This is just a story but well worth repeating I think.

I was down at the local Cal Fire (California Department of Forestry) station a couple of weeks ago talking to a friend of mine who is a mechanic for CDF. I mentioned that I had found some parts for an obsolete fire pump through a friend that I had met on the BFF. Of course I had to explain that I'm into the whole BF thing and was expecting to get some pretty good ribbing from him. I told him the Marble Mountain story and how that had spurned my interest. Well instead of giving me a big old ration, he told me his BF story.

He was out on a fire west of Bordertown (Hwy 395 north of Reno, Nevada). A hand crew had hiked up to where he and some other CDF guys were working on a piece of equipment and they said that there was a really strange looking camp down the hill. They thought that it looked like it had been used for some sort of weird human torture. So my friend and another guy hiked down there only to find out that it was a deer hunters camp and the "human torture" stuff was where the hunters had hung their deer to dress them out. It was down near this camp that he and the other guy noticed a whole string of these giant footprints in the dirt. He said that they were 18'' long, 6" wide at the heal and 8" wide at the toes and the stride was longer than either one of them could duplicate. They both looked at each other and thought the same thing.

They didn't report it anywhere but there are now two CDF guys that believe in BigFoot. Makes ya wonder how many unreported events like this one are out there.

Yet, it is Nevada where the alleged Battle Mountain Complex fire incident occurred (burned Bigfoot) and where previous posters have told us Bigfoot would have no reason to be in the state of Nevada unless they had "call-girls" on the mind. So, who is right?

Great story, when did this occur? LOL Call girls, I think who posted that has never been to north/west NV.

I think we can all agree that most sightings/prints go unreported.
I'm ignorant, but I assume the Reno/Tahoe region is much like the rugged redwood forests of most of N Cal?

My guess is that over the years there have been a great many more unreported events than reported.

I don't remember exactly when he saw the tracks but I think it was a few years ago. This occured in California, west of Bordertown, NV. This area is on the eatern side of the Sierra Nevada crest so it is a much drier area than the western side and a whole lot drier than the coastal Redwood region. If you ever want to see a whole lot of nuthin', go to the northwestern part of Nevada. National Geographic labeled it the least inhabited place in the lower 48 states.

I searched Google Earth west of Bordertown to see what was up there. Not much. I do know that it's a lot prettier on the ground than looking down from a satellite.

would you happen to have anymore info on the "alleged Battle Mountain Complex fire incident"???

cheers

I work with an oldtimer who spent 30 years in logging and working for the railroad, he told me lots of loggers and RR guys have BF stories that they tell. He told me with all his years in the woods he never saw one hint of anything bigfoot related but then he had one cut through his front yard. He thinks it is very ironic. He also told me how in the early 90's he was working as a "tender" for a water dropping helicopter (I don't know what this job is but assume it's re fuel/water) and the pilot told him about dropping water and coming around the back side of a mountain and there were two Bigfoot making their way across a ridge away from the fire. Later the pilot told him not to repeat it to anyone. This old guy said he would never report anything like that to authorities or anything because it would damage his reputation in the business. So stories over beers is ok but officially swearing you saw it not ok.

With the sightings from before up in Nevada and now from the CDF guys one can only imagine how many other sightings have gone unreported due one or more of the wildland firefighters not wanting to be made fun of or knowing that they could lose their jobs if the reported the sighting.

You can read about the Battle Mountain Complex fire incident here.

Previously discussed here.

Never set foot in Nevada myself, so excuse the poor knowledge of geography. However, seems the place isn't as barren of Bigfoot sightings as I was lead to believe.
http://www.bfro.net/GDB/show_report.asp?id=5770

