept the eyewitness reports from across the country, then sasquatches are -if anything - expanding their range.

[Saskeptic]

I would trust and believe just about anybody before I'd believe an "environmental research" organization.

Exxon?

I understand your mistrust of "environmental" organizations - especially if you've been personally burned by someone in the past - just please try not to lump all of them together. Both The Nature Conservancy and EarthFirst might fight very hard to protect a natural area from some development pressure, but TNC would do it through biological inventory and conservation easements, not spiking trees or stealing distributor caps off bulldozers.

(Do dozers have distributor caps??)



I like the idea of quantifying the rate at which good photos are obtained of rare and wary animals like wolverines. I just did a Google Image search and found SIX excellent photographs on the first three pages. (The rest were images of Huge Ackman.) Doesn't prove a tinker's dam, of course, but it would be a fun exercise to detertmine the ratio of unimpeachable photos vs. "bloberines". Of course anyone who would engage in this kind of folly would be a true glutton for punishment.

Ha! Get it?! I slay myself . . .

[Huntster]

...So do you discredit reports that continue to pour in from outside the PNW?...

I discredit most reports from everywhere, including PNW. Generally, I'd say that only 5% of reports are likely accurate, and I'm being generous.

And yes, I believe that reports outside of the PNW are on the rise, and that most of them are bullshit. If there are some of these creatures on the eastern seaboard, they are nearly extinct.

I base this on the number of reports over the past century, compiled by regional density, compared to the density of human habitation, and the reality of a minimum population being needed to sustain reproduction.

[Huntster]

...Exxon?

I understand your mistrust of "environmental" organizations - especially if you've been personally burned by someone in the past - just please try not to lump all of them together. ...

Sorry, I lump them all together, and include Exxon in the bag.

They're all organizational liars. I don't trust any of them.

But at least Exxon provides me with fuel for my vehicles.

The environmental organizations attack my way of life along with my need for fuel and an occasional 2x4. I need them like I need a nuclear detonation in my watch pocket.

[Bonez]

looks kinda like a lemur with mange...sorta

[Navy SEAL]

'Otayzilla' Lurking Around Otay Lakes

Experts Believe Mystery Creature Is Monitor Lizard

http://www.10news.com/news/6881253/detail....00481&qs=1;bp=t


SAN DIEGO -- Fishermen flocking to Otay Lakes are discovering there is more than just fish in the water.

The area just opened last week, but instead of talking about fishing, people have something else on their minds, 10News reported.

Since June 2005, a creature dubbed "Otayzilla" has been lurking in and around the water.

The mystery monster has been spotted at several places around the lake, which is located just south of Otay Lakes Road in Otay Mesa.

"I was actually coming up on a boat at the end of Otay arm," said Jose Gutierrez, a fisherman. "There have been other fisherman who have seen it."

It's not quite as scary as Godzilla, but Otayzilla is very real, according to 10News.

"I know one fisherman, about a week ago, he said he thought it was an alligator," said Gutierrez.

Officials say Otayzilla is not an alligator, but a monitor lizard.

A lot of people haven't seen Otayzilla, but most have heard about it.

Several fishermen told 10News they had never seen Otayzilla.

Mark Gartland is actually looking forward to seeing the creature.

"I hope to see him. I'd like to be able to spot him," Gartland told 10News.

Rick Sturm is a herpetoculturist and knows his reptiles, according to 10News.

"It does look like a Nile monitor," Sturm said about Otayzilla.

Sturm owns a monitor lizard, which resembles Otayzilla. He believes it used to be someone's pet and they released it into Otay Lakes.

"(Potential pet owners) need to talk to people at the pet shop and ask them what the adult size is going to be and even go beyond that. Ask them, 'What size cage do I need to hold this animal properly as an adult?'" Sturm said.

Sturm said when people don't do their homework, they don't realize what it takes to care for the creatures.

"It's important to realize most animals getting released are not going to survive. You (may) think a lake is perfect for them, but it's not," Sturm said.

Instead of releasing a pet into the wild, other, better options include adoption, pet shop return or calling animal control, Sturm suggested.

Sturm said anyone who has a chance encounter with Otayzilla should knwo the creature will probably not bite unless it's provoked. He believes the lizard can easily survive around the lake by feeding on fish, mice and birds.