http://www.cryptozoonews.com/mackal-obit/
Showing posts with label Roy Mackal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Roy Mackal. Show all posts
Monday, December 16, 2013
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
LINDSAY SELBY: Eels as monsters
In The Monsters of Loch Ness by Roy P. Mackal (1976 Futura London) he wrote about the investigations in Ireland. The Loch Ness investigation teams did not confine them selves just to Loch Ness but also looked at Loch Morar and a couple of loughs in Ireland. Some of the information that lead them to look at Irish loughs is detailed in the book (p37-39 in the edition cited above) and includes:
Teige O’Donovan reporting sightings going back to 1914 from Lough Abisdealy (which translated means the lake of the monster). The descriptions of the creature were that it had a small flat head , along neck and three large loops sticking out of the water. Size was estimated at 25 feet( 8 metres) and the creature was dark brown. Interestingly one of the observers said the creature swung a portion of it’s body out of the water and described it as “looking exactly like the tail end of a huge conger eel”.
Lough Fadda has been discussed on here before.
There was strange sighting at Lough Claddaghduff by a Mr. Michael Coyne in 1956 who reported seeing a creature like looked like a large eel with ten feet showing as it turned over to display it’s lighter underbelly.
There was the story of the large eel stuck in a gully between Loughs Gowlan and Derrylesa from 100 years ago, which died.
In Lough Neagh in 1956 fishermen reported their nets damaged “by a thing like a giant eel”
You may wonder how this was connected to Loch Ness. There were stories that Roy Mackal mentions(p68) from older residents of Loch Ness that claimed eels of 10 feet(3 metres) to 16 feet( 5 metres) long had been caught in the loch years ago. I also heard the same stories from an elderly fisherman in 1972. He said when the eel fishing had been at it’s peak many years ago ,very large eels had been caught . I have been unable to substantiate this but I have seen it mentioned in other books about the Loch( I believe Tim Dinsdale mentions it in his books). Eels live in the loch in large numbers but are the normal European eel who don’t normally grow to enormous sizes. There have been reports of eels with manes being seen in the loch and divers reporting eels thicker than a man's leg, but no proof has been forthcoming. The theory that the lake monsters are giant eels is not a new one but when you look at reported sightings the descriptions of many say “eel like” . Eels tend to dwell near the bottoms of lakes and would only occasionally appear on the surface, perhaps when chasing fish. The manes reported could be a frill such as some fish like the Oar Fish have and a very large eel would indeed be very thick around the middle to be almost as big as a man’s thigh.
Dale Drinnon points out on the CFZ website there could be more than one type of “monster” , some sightings could be a large eel , some a huge fish. Certainly a giant eel has more credence than a plesiosaur but could be a breed of eel from the Ice Age and hence the large size. Anything is of course conjecture but then science starts with conjecture and observation and then tries to prove or disprove a theory , which is what cryptozoologists are actively doing.
I am not so well today so apologies for any spelling errors or woolly thinking.
Teige O’Donovan reporting sightings going back to 1914 from Lough Abisdealy (which translated means the lake of the monster). The descriptions of the creature were that it had a small flat head , along neck and three large loops sticking out of the water. Size was estimated at 25 feet( 8 metres) and the creature was dark brown. Interestingly one of the observers said the creature swung a portion of it’s body out of the water and described it as “looking exactly like the tail end of a huge conger eel”.
Lough Fadda has been discussed on here before.
There was strange sighting at Lough Claddaghduff by a Mr. Michael Coyne in 1956 who reported seeing a creature like looked like a large eel with ten feet showing as it turned over to display it’s lighter underbelly.
There was the story of the large eel stuck in a gully between Loughs Gowlan and Derrylesa from 100 years ago, which died.
In Lough Neagh in 1956 fishermen reported their nets damaged “by a thing like a giant eel”
You may wonder how this was connected to Loch Ness. There were stories that Roy Mackal mentions(p68) from older residents of Loch Ness that claimed eels of 10 feet(3 metres) to 16 feet( 5 metres) long had been caught in the loch years ago. I also heard the same stories from an elderly fisherman in 1972. He said when the eel fishing had been at it’s peak many years ago ,very large eels had been caught . I have been unable to substantiate this but I have seen it mentioned in other books about the Loch( I believe Tim Dinsdale mentions it in his books). Eels live in the loch in large numbers but are the normal European eel who don’t normally grow to enormous sizes. There have been reports of eels with manes being seen in the loch and divers reporting eels thicker than a man's leg, but no proof has been forthcoming. The theory that the lake monsters are giant eels is not a new one but when you look at reported sightings the descriptions of many say “eel like” . Eels tend to dwell near the bottoms of lakes and would only occasionally appear on the surface, perhaps when chasing fish. The manes reported could be a frill such as some fish like the Oar Fish have and a very large eel would indeed be very thick around the middle to be almost as big as a man’s thigh.