That's very interesting. Nevada has been more or less written off by those who think BF needs the cool dampness of the Pac NW and it is true that Nevada is dry, being in the rain shadow of the Sierras, as Norcal Logger says, lots of remoteness, but its reputation as being nothin but desert is largely due to the impression of those who travel through the dry desert basins where the roads mostly are located, Nevada being characterized by the distinctive geophysiographic region known as Basin and Range (range meaning mountain range, and not the more typical use as land for grazing cattle which are very common there). Never the less, if you go up in altitude it is much cooler and so moister and most of the mountain tops accumulate snow in the winter and rain during the summer monsoons while in the lower areas, the basins averaging around 5 thousand feet in elevation, precipitation evaporates very quickly or falls as "virga" evaporating before it hits the ground. Almost every night is summer you can see lightning storms somewhere out across the region. So, these ranges are islands of marvelous habitat with deer, and elk and if BF are living up in the higher elevations in the montane forests above the pinyon and juniper forests, and composed of ponderosa pine, white pine, bristlecone pine, aspen, douglas fir, true fir, and engleman spruce (treeline is around 9,500 feet), not many would encounter them since almost nobody travels up there. Some of the ranges have beavers, even, though most of those were trapped out by the mid 1800s and have not established themselves again, since travel between the ranges, across desert, is not something beavers are adapted to do. The original populations no doubt arrived when the climate was wetter (not necesssarily cooler) and filled with lakes. The lakes emptied about 5 thousand years ago after the Sierra Glaciation ended and its melt decreased and presumably when the descending Hadley Cells shifted. Then the the northern rim of ancestral Lake Bonneville breached and emptied into the the Snake River. It's a really fascinating example of complex change and envirnmental feedback in the environment and the climate. The inventory of animals that lived there has of course changed to reflect that and human impacts. Giant tortoises gone lone ago, Bison and wolves gone over the last 150 years, and pronghorn (superbly adapted which put it in competition with cattle) much reduced.
Some of the ranges have bears, which are sometimes referred to as indicators of specific ranges ability to support big omnivors such as BF is presumed to be. Some ranges do not currently have bears and some dont appear to have ever had them (no fossil record anyway), depending on whether there's enough habitat to support a population over reasonable time. The surrounding basins make each range isolate the ranges and each range have their own balance which are kinda stable. Same with mountain lions.
My thought is that if BF are there living among the ranges, they are capable of traversing the 20 to 40 miles which typically seperate the ranges, which I think they could traverse particularly at night when cool temps would reduce their need for water, and so a population in that region would need a really large territory for a very dispersed population, large remote space it would have in abundance.
If anyone is travelling this summer to see the National Parks of the Western US they would be well advised to pay a visit to Great Basin NP to hike (great trail system and almost impossible to get lost since you're essentially on an island..or as they call 'em "sky islands"). It's about half way between Reno and Salt Lake. Most presume it's a hot desert given its name,but in fact the majority of the park is above 8 thousand feet and it's upper campgrounds it looks for all the world like parts of the Rockies, including mountain lakes and a permanent snow/ice accumulation in the cirque of Mount Wheeler, and 4 thousand year old bristlecones that are really beautifully formed...and a marvelous example of a decorated limestone cave system. It's never crowded and is one of the few NPs where you can actually set up a camp in very close proximity to a clear mountain stream and one of the most picturesque of any.

Biped, don't get mixed up because the OP said Marble Mountain, he didn't mean Battle Mountain, he meant Marble Mountain ( In CA ) & teh Battle Mountain stuff has no relevence at all to this Thread other than there were Fire Fighters presumable involved & the proximity of this location to the State of NV, if the Story was true in the first place..

Nice Post anyway NorCal & to answer your last question, lots & lots & lots & lots..

Excellent reply Dog4u. Among the myriad of joys to be found in Nevada (no brothel jokes please), my favorite is the isolation. A large portion of the state allows for motor vehicle travel to places where you could camp for weeks on end and never see another human being. It's quite a treat to sit around the campfire and contemplate on the idea that there probably isn't another soul for 50 miles in any direction. If you like star gazing there's nothing better than the northern Nevada desert. The Milky Way really is milky. And the sleeping is great- nice cool summer nights. Winters another story but there are lots of great hot springs to camp beside and warm the bones after a long day of wildlife viewing.

And speaking of wildlife, my best sighting was of a herd of Bighorn Sheep. Truly majestic. And they were more curious of me than I was of them. They let me get within 50 feet. Another treat was when my wife and I were on our trail bikes and a group of 6 antelope pulled up along side us. They ran parallel to us for miles. The bird watching high up in the Aspen groves is spectacular. And don't forget the herds of wild horses. 3 of us were on dirt bikes up on a ridge top jeep trail when we came upon a herd of about 50 and they just stood there. We killed our engines and just watched. The closest ones were no more than 30 feet away. This was very strange and the Stallion was obviously nervous but he wouldn't move his harem. All we could figure was a cat had been stalking the herd and they retreated to this ridge top for safety. I guess we were less of a threat than that big cat.

Nevada's a great place. Have fun, Norcal

I've been trying to find more info about the migration patterns of the deer in the Eastern Sierras. I know of one migration path that leads down from the higher elevations into the Mono Basin and beyond. I'm sure there are other migrations further north that could also explain sightings in the Nevada basins. I like the "follow the food" theory. Especially if Neveda sightings tend to take place in the Fall/Winter, when the deer come down from the higher elevations.

Thanks for the input on Nevada geography and wildness, I guess there is something to behold in most areas if you work hard enough to get there......can't wait to hit that Great Basin NP some time. Prime Bigfoot habitat it may not be, but we are dealing with stealthy, fit populations of low numbers of Bigfoot probably that are opportunistic and can get there if they need to. Great thread keep up the good work.

