Michael Killen's blog

The first official NESRA expedition of 2009 took place the first weekend in May. This time around we had chosen the central region of the Adirondack Park of upstate NY as our target research area.

May 1st

As usual I was up very early Friday morning preparing for the long drive upstate. I finished packing some last minute items and double checked all my gear while waiting for my good friend and fellow researcher John Campbell to arrive. Once John arrived he and I carried my gear out to his van and crammed it in the back beside all his gear. The van now packed, John and I hit the road to begin our long drive north. Leaving Long Island we took I-495 west into NYC then turned north heading for the Adirondacks.

We met Chris, Dave and Kevin at our predetermined meeting location which was about a 30 minute drive from the expedition area at 11 AM. Another team member Bill did not meet us at this location but would be joining us at base camp sometime Saturday afternoon. John and I both grabbed a quick bite to eat as we talked with the rest of the guys about our plans for the weekend. When we were all ready we once again got on the road at 11:45 AM driving towards our final weekend destination.

We arrived at our base camp location around 12:15 PM and began to set up camp. Once our tents were up and our gear unpacked we made plans to scout the surrounding area. We broke up into two teams and headed out searching for physical evidence as well as also looking for good locations to set up our night time observation posts. John and I hiked into the area south of camp while Chris, Dave and Kevin all headed north.

We spent several hours exploring the surrounding area before meeting back at base camp in the late afternoon. John and I didn’t find anything of interest south of camp or even a location we thought would make a good spot for an observation post. Chris, Dave and Kevin had better luck and found a good location for our night time observation posts along a ridge line north of camp.

Back at camp we made our plans for the night, got our surveillance gear ready and cooked dinner. After dinner we cleaned up, got our gear ready to go and divided up into two teams. Chris and Dave were designated Team A, Kevin and I were Team B. John stayed back at base camp in order to watch over the camp, man the camp radio and take notes on our night time activities and radio communications. This was the first time John was manning base camp. Usually the job of base camp commander falls to Chuck, our resident chef, Adirondack guide, all around outdoorsman and expedition scribe. Chuck couldn’t join us this time so John stepped up to take his place at camp and did a great job taking expedition notes and manning the camp radio.

Our gear ready to go, we shouldered our packs, grabbed our chairs and hiked out of camp heading north towards the ridge line at 8:05 PM. To get to the ridge we had to cross several small streams/creeks and navigate through the forest in the dark of night using our head lamps to guide us. We reached the ridge and began our climb to the top. Kevin and I headed west down the ridge line once we reached the top to set up our observation post. Chris and Dave went to the east end of the ridge and set up their OP about 100 – 125 yards from our own.

Once Kevin and I were at our chosen OP location I radioed John at base camp to let him know we were in position at 8:29 PM. Team A called us to let us know they were now in position at 8:46 PM. I then reported to John that both teams were in position and set up at 8:48 PM.

At 8:53 PM Team A radioed Kevin and I to ask if we had just tried a wood knock. We replied we hadn’t and asked what they had heard. Team A reported they heard what could have possibly been two soft, weak sounding knocks as if they were made on a rotted tree.

9:10 PM John in camp called both teams to let us know he had just heard a sound in the distance that sounded like either a motor bike or possibly a chain saw.

9:14 PM I radioed camp to ask John if there are vehicles driving past our camp as I can see what I thought were headlights in the distance on the road through the trees. John acknowledged I had indeed seen headlights and replied a truck drove past camp.

I decided to try some vocalizations and called both Team B and base camp at approx 9:28 PM to tell them that I would be doing 2 whoop calls. At 9:30 PM I did two loud whoop calls. Both Team A and John in camp acknowledged they heard two whoops. We listened for any possible return calls but heard nothing.

At 9:38 PM I radioed Team A to tell them Kevin and I had heard movement in the valley below and to the left of our OP. Dave replied that Chris had been walking around looking for a stick to use for wood knocking.

9:39 PM Chris made two wood knocks. We again listened for any possible response but heard nothing.

I decided to try another vocalization and told Team A and camp at 10:15 PM that I would be doing a long, low pitched howl this time. At 10:16 PM John called me to tell me he had heard my howl clearly at base camp.

10:23 PM I advised Team A that I had heard a faint sound from the west but that I wasn’t sure what it was. Being that I had just heard something, Team A decided to try some more wood knocks hoping to get a response. They told Kevin and I they would be doing 2 more wood knocks.