Dale Drinnon points out on the CFZ website there could be more than one type of “monster” , some sightings could be a large eel , some a huge fish. Certainly a giant eel has more credence than a plesiosaur but could be a breed of eel from the Ice Age and hence the large size. Anything is of course conjecture but then science starts with conjecture and observation and then tries to prove or disprove a theory , which is what cryptozoologists are actively doing.
I am not so well today so apologies for any spelling errors or woolly thinking.
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
DALE DRINNON: Old Three Toes, The Matter As It Stands After the Supposed 'Confession of The Hoaxer'
Ivan Sanderson introduces the subject of his Chapter 2 In More "Things" with the words 'This Thing is thus a true Monster. I have named it 'Three-Toes'"..' In the book he was reprinting a two-part article of his 'That Forgotten Monst.jpg)
er, Old Three-Toes' as his chapters 2 and 3 when they had originally appeared in FATE magazine in Dec 1967 and Jan 1968. In this case the focus is on his part 2 and Chapter 3, 'Old 3-Toes, Model B', although the identity applies equally well to 'Model A.'
The gist of the story is that Ivan Sanderson oversaw an extensive investigation into reports of an enormous creature leaving three-toed tracks in Florida, Sanderson's investigations starting in November 1948 and his eventual report running to 53 pages of typescript. Eventually, a person claiming to have been the author of the hoax was identified, the hoax boots with artificial soles shown and an article about it reprinted in PURSUIT. It was said that this one person had made 'ALL' the tracks.
The trouble is, the fellow was lying. The tracks started before he said he had the boots made up and started making 'Dinosaur' tracks and they continued for longer than he claimed to have been making them. And they are in fact still being reported, after the fellow has died and his boots were taken into custody.
Sanderson says in More "Things", on page 27, 'Prior to 1937, Three-Toes left tracks on several widely-dispersed beaches throughout the world-Southern New Zealand, Tasmania, Queensland, Patagonia and, of all places, Nantucket Island. Then there was the extraordinary business of Kerguelen Island (but more of this anon).' The 1937 case he mentions was in South Africa; another case Sanderson undoubtedly knew about but did not mention was reported by Dr Thomas Gannin Belize in 1932 and mentioned in Secret Cities of Old South America by Wilkins. These tracks were said to be 'Iguanodon' tracks and Eberhart in Mysterious Creatures lists this case along with several other such cases all around the curve of Brazil, including Marajao Island at the mouth of the Amazon and the island of Trinidad, covering the period broadly from 1800 to the 1920s, at least. Some of the Trindad tracks are attributed to the 'Huilla.' At the time the Florida tracks hit the news in 1948, there were letters saying that similar tracks were known around Moro Castle in Cuba and had been showing up for a long time there (including a description of the supposed monster) and later news stories out of Florida said that the tracks returned every four years - suggesting that by the time they were recognised in Florida in 1948, they were already supposed to have been there in 1944.
In a later article in PURSUIT, Sanderson identified the White River monster tracks as being like the Florida 'Three-toes' tracks. Roy Mackal later identified the tracks as an elephant seal. I would have been satisfied to leave the matter alone at this point but in 1988 a new wrinkle appeared. An article was reprinted in PURSUIT saying the mystery was solved: a Florida man had confessed to making all the tracks 40 years before. This was stated in the feature 'Big Creature Hoaxes' in PURSUIT, vol 21 no. 2, whole no. 82, 2nd quarter 1988, pgs 72-73. The 'confession' had it that the tracks were started in late spring and early summer of 1948. Actually, we do not even need to trust Sanderson's account to see that this would not account for 'all' the tracks; Willy Ley's The Lungfish, The Dodo and the Unicorn has a footnote at the bottom of page 146 which states 'Evidence of a large and unknown animal, possibly a gigantic turtle, has turned up in Florida during the winter 1947-8. "something" had tried to climb the sea wall, without success. The tracks looked like turtle tracks but were much too large and too far apart for anything known'
Then again, there were several reports of the creature, which Sanderson mentions, consistently portraying a large furry creature with a body 5 feet wide and 15 feet long, with four flippers, the back ones larger, and a head once described as looking like that of a rhinoceros: the Cuban's r
eport also specified that it had a big mouth full of sharp teeth. Sanderson called that a giant penguin, but a large penguin, a large turtle and a large seal all have about the same outline (through convergence, the shape makes swimming easier)
Thus it seems that the earliest tracks were 'Turtle' tracks with the occasional 'Three-toed' tracks as variants and the hoax tracks came some months later when it was warmer to go into and out of the water. Sanderson even specifies that he found evidences that there was a hoaxter at work.