I recently visited the Lake Tahoe NV area (not far from Reno) and was shocked at how dense the forest was in the mountains. There are black bears there (according to the shop owners - not mention the unsettlingly close bear bellow I heard as I was hiking).

It is striking how one side of the mountain range is barren and dry and the other side is lush, thick and green.

Then again, I am a flatlander and easily awed by anything bigger than a gently rolling hill.

Not sure if there is thick woodslands that connect to the Northern Cal - PNW area (I suspect there is) but from what I saw it seems possible it could be BF habitat.

Oh, forgot something about these tracks. The CDF guy said they were sunk into the ground about an inch and a half and he wasn't sinking in at all.

I bartend in Cary N.C. just outside of Raleigh and one day had this couple in their 60's at the bar. Just making small talk find out they live in Cumberland county where Fayetteville is. They mentioned the fact they live on this 20 acre wooded lot away from everything. Reading old reports of sightings in Cumberland county on the BFRO and GCBRO, I started questioning them about the amount of wildlife they see. I herd about all the deer, some rabits, racoons, and some other random animals that came around their property. I jokingly ask about bigfoot and without any hesitation or reservation the man says in a matter of fact tone how he saw one in Nevada many years ago. Said he was horseback riding with some friends near the Tahoe. Don't have many details but they were all sitting on their horses near an eight foot fence when all of a sudden the horses started acting strange. They looked over and he said their he was about 50 yards away looking over the fence. They all had guns but nobody wanted to shoot he was saying. After about 10 seconds it eventually walked away.

Probobly one of many stories that never gets published on reports or forums.

Norcal Logger...excellent point about so much of NV being accessible by road..old mine sites by the zillions especially. While not a common sight exactly, it's not all that uncommon when travelling the back roads to see what one might think of as a modern prospector driving a rig right out of Mad Max with jerry cans of water and fuel, spare tires roped to the roof, shovels and stuff strapped on, covered in dust and sporting some sizeable antennae. I encountered one old guy on a pull out at 9500 feet overlooking the Mt Moriah Wilderness and other distant ranges who'd obviously been out for some time.
Turned out to be a retired radio engineer and, of course, an avid ham radio guy, retired, who spent some of his time monitoring the Q and Ku band for the distinctive signals created from meteors, or so he said. There's plenty of room to be on your own and low profile. There's enough wierdness out there to make one cautious about being too high in profile for fear of drawing attention. It's not for those who aren't comfortable with being self sufficient and something of a hermit about it. And of course, the nights are special when the desert awakens.

Northern Nevada is gorgeous (If you don't mind a native adding her biased opinion!) - as others have stated - and I've read several different sightings in and around the Tahoe area. And actually have read one or two sightings in Clark County (where Las Vegas is located).

BTW - "Nevada" is Spanish for "snow-capped".

The mountain ranges, some of which have peaks above 13,000 feet (4,000 m), harbor lush forests high above desert plains, creating sky islands for endemic species. The valleys are often no lower in elevation than 3,000 feet (900 m). ~ from Wikipedia

Noel

I think we hear and read of only a very small fraction of what's really being seen and heard out there.

Any benefit to trying to gather up these stories? May some online place to dump them once you get em? Course, it won't prove anything, but it could be fun.

But I think the evidence shows that what we do hear about - the majority (I'm not saying all) is pretty unreliable.

It's almost as if the real stuff stays hidden and a lot of people/organisations are spouting off their tall tales and posting sighting reports for their own purposes/agendas.

I think bf is one of those creatures that can adapt to any enviroment it has to. Like NV. , So, Cal. s' high desert area has bf running around out by that by Edwards Air Force since the seventys' to the present. They might migrate down from the so. serrias for a period of time for some reason, snow maybe. That area is very arid with little water to speak of yet they are being seen there. 99 % of the planet has life adapting to climates of all kinds except Antarctica and peaks over 20,000'. The other reason for bf sightings in dry areas could be that they are just passing through.

The dry areas on Nevada (and SoCal's Mojave) are typically the lowlying basins and surrounding hills (alluvial fans and intersecting arroyos) and due to the particular physical geography of that geologic domaine they are spaced between relatively short north south ranges, and spaced at intervals that measure somewhere between 20 and 40 miles. That's a long hike but humans (and presumably BF) are well adapted for crossing those kinds of distances, and if it's olfactory sensitivity could direct it to water, it might very well do it in long night. Travelling in broad daylight during the heat of the day requires gallons of water but the same trip at night when it cold, will require a lot less. Many creature in the desert are nocturnal (or crepuscular) and it helps them operate on a lot less water than they otherwise would need.