At 10:44 PM Team A did two wood knocks but again we hear no direct response to the knocks.

The wind had started to pick up over the last hour or so and by this time the sky was cloudy and it looked like it was going to rain. Team A called us at 11:00 PM to say that they were packing up to go back to camp since we hadn’t really had any definite activity and now it looked like rain was coming. I acknowledged that rain was likely soon and that it seemed quiet as far as signs of activity so we would be packing up as well.

At 11:05 PM I radioed John to tell him both teams were packing up and would be heading in since we had no activity and it looked like it was about to rain. The two teams met up and began the short hike back to camp.

We walked up the hill returning to base camp at 11:27 PM just as the rain started to fall. We got back just in time too. Not long after we had returned the skies opened up and a steady heavy rain came down. It rained heavily a good portion of the night but the sun returned by Saturday morning.

May 2nd

Saturday afternoon Chris, Kevin, Dave, John and I all decided to hike in to a remote pond located several miles from our base camp. We were going to the pond to search for any possible tracks that we thought might be found in the mud around the edge of the pond. There are no trails to this pond so we followed a stream for a while to get us relatively close then turned and hiked directly into the forest guided only by GPS and compass. As we bush whacked our way through the forest we kept our eyes open looking for any other possible signs of physical evidence we might find on our hike in to the pond.

The hike was rough going as we had to climb and descend many hills and ridges while beating our own path through the forest. It was several hours before we finally arrived at our target destination and the remote pond came into view. When we reached the one end of the pond we split up our five member team into two teams. Chris and Dave searched one side of the pond while Kevin, John and I searched the other.

Unfortunately once we began searching around the perimeter of the pond we were all disappointed to find that there was absolutely no mud around the edge of this pond what so ever. The grass just grew directly right out into the water with no mud in sight so there would be no hope of finding any tracks at the waters edge. After searching in vain we then took a short rest break before we started the exhausting hike back out of the area.

As we hiked out we received a radio call from fellow NESRA researcher Bill who had just arrived at base camp. He asked us for directions to where we were located so he could come out to meet us. We told Bill to stay put as we were almost out of the forest and would be joining him back at camp soon. A short time later Chris, Kevin, Dave, John and I returned to camp to find Bill there waiting for us. We all exchanged greetings and then told Bill that our exhausting, tough afternoon hike in search of tracks that in the end had been a wasted effort.

Back at camp we all relaxed for a while before getting ready for dinner. We ate an early dinner and talked with Bill about what we had done Friday night and what our strategy would be for Saturday night. After eating we checked our gear in preparation for our night time surveillance ops. Then we split up into two teams again with Kevin and I staying together as Team B while Bill replaced Dave and joined Chris in Team A. On this night Dave had decided to stay back in camp to help John monitor the radio traffic and take notes on our activities.

At 6:30 PM Chris, Bill, Kevin and I headed out for our surveillance area leaving Dave and John in base camp. It took almost an hour for both teams to reach their individual OP’s and be fully set up for the night. This time Kevin and I decided to set up on a plateau just south and towards the east end of the ridge. Team A set up on top of the ridge as they had done Friday night.

I radioed base camp at 7:23 PM to report Kevin and I (Team B) were in position and set up. A few minutes later at 7:27 PM Team A (Chris and Bill) reported they were also now in position and set up.

Being mindful of the heavy rain we experienced the night before, Chris checked the weather on his Garmin Rino 530 and reported rain was again in the area at 7:46 PM. We just hoped the rain would stay away for a while to give us some time to conduct our surveillance.

At 8:10 PM Team A reported their audio gear was up and recording and that they were now going “silent” at their OP which meant that they were going to sit as quietly as possible to listen with only minimal radio communications as needed.

About 20 minutes later Kevin and I heard a “snorting sound” down by the stream closest to our location. The noise repeated several times then stopped. It sounded to me like it was most likely a deer snort and I reported hearing the sounds at 8:33 PM.

A few minutes later at 8:39 PM I called Team A to ask if they wanted to try any wood knocks or vocalizations in an attempt to get a reply. They replied they would do 3 wood knocks. Two minutes later at 8:41 PM Team A did 3 wood knocks. Both teams then sat in silence and listened for a reply but none was heard.

With no apparent response to our wood knocks, Kevin decided to try using his electronic game caller to see if he could cause some type of reply or action. At 9:14 PM he advised Team A that he would be trying the game caller in the next 30 seconds. Kevin played his game caller then we sat quietly for a while listening but heard nothing.

