I placed a camera trap in the area of Big Creek near Skookum Meadow at the beginning of the summer.

At first I used no bait for the first month. During maintenance on the second two week period I had some campers in the area. I met the people camping nearby and learned that they were from out of state and were looking for Sasquatch in the Indian Haven Wilderness. That same night (Fathers Day) they had a sasquatch vocalize from Big Creek where the trap was located. I was contacted one week later by them, and told me about the vocalization. One of the bait piles they had left out had been disturbed, large incisor marks where present on cantaloupe rinds. Footprints were found straddling the bait pile.

I returned to the trap to do maintenance and there was over 20 exposures on the roll. Something had triggered the sensor but was out of the range of the flashes depth of light. Giving all underexposed frames of dead air: nothing was visable in the negs. I pushed the film but two stops trying to increase the films speed/depth of light but it did not work. It was still too far away from the flash.(no Fresnel lens)

In the subsequent week with twenty hits: until the end of the study ending yesterday the 9th of september 2005; each two week period after that the maximum amount of frames taken was around 8 frames, excluding the ones not cause by me setting up and taking down the trap.

What I have concluded from this is that the presence of humans in the area had attracted the attention of something curious enough to cause the trap to go off twenty times in the week. I cannot say for sure that it was a Sasquatch since its image was not recorded.

The next week I went on vacation with the family to California. My mother-in-law lives in Santa Cruz and she took me to the Felton Bigfoot musuem run by Mike Rugg. I spoke to Mike and to my surprise he knew who I was and of my camera trap project. I spoke with him about the bait remains that had been chewed on and he showed me diagrams of Gigantopithicus dental formations. Which gave me a few ideas about trying to cast tooth marks in future bait remains I found. Being that the only fossils of Gigantopithicus are the teeth, I would be able to compare the wear marks on the fruit to the fossils.

As for attempting to bait the trap, I used these alone and in combinations:

Three Cantaloupes & 20 lbs of celery: Punctured two melons with my thumbs and left one intact. When i returned the two i damaged were smushed. The intact one had a hole in it and had rolled down a small hill. Looked like something had pushed a finger in it and dug out the center of the melon. I took this melon home and tried to cast the inside of the melon with B-11 looking for fingernail marks. I poured the material in the hollow space allowed it to dry for 2 days in the sun and cut away the melon revealing rodent tooth marks.

20 Lbs of Celery: No activity.

20 Lbs of Celery and 96 ounces of honey: No movement of the celery. The honey was not evident in the bait pile.

Old Fashoned Doughnuts placed on a log: The doughnuts were taken. Damaged mushroom stalks were left on the same place as the doughnuts.

The last two rolls of film will be going to the lab and will be back next week.

I will post more later about the project, it is getting late.

Ken Ken Yielding

please move this thread to independent research.



Thanks

Ken Ken Yielding

Ken - please keep working. I always enjoy your reports.

Man, this sounds great... please keep us up to date! Thanks!

Great stuff, Ken! What did you need the BFRO for anyway?

True.

Does not effect my research.

I like being a independent researcher.

Ken

Questionable cougar or bear photo

Another Camera trap photo.. Two Elk near a log

Another camera trap photo.. Camera position one.

Another Camera trap Photo.. Doughnuts on a log..

No Photo of what took the doughnuts, I think i placed the bait to close to the lens.

Nothing visable in the frame that can explain why the trap went off.

This picture looks like a horse or a pony to me

I don't think thats a cougar or a bear, i believe thats a horse, you can see the main and the bridel or bit around its snout, I think thas what you can it anyway.

Work's being done from all angles - good luck with your branch
of research.

The area that the trap was set up is not a place i would take a horse. Lots of dead fall logs unless you want to have your horse break its legs i would not take one up there. It looks to be head shake to me. The unit was only 4 feet off the ground looking down a embankment. I was hoping that some thing would walk up the hill to the camera. Very short for a horse plus horses have manes and longer pointed ears not short rounded ones.