One quite plain fact is that the hoax-foot-templates did not match the tracks. Sanderson specifies that the tracks were not symmetrical but were lopsided: the Arkansas tracks were even more so. The hoax-tracks by contrast WERE symmetrical. (The part about Sanderson noticing the hoax tracks was made in PURSUIT in the 'editor's note' on page 73, but the difference in the tracks got by the editor.) Some of the trackways made 'Tunnels' through the vegetation and Sanderson noted (probably correctly) that the tunnels thus made were too tight for the human hoaxter to navigate. The same tunnels are also noted in the Kerguelen Island case that Sa
nderson noted; only in this case the trackways and the tunnels were DEFINITELY made by elephant seals.
The idenitifaction of the tracks as elephant seal tracks was made by Mackal and I am willing to let him have the credit. The one really good sighting of a South American 'Dinosaur' (the Schmidt and Pfleng account up the Amazon) is clearly a somewhat exaggerated account of an elephant seal. I have been through Sanderson's files shortly after his death and I do know that the 3-toes case was never closed: another series of reports occurred in the fall of 1953 and involved the larger part of the Florida coastline. Tracks were reported from Clearwater, Tampa Bay, Sarasota, Charlotte Harbor and Naples in Collier County; sightings were made in the St. Johns River in the northeast of the state. This time the tracks were mostly the 'Giant turtle' or 'Snowplow' [sic] tracks: sightings described a thick-bodied creature 30-35 feet long, 6 feet high at the shoulder, with a head described as being like that of a cow or hippopotamus 5 feet long, 30' broad and 18' between the cow-like eyes, and with a 10" horn on a blunt-ended snout. This is also an elephant seal, probably with exaggerated dimensions but the proportions about right.
The current and continuing guise of 'Old Three Toes' is 'Tarpie', the Lake Tarpon Monster, allegedly a dinosaur that walks on two legs. Here is the info from the website:
Eyewitness accounts vary with respect to length (10-30 feet), skin texture (smooth or scaly) and shape of the head (described as resembling a dinosaur, an alligator, a dog, or pig - we think the last description may be more a case of alcohol than aquatic pigs). Most say it resembles some form of a large reptile, capable of walking on its two hind legs. However, one indisputable fact remains, that the mystery surrounding this Florida Lake defies description and identification! Also, some allege that Tarpie - as the Monster is now known - has taken his share of local wildlife and tourists! Which has the locals quite upset (about the wildlife!).
Some say the "monster" has been spoken of in the area for centuries - Indian legends may have it that anyone foolish enough to intrude on its territory would not return. Many have not! And not because of poor fishing either! http://www.laketarponmonster.com/
.jpg)
er, Old Three-Toes' as his chapters 2 and 3 when they had originally appeared in FATE magazine in Dec 1967 and Jan 1968. In this case the focus is on his part 2 and Chapter 3, 'Old 3-Toes, Model B', although the identity applies equally well to 'Model A.'
The gist of the story is that Ivan Sanderson oversaw an extensive investigation into reports of an enormous creature leaving three-toed tracks in Florida, Sanderson's investigations starting in November 1948 and his eventual report running to 53 pages of typescript. Eventually, a person claiming to have been the author of the hoax was identified, the hoax boots with artificial soles shown and an article about it reprinted in PURSUIT. It was said that this one person had made 'ALL' the tracks.
The trouble is, the fellow was lying. The tracks started before he said he had the boots made up and started making 'Dinosaur' tracks and they continued for longer than he claimed to have been making them. And they are in fact still being reported, after the fellow has died and his boots were taken into custody.