Team A called Kevin and I at 9:31 PM and asked us to try a wood knock or vocalization. I decide to try a whoop and after a 30 second warning to Team A I did my whoop at 9:34 PM.

Team A called us back at 9:40 PM and asked me to do another whoop because they thought they heard a growl sound after my first whoop. After telling them I would do two more whoops I did a double whoop at 9:43 PM. We heard no answer to my whoop calls.

After about 15 minutes of sitting quietly with nothing heard I radioed Team A at 10 PM and asked them if they had heard anymore possible growling. Chris replied that they hadn’t heard anymore growling and that they now thought the growling sound was most likely just the wind whistling over a rock overhang near their OP. I suggested that they try some more wood knocks at 10:10 or 10:15 PM.

Team A did 4 wood knocks at 10:10 PM. We listened but heard no reply. After waiting a while I called Team A at 10:35 PM to ask if they have heard anything at their OP but got no reply. About ten minutes later at 10:43 PM we got a short reply from Team A but their radio cut out in mid sentence. I tried calling them back but could not reach them. John tried calling Team A from base camp and also got no reply.

At 10:45 PM Team A tried to answer our radio calls but their transmissions were completely garbled. I called John at camp and told him that if we haven’t heard from Team A by 11 PM I would go to their OP location and check on their status in person.

Just before I was going to hike out to Team A’s location, Kevin and I saw headlamps moving around on the high ridge where Team A was set up. Kevin and I decided to pack up our gear and head over to where we see Team A moving around. Just as we got ready to hike out of our OP we noticed Team A’s headlamps appeared to be moving down the ridge towards our OP position.

By 11:17 PM Team A had joined us and we then found out that both of their radios weren’t working properly. Chris’s radio had stopped working and Bill’s radio was transmitting in what sounded like the Klingon language from the TV series Star Trek. With no working radio for Team A and with both of our OP positions now fully compromised we all decided to head back to camp.

Both teams hiked back to base camp together. Bill tried to figure out what was wrong with his radio and eventually figured out that it was some how set to a scrambled frequency. Unless all of our radios were set to the same scrambled channel it was impossible to understand and communicate with Bill since his radio was set on scramble.

May 3rd

Sunday morning John and I both got up about 8 AM to find the rest of the team already up and beginning to pack up their gear. John made some coffee and we had a quick breakfast before we also started to pack up our gear. We hadn’t heard or seen anything unusual the entire weekend at this location. Once we had finished packing up and said our goodbyes to our fellow researchers, John and I decided to drive to another nearby pond to have one last look around in the area. We spent about an hour at this pond but found nothing except for a nice view. At that point we decided to head for home so we drove out of the expedition area heading for the interstate and the long drive south back to Long Island.

Below are some of the pictures I took during this expedition.

A view of the river we followed into the forest on our Saturday hike into the remote pond

My friend John on a rock beside the river further upstream

A shot of me climbing over a tree as we hiked in towards the remote pond

One of the many hills we climbed on our exhausting Saturday hike

Chris climbs over a tree blocking our path on the way to the pond

John is right behind him

A view of the pond after we finally reached it only to find no mud anywhere and the grass growing right into the water

A different view of the river on our hike back out of the forest

A typical small Adirondack stream

A group shot back at base camp - from lower left to lower right are: Bill, Mike, Kevin, Chris and Dave

Another group shot to include John who took the first one: John, Mike, Kevin, Chris and Dave

The other pond John and I checked out before we left the area Sunday afternoon

Well it's August already and I've been neglecting my blog for months now. I should have posted 3 months ago when we held our spring '09 expedition on the first weekend of May. I should have written my report on that expedition and posted it much sooner but I didn't. I did start my report and had every intention of finishing it and getting it posted here but we all know how even with "the best of intentions" things don't always go according to plan. Well in any event, as I said I am working on the report from our spring expedition and will get it posted, eventually.

Speaking of expeditions, we just recently returned from another one in the Adirondack Park. So now I have a second report to write for this latest expedition even though I still have yet to post the first one, yikes! I guess I better get busy then.

I’ll give a really brief description of the first few hours of our latest field research trip here. There won’t be very many specific details related here now, though I will post a much more inclusive full expedition report eventually. The reason I’m posting this now instead of waiting to post my full report later on is simple. The NESRA team was lucky enough to get some very interesting audio clips recorded during this expedition and we wanted to get these audio clips out there for everyone to hear as soon as possible. So that’s why I’m not waiting until my report is ready to post these clips because otherwise you would all be waiting quite a while being that I still have to finish the first report I’m still working on.