The face of the animal is blurred giving a wierd look to the photograph.

What else is puzzling about the photo is that the flash is mounted on the opposite side of the unit. Not on the side were you see the nape of the neck.

Its not a sasquatch anyway.

Ken Ken Yielding

Cougar ear comparison photo

Horse ear compairison.

Bear Ear compairison

I looked and looked at that picture and pony was all I could come up with too! Ponys do have shot stubby ears like that.....nothing like a horse. Hummmm, interesting for sure.

Great job Ken. Thanks for sharing those with us.

Explaination of the study and the process:

What I think is most interesting feature about using the B&W Kodak Highspeed IR film is the films ability to render green vegetation white. The seperation of values of an animals fur and skin from the background is striking and obivous.

The photographs I have shared here so far do not do the technique justice.

I will add some more photographs of other animals against the white background of green plants.

If you have examples of this, please share them.

The camera trap was set up in deepshade; shooting out toward the light of a glade of Big Creek.

The type of camera trap I used for the study is a Buckshot 35 with only a point and shoot automatic camera. The trigger for the Buckshot 35 is a thermal enviromental sensor. The trigger measures the enviromental temperture in a cone projected from the unit from the bottom of the housing. When the temperture changes in the cone the camera is triggered.

The Buckshot 35 camera trap has a many flaws. The triggering system is not one of them; it is the weak flash output.

Problems with the Buckshot 35:

The Flash is weak.

The close proximity of the flash on the housing in relation to the lens causes huge problems attaching a frensel lens to the unit at a distance (6 inches) potenially blocking the field of view of the lens. It can be mounted closer to the flash inside of the housing, but the column of light would be too focused to cover a larger area. Instead of a mag-light you would have a laser pointer effect; the distance of the frensel lens from the flash effects on the width of the column of light. The further away from the flash the wider the column and the subsequent greater coverage of the light at a distance.

Using a opaque filter over the electronic flash causes the light to fall off a huge rate: as I illustrated in the thread "advanced camera trap". This is a problem with any electronic flash. Additional slave unit flashes and fresnel lenses added to a system like this will increase the depth of light for a proper exposure if within the range of the master unit (Canon Speedilite 60 feet).

With a slave flash system, IR photography in complete darkness can be used to its fullest extent. Such as painting with light *(see below)

Normally the Kodak High Speed Infra red film is suggested to be rated at ISO 200.

I rated the Kodak High Speed film for this study at ISO 25 and still pushed the film in development time by one stop. The professional lab I used to develop the film uses D-76 Chemical developer.

I developed the film at Pro Photo supply in Portland. Idoits man the counter so tape your container closed. I had a three week portion of the study fogged from lab stupidity. They opened the container after i told them it was Infra-red. I not only chewed out the new girl at the shop but reamed the manager for not training the help in proper handling of the film.

If I knew there was a photo of a sasquatch on the film i might be in jail right now.

Moral of the story: Dont piss me off or i will have words with you.......... and it wont be pretty. I feel bad for the girl at the counter it was her managers fault. Anyways...

The contrast of a photograph is controlled namely by the exposure, type of developer used (contrast ratio) and the development time. HC-110 and T-max developers will give a greater contrast to the film compaired to D-76 and will not require pushing depending on the lighting conditions. So, in deep shade the light has more blue light than red; in direct sunlight DO NOT PUSH the film and go with D-76.

If you know that the camera and or the flash is not going to expose the film properly you can compensate. Underexposed B&W film is very flat in contrast. These shortcomings can be predicted to a certian extent. What i did in this project was a type of modified Zone System.

I used a filter 87C which blocks out most of the visable light; all light under 720 nanometers. Only allowing deep red and the invisable IR light to be emitted. This filter cripples the flashs effectiveness and the distance the light will travel to properly expose the frame(depth of light).