Sanderson says in More "Things", on page 27, 'Prior to 1937, Three-Toes left tracks on several widely-dispersed beaches throughout the world-Southern New Zealand, Tasmania, Queensland, Patagonia and, of all places, Nantucket Island. Then there was the extraordinary business of Kerguelen Island (but more of this anon).' The 1937 case he mentions was in South Africa; another case Sanderson undoubtedly knew about but did not mention was reported by Dr Thomas Gannin Belize in 1932 and mentioned in Secret Cities of Old South America by Wilkins. These tracks were said to be 'Iguanodon' tracks and Eberhart in Mysterious Creatures lists this case along with several other such cases all around the curve of Brazil, including Marajao Island at the mouth of the Amazon and the island of Trinidad, covering the period broadly from 1800 to the 1920s, at least. Some of the Trindad tracks are attributed to the 'Huilla.' At the time the Florida tracks hit the news in 1948, there were letters saying that similar tracks were known around Moro Castle in Cuba and had been showing up for a long time there (including a description of the supposed monster) and later news stories out of Florida said that the tracks returned every four years - suggesting that by the time they were recognised in Florida in 1948, they were already supposed to have been there in 1944.
In a later article in PURSUIT, Sanderson identified the White River monster tracks as being like the Florida 'Three-toes' tracks. Roy Mackal later identified the tracks as an elephant seal. I would have been satisfied to leave the matter alone at this point but in 1988 a new wrinkle appeared. An article was reprinted in PURSUIT saying the mystery was solved: a Florida man had confessed to making all the tracks 40 years before. This was stated in the feature 'Big Creature Hoaxes' in PURSUIT, vol 21 no. 2, whole no. 82, 2nd quarter 1988, pgs 72-73. The 'confession' had it that the tracks were started in late spring and early summer of 1948. Actually, we do not even need to trust Sanderson's account to see that this would not account for 'all' the tracks; Willy Ley's The Lungfish, The Dodo and the Unicorn has a footnote at the bottom of page 146 which states 'Evidence of a large and unknown animal, possibly a gigantic turtle, has turned up in Florida during the winter 1947-8. "something" had tried to climb the sea wall, without success. The tracks looked like turtle tracks but were much too large and too far apart for anything known'
Then again, there were several reports of the creature, which Sanderson mentions, consistently portraying a large furry creature with a body 5 feet wide and 15 feet long, with four flippers, the back ones larger, and a head once described as looking like that of a rhinoceros: the Cuban's r
eport also specified that it had a big mouth full of sharp teeth. Sanderson called that a giant penguin, but a large penguin, a large turtle and a large seal all have about the same outline (through convergence, the shape makes swimming easier)
Thus it seems that the earliest tracks were 'Turtle' tracks with the occasional 'Three-toed' tracks as variants and the hoax tracks came some months later when it was warmer to go into and out of the water. Sanderson even specifies that he found evidences that there was a hoaxter at work.
One quite plain fact is that the hoax-foot-templates did not match the tracks. Sanderson specifies that the tracks were not symmetrical but were lopsided: the Arkansas tracks were even more so. The hoax-tracks by contrast WERE symmetrical. (The part about Sanderson noticing the hoax tracks was made in PURSUIT in the 'editor's note' on page 73, but the difference in the tracks got by the editor.) Some of the trackways made 'Tunnels' through the vegetation and Sanderson noted (probably correctly) that the tunnels thus made were too tight for the human hoaxter to navigate. The same tunnels are also noted in the Kerguelen Island case that Sa
nderson noted; only in this case the trackways and the tunnels were DEFINITELY made by elephant seals.
The idenitifaction of the tracks as elephant seal tracks was made by Mackal and I am willing to let him have the credit. The one really good sighting of a South American 'Dinosaur' (the Schmidt and Pfleng account up the Amazon) is clearly a somewhat exaggerated account of an elephant seal. I have been through Sanderson's files shortly after his death and I do know that the 3-toes case was never closed: another series of reports occurred in the fall of 1953 and involved the larger part of the Florida coastline. Tracks were reported from Clearwater, Tampa Bay, Sarasota, Charlotte Harbor and Naples in Collier County; sightings were made in the St. Johns River in the northeast of the state. This time the tracks were mostly the 'Giant turtle' or 'Snowplow' [sic] tracks: sightings described a thick-bodied creature 30-35 feet long, 6 feet high at the shoulder, with a head described as being like that of a cow or hippopotamus 5 feet long, 30' broad and 18' between the cow-like eyes, and with a 10" horn on a blunt-ended snout. This is also an elephant seal, probably with exaggerated dimensions but the proportions about right.