Okay so here is a brief description of the first few hours of our most recent expedition and of the events that led up to the recording of some very interesting sounds at our base camp location.

The weekend of 7/31/09 – 8/02/09 the NESRA team was on expedition again in one of our favorite research areas in the Adirondack Park of upstate NY. The first afternoon of the first day I was at our chosen base camp location alone for several hours until the next member of our team arrived. The small clearing was choked with high grass and weeds and was much smaller than it had been the last time we had been at this location. I drove my truck back a forth through the clearing trying to flatten as much of center of the clearing as possible to make room for the other vehicles and our tents. After doing this I parked my truck then got my Zoom H2 recorder and some of my other gear ready.

Fellow NESRA researcher Bill was not scheduled to arrive for at least another 60 – 90 minutes so I found myself alone with some time to kill. I decided to do a quick recon of the immediate area around our base camp and also to try some wood knocks since it was so quiet in the forest, except for the sounds of the rain that is, with nobody else there.

I hiked around for about an hour or so just to see what I could see. I figured it was better than just waiting there at camp for Bill to show up. At least this way I had something to do for a while. As I scouted the surrounding area, I had my recorder running the entire time. I narrated everything I was doing as I did it and described everything I was seeing as well to create a complete audio record of my first hour in the forest. I found a small unusual rock pile not far from camp, a game trail that seemed to have seen some recent use and a flattened down spot in the high grass where a large animal (probably a deer) had obviously bedded down. I didn’t find much else of interest on this initial short hike but it’s not really what I found but more what I heard that is important to note.

I kept checking my watch and when it was close to the time that Bill was scheduled to join me I headed back towards the clearing. Near the end of my hike when I was close to our camp location I decided to try some wood knocks just to see if I would get any type of a response. I really wasn’t expecting a response but thought it was worth trying anyway. “Hey, you never know…” as the saying goes, right?

So I did a few wood knocks on a good sized downed limb just off the trail. Then I hiked the short distance back to the base camp and did a few more knocks about 8 minutes later. Well almost exactly 2 minutes after the last wood knocks I did and approx 10 minutes after the first knocks I certainly got a response, and what a response it was!!!

All of a sudden from behind me came these sounds which I heard even over the fairly loud background noise of the falling rain on the hood of my rain gear! What I heard was the sounds of 3 quick “bangs” (which I believe are most likely wood knocks) followed immediately by a single “heavy crash” sound (that I’m not sure about but I’m leaning towards it being a tree falling or possibly being pushed over or a large heavy object being thrown down). I had my recorder on and was able to document these sounds over the background noise of the rainfall. I remained quiet for some time after recording the sounds I had just heard in case there were more. But those would be the only unusual sounds I would hear for the rest of the day.

After waiting around a while I decided I wasn’t going to hear anything more so I got back in my truck to get out of the rain for a while. I was really hungry by this point so I figured it was time for some lunch. I ate my lunch and just when I had finished eating I heard the sound of a vehicle approaching.

Bill drove up in his truck as I got out of my truck to greet him. He had arrived quite a bit later than he had originally planned. Dave was the next member of the NESRA team to show up and he arrived shortly after Bill did that afternoon. Later that evening we were joined by fellow field researcher Chuck.

Once I returned from the expedition, I listened to my audio clips and edited them down a bit. Then I sent the shortened audio files to Bill who uploaded them to the Soundcloud.com website he likes to use to host his recorded audio clips. So follow the links after each brief description over to Soundcloud to listen to these sounds and see what you think of them.

This first clip is the full 2:18 real time clip which I edited down from the original length recording to isolate the last wood knocks I did in base camp followed by the response I received about 2 minutes later. Because this is a real time clip, there is approx 2 minutes of near silence as I’m waiting to hear if there was any reply. There are of course some noises like the sound of the falling rain, a few handling noises of my fingers on the exterior of the recorder and me moving around a bit but that’s it until the response occurs at the end of the clip.
NESRA Expedition 7-31-09 - 8-2-09 1 edit 3 wood knocks and crash real time 2 18 clip 7 WAV by imonacan

The second clip is a very short clip which I edited down from the first real time 2:18 recording to only 6 seconds to isolate just the four sounds of the “bangs” and “heavy crash”.
NESRA Expedition 7-31-09 - 8-2-09 1 edit 3 wood knocks and crash WAV clip by imonacan

The third clip is an enhanced version of the second short 6 second clip that fellow NESRA researcher Chris Bartow modified using Steinberg Wavelab software to remove most of the background noise of the rain. Though much of the rain noise has been removed, the “bangs” and “heavy crash” sounds themselves have taken on artificially created tones. As a result of removing the background rainfall noise, these tones are significantly deeper sounding than the actual tones I recorded but it does make it easier to hear the four sounds more clearly.
Chris B Enhanced 3 wood knocks and crash 6 sec clip 7 b WAV by imonacan

So what do you think made these sounds?