I did NOT place a filter over the lens during the study. Normally with IR photograghy a deep red filter #25 is placed over the lens which would cut the light by another 3 stops. I did not want to have to rate the film at ISO 3. (87C Opaque gel 3 stops (200 to 100, 100 to 50 ,50 to 25)#25 Red filter on the lens 3 stops(25 to 12, 12 to 6, 6 to 3)). I wanted a somewhat workable result from the latent image on the film.

I will post later to futher explain the process.

Ken Ken Yielding
AIR
SRI

sasquatchresearcher@yahoo.com

* Painting with light: Some times when a photographer is trying to expose a piece of film, the light is poured on the subject in stages.

This is a common method in commercial photography. All of the more advanced photographs are done in this way. Sure you can rely on digital photography to make amazing images in photoshop; but the images you make are NOT real.

Flashes at any distance from the open lens will register on film if they are syncronized.

It is flash to subject distance that matters.

The light emitted from the flash within the field of view determines if the subject is recorded. I could have the shutter open in complete darkness for a hour and pop a flash from 100 different locations in a forest from 10 feet away from each tree(proper exposure distance depending on the Flash energy output: distance may vary depending on the flash) and record a 100 different trees and light up a forest in the dead of night on one frame.

If you could syncronize 5 flashes to one shutter opening the mystery would be over; if you set the slave flashes along the triggering beam within the field of view of the lens.

Painting with light is old school: if you want to photograph a sasquatch it is the only way to do it. Just do it with invisable light.

I’m betting a miniature Shetland pony is what your questionable picture is, Ken. Some people pack with them, they can do tougher terrain than a horse, and they’re definitely small enough to match the height you gave for the camera; the light colored mare I found for comparison to your photo was 31� at the shoulder.



Alicia

I just would not expect shetland ponies roaming around Skookum meadow area.

They have remarkable shaggy manes. I dont see the mane on the animal in the picture from the trap and wouldn't you lead a pack animal?

Damn Blobshetlandponysquatch.

Ken Ken Yielding

Dude with a bag of pot....

1. head

2. glasses

3. elbow

4. plastic bag

OMG I see him! Not sure I see the head and the glasses, but definetly see the back, shoulder, elbow and shirt sleeve of the dude. And, that's gotta be a bag of weed. Good eye Maheekat!



Edit: After looking closer, I see the head and the glasses too! Man, that's more scary than thinking a pony was wandering in the woods.

Holy crap i think you figured it out, amazing, now that i see what you see it looks nothing like a pony or horse. That is defently a guy with a bag slung over.

Actually my wife saw it! I took it into photoshop and voila!

Ok Ken, we need a picture of you to compare this to.

By the way who's trash is he taking out?

I think it is me Taking the bait up to the trap. LOL

The top of the bag over the shoulder looks to be the ears.

Nape of the neck is the plastic bag i carried the 10 bunches of celery in.

Duh on my part.

:doh:

Thanks for pointing it out.

Ken

:rotflmao:

very nice, I was going to call it a unicorn but hey, very nice

Now that's just funny!

Yeah, I gotta say that is hilarious. Funniest thing I've heard all week. Admit it, you were just testing and teasing everyone to see how good they are before you pull a pic of the BIG GUY out!

Great stuff Ken!

I didn't think one could get any better than the hat. And the lesson is....


Edit: What happened to the infrared film separating out the creature from the background foliage? Here I see the infrared, or even just B&W, being detrimental to determining what is in a picture. If this would have been in color, could we have been any more questioning as to its content?

That's funny. It's like one of those trick photos. "Do you see an old woman or a young woman? Do you see Ken or a Pony?

That is too weird, at first I thought someone was making a joke about the bag of mary jane. Then after staring at for a little while the guy just suddenly appeared. I would of given my right eye to say that was some type of horse/pony.

That's what I thought, too... a guy with a bag over his shoulder.

The lesson is proper background selection. Chlorophyll is the key to getting background to subject seperation.

I am hoping for better results next time.

Ken Yieldng