The current and continuing guise of 'Old Three Toes' is 'Tarpie', the Lake Tarpon Monster, allegedly a dinosaur that walks on two legs. Here is the info from the website:
Eyewitness accounts vary with respect to length (10-30 feet), skin texture (smooth or scaly) and shape of the head (described as resembling a dinosaur, an alligator, a dog, or pig - we think the last description may be more a case of alcohol than aquatic pigs). Most say it resembles some form of a large reptile, capable of walking on its two hind legs. However, one indisputable fact remains, that the mystery surrounding this Florida Lake defies description and identification! Also, some allege that Tarpie - as the Monster is now known - has taken his share of local wildlife and tourists! Which has the locals quite upset (about the wildlife!).
Some say the "monster" has been spoken of in the area for centuries - Indian legends may have it that anyone foolish enough to intrude on its territory would not return. Many have not! And not because of poor fishing either! http://www.laketarponmonster.com/
ElephantSeal+3-Toes tracks, Photo of Antarctic Ice Floe
.jpg)
Elephant seal tracks looking like the tracks of a biped (one side)
'3-toed' flipper imprint from elephant seal trackway & Dessicated E.Seal Flipper looking like a 3-Toed foot
It is also my contention that 'Normandy Nessie' currently being reported in the same area is also an elephant seal.
My first inkling into this identification was the fact that Bernard Heuvelmans said that Thomas Helms's 1943 sea monster seen off of Florida did in fact have a head the size of an elephant seal's and the female does appear slimmer and flatter-faced than the male. It could well have been standing up in the water with the flippers pressed to the side as in one of Heuvelmans's plates showing a smaller seal in that position.
Mackal was much criticised for saying that the White River Monster could have been an elephant seal gone up the Mississippi river on the asumption there were not supposed to be any elephant seals there. As a matter of fact there is an unknown animal in the area listed by Eberhart and corresponding to the description of an elephant seal. The english translation of the name means 'Water Horse.' I have seen photographs and pre-Columbian artwork that I am satisfied depict exactly that animal as being like an elephant seal. And the Sea Elephant was originally a mythological animal of the NORTH Atlantic before reports came back of the seals being in other areas. Karl Shuker illustrates one old print of a Sea Elephant based on a French sighting of 1558 in From Flying Toads to Snakes With Wings, on page 197.
There is another issue attached to this: the story of the deathbed confession to a hoax is a popular legend (I refuse to use the meaning
less distinction 'Urban legend') and follows a folkloric pattern. The same basic story is told in the case of the Minnesota Iceman, the Surgeon's Photo at Loch Ness, and in this particular instance. In all of these stories, the source is not the hoaxer himself but is a close relative who is reporting on the supposed confession made by somebody else who is no longer around to tell the story for himself. The confessor is dead so that all trace of the 'real guilt' died with him. The narrator is always an accomplice and never the originator of the scheme. There are often other accomplices named but always also either dead or unwilling to admit their guilt. Often there is an implied complicity by the reporter that broke the case or his sponsoring publication. Always the case is supposed to have been a joke that got out of hand when people actually started taking it seriously and so the confession is delayed for years until the narrator decides to 'come clean'
My first inkling into this identification was the fact that Bernard Heuvelmans said that Thomas Helms's 1943 sea monster seen off of Florida did in fact have a head the size of an elephant seal's and the female does appear slimmer and flatter-faced than the male. It could well have been standing up in the water with the flippers pressed to the side as in one of Heuvelmans's plates showing a smaller seal in that position.
Mackal was much criticised for saying that the White River Monster could have been an elephant seal gone up the Mississippi river on the asumption there were not supposed to be any elephant seals there. As a matter of fact there is an unknown animal in the area listed by Eberhart and corresponding to the description of an elephant seal. The english translation of the name means 'Water Horse.' I have seen photographs and pre-Columbian artwork that I am satisfied depict exactly that animal as being like an elephant seal. And the Sea Elephant was originally a mythological animal of the NORTH Atlantic before reports came back of the seals being in other areas. Karl Shuker illustrates one old print of a Sea Elephant based on a French sighting of 1558 in From Flying Toads to Snakes With Wings, on page 197.