On November 16th and again on November 23rd, my friend John Campbell and I traveled to Dutchess County upstate NY. We were there following up on an encounter report from last year which occurred at a lake along the Appalachian Trail in this area.

On Saturday November 1st, 2008, fellow NESRA investigator Kevin Humphrey and I traveled to Hartford County in northern Connecticut near the Massachusetts border. We were scouting out an area there Kevin has been researching. He has heard some distant and questionable/possible wood knocks there in the past, so this was the reason for our trip.

The weekend of Sept 26th - 28th, what a great weekend this was! I was at the 2008 East Coast Bigfoot Conference in Jeannette, PA on Sept 27th where I finally had a chance to meet many of the people I have been talking to online on a regular basis.

This is my second blog entry and also part two of my Delaware County, NY investigation blog. I was planning on writing and posting this the weekend after I got back, which would have been last weekend, but instead I made a spur of the moment decision and went on a two-wheeled road trip to Maryland for the extended Labor Day weekend.

As this is my first official blog entry on this website I want to start out by saying shame on me! I should have been posting on this blog all along every time I went into the field but for some reason I just didn’t. From now on I'm going to try to post something here much more regularly to keep everyone updated on my field research efforts. Okay now that I’ve said my peace, on to the blog.

NESRA Bass River State Forest Bigfoot Investigation 2005 New Jersey Pine Barrens By Michael Killen

On the morning of November 12th, 2005, I traveled to Bass River State Forest in the Pine Barrens region of southern New Jersey. I was joined there by fellow NESRA researcher David Girard who met me at the park office. Our trip that day had a dual purpose. We wanted to visit the exact location of the previous sighting of two Sasquatch/Bigfoot creatures in the park which took place on September 29th, 2003. (Click HERE to read the 2003 report.) We also wanted to look for any signs of possible recent activity in the area. The weather was perfect for a hike that day; sunny skies with temps in the lower 60’s with a light wind at about 5 mph.

Forest Entrance

Pine Barrens

Wild Berries

I arrived at the park office at 9:00 am and went inside to get maps of the campsites and trails there. As I was sitting in my car examining the trail maps David G. arrived. We exchanged greetings and proceeded to examine the maps together to decide a plan of action for the day. We decided we should visit the location of the 2003 sighting first because it was very close to the park office. After doing this we would hike the trails to look for any signs of possible recent Sasquatch/Bigfoot activity in the area.

With our plan decided we left the office and drove the short distance to the parking lot in the area where the sighting took place. As soon as we had parked and exited our cars the sighting location was immediately in view. The exact location where the 2003 sighting took place is a swing set located in the Swimming Beach Complex of the Lake Absegami Recreation Area. This area is located on the eastern shore of the lake surrounded by the campsites of the park. The swing set lies between the parking lot and the many tables and barbeques which make up the picnic area, approximately 60 feet west of the parking lot.

With our cameras in hand, we walked the short distance to the swing set sighting location. We noted how close the swing set was to the parking lot as well as to the picnic area and the large building which sits facing the lake. The distance from the swing set to the closest table in the picnic area is only approximately 25 feet while the distance to the large building is approximately 100 feet. The swing set sits literally at the edge of the woods. The first few trees and scrub brush of the woods begin only 10 feet from the swing set. There is also a small inlet area just beyond the edge of the woods where the lake comes in to within 25 feet of the swing set.

2003 Sighting Area

2003 Sighting Area

Lake Inlet

David and I began to explore and take pictures of the immediate area around the sighting location. We checked out an area just northwest of the swing set where the land juts out into the lake forming a small peninsula. The whole area north and west of the swing set is lake front beach. The ground in this area is soft sandy soil and readily shows footprints and other impressions. We checked the area for any type of large tracks or impressions but nothing was found. We also investigated the edge of the woods around the swing set and at the muddy edge of the lake in the inlet area just north of the swing set but no large impressions or tracks were found here either. It doesn’t appear that there has been any recent activity in this immediate area as we were unable to find any possible signs of activity.