There is another issue attached to this: the story of the deathbed confession to a hoax is a popular legend (I refuse to use the meaning
less distinction 'Urban legend') and follows a folkloric pattern. The same basic story is told in the case of the Minnesota Iceman, the Surgeon's Photo at Loch Ness, and in this particular instance. In all of these stories, the source is not the hoaxer himself but is a close relative who is reporting on the supposed confession made by somebody else who is no longer around to tell the story for himself. The confessor is dead so that all trace of the 'real guilt' died with him. The narrator is always an accomplice and never the originator of the scheme. There are often other accomplices named but always also either dead or unwilling to admit their guilt. Often there is an implied complicity by the reporter that broke the case or his sponsoring publication. Always the case is supposed to have been a joke that got out of hand when people actually started taking it seriously and so the confession is delayed for years until the narrator decides to 'come clean' Often the downfall of the confession is that there are several competing versions, each one claiming to be the one and only true confession, such as in the cases of the Minnesota Iceman and the Surgeons' photo at Loch Ness.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
LINDSAY SELBY: Lough Fadda Horse Eel?
Lough Fadda in Ireland is known for its salmon and trout-fishing, and also reports of an unknown creature seen in the lake. For generations the locals of the Connemara area spoke of strange creatures called Horse Eels that inhabited the surrounding bog waters and children were warned to stay away from the loughs as Horse Eels dwelt there. In the 20th Century a lot of people dismissed it as folklore. Then there was a sighting in 1954. Four members of the local Clifden community saw the creature and two were reported to be very disturbed by the experience, so much so that when they returned to Clifden they insisted men armed with rifles be sent to the scene.
In June 1954 Georgina Carberry and three friends cycled down to Lough Fadda. They took a boat owned by the Clifden Angling Association and set out to fish. Later in the afternoon they decided to set the boat ashore along a finger of land that almost splits the lake in half to have some refreshments. They were sitting down with their tea when one of the group pointed out an object moving from 'an island', which she assumed was a man swimming. The object was approaching them and as it got closer it was obviously too big to be a human swimming. They began to get concerned and when it reached within twenty yards (18 metres) Georgina made the first move and jumped back; the others followed and moved away from the water's edge. The movement must have disturbed the creature and it swung right around a rock near the shore and dived. In two minutes it was up to the island again where they were watching and reappeared. When the creature came close to the group on shore it opened its "huge great mouth". Two big humps were noticed sticking above the water behind its head. Georgina said she spotted a forked tail when it swung around the rock. (Another witness, Ann, didn't recall seeing one, when interviewed later). Georgina likened the creature’s mouth to a shark's and described the animal's skin as "wormy" or "creepy". (She explained to F. W. Holiday when interviewed that the "body seemed to have movement all over it all the time.") 'Ann' recalled later on being interviewed that it had prominent eyes to the front of the head. 'Ann' (one of the two surviving members of the group) was interviewed in 2001 by a local historian and the details of the sighting she told him matched the details from nearly 50 years previously, it was still so clear in her mind.
The Loch Ness Investigation Bureau came to search the lough in 1965. The team included Captain Lionel Leslie, Dr Roy P. Mackal and David James, founder of the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau. Captain Leslie set off 5 lbs of explosive along the shore of Lough Fadda in an attempt to lure the creature out. A similar thing had been tried at Loch Ness in an attempt to imitate the 1933 road blasting to lure out Nessie. The police at Inverness, however, made them stop. It was recorded that about ten seconds after the blast a long black object broke the surface and began violently thrashing about. Cameras were on hand but apparently failed to capture any footage. The creature thrashed so wildly no identification or conclusions could be made of the brief sighting. Nets were left across the lough but no further evidence was obtained.
There was apparently an earlier sighting of some sort by two men in a boat during the 1940s but no details have been forthcoming and a search was conducted in Lough Fadda during the early 1980s that was mentioned in the local newspaper but again, no details have been forthcoming about what was found.
So, a candidate for the giant eels theory? I think it sounds very like many other sightings and could well have been an enormous eel. It may have been protecting it’s territory or moved to that lough because it was hungry. Sadly, the blast may have killed it or it may have moved on because of it, as there seems to have been no sightings since.
In June 1954 Georgina Carberry and three friends cycled down to Lough Fadda. They took a boat owned by the Clifden Angling Association and set out to fish. Later in the afternoon they decided to set the boat ashore along a finger of land that almost splits the lake in half to have some refreshments. They were sitting down with their tea when one of the group pointed out an object moving from 'an island', which she assumed was a man swimming. The object was approaching them and as it got closer it was obviously too big to be a human swimming. They began to get concerned and when it reached within twenty yards (18 metres) Georgina made the first move and jumped back; the others followed and moved away from the water's edge. The movement must have disturbed the creature and it swung right around a rock near the shore and dived. In two minutes it was up to the island again where they were watching and reappeared. When the creature came close to the group on shore it opened its "huge great mouth". Two big humps were noticed sticking above the water behind its head. Georgina said she spotted a forked tail when it swung around the rock. (Another witness, Ann, didn't recall seeing one, when interviewed later). Georgina likened the creature’s mouth to a shark's and described the animal's skin as "wormy" or "creepy". (She explained to F. W. Holiday when interviewed that the "body seemed to have movement all over it all the time.") 'Ann' recalled later on being interviewed that it had prominent eyes to the front of the head. 'Ann' (one of the two surviving members of the group) was interviewed in 2001 by a local historian and the details of the sighting she told him matched the details from nearly 50 years previously, it was still so clear in her mind.
The Loch Ness Investigation Bureau came to search the lough in 1965. The team included Captain Lionel Leslie, Dr Roy P. Mackal and David James, founder of the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau. Captain Leslie set off 5 lbs of explosive along the shore of Lough Fadda in an attempt to lure the creature out. A similar thing had been tried at Loch Ness in an attempt to imitate the 1933 road blasting to lure out Nessie. The police at Inverness, however, made them stop. It was recorded that about ten seconds after the blast a long black object broke the surface and began violently thrashing about. Cameras were on hand but apparently failed to capture any footage. The creature thrashed so wildly no identification or conclusions could be made of the brief sighting. Nets were left across the lough but no further evidence was obtained.
There was apparently an earlier sighting of some sort by two men in a boat during the 1940s but no details have been forthcoming and a search was conducted in Lough Fadda during the early 1980s that was mentioned in the local newspaper but again, no details have been forthcoming about what was found.
So, a candidate for the giant eels theory? I think it sounds very like many other sightings and could well have been an enormous eel. It may have been protecting it’s territory or moved to that lough because it was hungry. Sadly, the blast may have killed it or it may have moved on because of it, as there seems to have been no sightings since.
Saturday, April 04, 2009
GUEST BLOGGER FLEUR FULCHER: My unexpectedly crypto week
Over, once again to the divine Ms F. After a gap of a few weeks during which she has been about her studies, she is back and as charming as usual....It all started innocently, with me making my usual trip to the Adam and Eve pub in Lincoln for the pub quiz, I was wearing my new and very shiny shoes.
The questions were the normal mixture of ridiculously easy and horribly unfair, I was no help with the music round (I was ill the week they played the Ying Tong song), but then they asked which bird had laid the giant egg that was recently up for sale, of course I knew that it was the Elephant Bird of Madagascar, I even wrote the latin name, hoping for an extra point.
It turned out that we were the only team to get that question right, so I gleefully texted Max about it; texting Max whilst I’m tipsy is turning into a bit of a tradition.
A few days later my friends Jim and Catherine and I decided the day was too lovely to go to uni so we went to Newark instead, intending on looking at the ruins of the castle, we went to some of the many charity shops that were there, and found in the Oxfam bookshop a copy of the excellent ‘Searching for Hidden Animals’ by Roy P. Mackal, for £4 this was a major bargain and I did my now notorious happy dance all round the shop. In another charity shop they had several plastic dragons and cockatrices, and whilst I was rather tempted by these, I did not add them to my bag of purchases.
On getting home I realised that the Mackal book goes for upwards of £30 on Amazon, so this really was a cheap crypto find, I advise you all to check the shelves of your local charity shops.The next item in my week is rather sillier, I was perusing the amazingly hilarious Cake Wrecks site and found some amazing animal and cryptid cakes –
and dragon and unicorn cakes-
(you really really have to look at these, you won’t believe the top dragon one is actually a cake!)
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