We then decided to leave the sighting area to begin exploring the trails we had chosen from the map of the area. The area we decided to investigate was located approximately 6 miles northwest from the Lake Absegami Recreation Area where the northwestern edge of Bass River State Forest meets the wilderness of the Pine Barrens. There are no buildings or other signs of human habitation for miles in any direction from the trails we were hiking through. This area is virtually untouched, pristine wilderness. There are no campsites in the area and the only people who use the network of trails there are probably hikers, hunters and the occasional off-road enthusiast. Most of the trails we saw in the area during our hike are accessible by truck or ATV. Only a few trails were too narrow for any type of vehicle traffic.

The surface of the trails in the area is a mix of soft sandy type soil and harder packed dirt. Most of the trails were partially covered in dead pine needles, sticks and other debris blown across the trail from the surrounding Pine Barrens scrub. The dense brush came right up to the edge of the trials and limited our off trail visibility to 10 – 20 feet in most areas and less then 10 feet in some areas. There were signs of a plentiful deer population in the area. We found deer tracks on virtually every section of every trail we hiked as we searched the area for signs of any possible larger tracks or impressions. As we hiked into the Pine Barrens, David and I had our digital still cameras in hand and I was also recording our entire hike on video. I wanted to have the video rolling constantly to record anything we might see or hear as we searched the network of trails.

Trail Picture

Trail Picture

On the first trail we searched, approximately 1.5 miles southeast from our starting point, we found what appeared to be three or four “footprint shaped” impressions. David was out in front scanning the ground ahead for any type of tracks or unusual impressions on the trail. I was following him as I constantly panned the video camera left and right into the surrounding brush. He suddenly stopped and pointed to the ground at his feet. At first glance it was very hard to see the impression he had found because of the layer of dead pine needles covering most of the trail. After a few seconds of staring at the ground I was able to look through the pine needles and see what he was pointing at. There appeared to be a large “footprint shaped” impression in the soft sandy soil of the trail. As we scanned the area we found two more matching impressions and possibly a fourth. Each impression measured approximately 12 inches long but lacked any real detail, except that they were all roughly in the shape of a footprint. There were no individual toes evident in any of the impressions but they all had a depressed area in the front and back sections. The depressed areas were set deeper into the soil as if they were made from toes and a heel. In the center portion of the impressions the soil was either slightly raised or level with the surrounding soil. We noticed that the first three imprints were in line with each other. Then we noticed something unusual about these simple impressions, there appeared to be quite a distance between them.

Area Where Impressions Found

First Impression Found

Second Impression

I got my tape measure out of my backpack and we confirmed the distance between the first two impressions as being unusually long. We measured the distance between the impressions, also known as the step length, and we were surprised to find it was almost exactly five feet. David is a big man who stands 6’6” tall and weighs about 270 lbs. He attempted to equal the apparent step length between the first two impressions and could just barely stretch his legs long enough. He was so stretched out that he almost fell over and could never have walked this way at all. He was only able to equal the distance by standing with his legs stretched to their absolute maximum length. The apparent five foot step length made the discovery of the impressions all the more interesting. We also found a fourth possible impression at the same location as the first three but this impression wasn’t exactly like the others. This one wasn’t nearly as deep in the soil as the other three were and the outline was even less clearly defined. We thought it was possible that it might have been made at the same time as the other impressions but it just didn’t quite match. This possible impression was on the edge of the trail where there were some broken branches and other bits of wood debris on the trail. The possible impression was directly on this wood debris so this may have been the reason that it didn’t quite match the other impressions. There was a slight depression in the front edge of the possible impression but the back portion where the bulk of the wood debris was didn’t show any really noticeable depression in the soil. Because of this we can’t say with any degree of certainty if this was a fourth matching impression or not. We also don’t know what made these impressions on the trail, but they did get our attention.

Third Impression

Step Length

Step Length - Side View

We continued to search the trails in the area for any other large or unusual impressions. The only other large impressions we found that day appeared to have been tracks left behind by a horse ridden through the area recently. As we hiked along the trails we would stop and listen at regular intervals for any unusual sounds. A few times while we were hiking we did hear something moving in the brush and we immediately stopped to listen more closely. Most of the time the noises weren’t very loud and we thought it was probably a small animal like a bird, a mouse or a squirrel. We did hear a louder noise coming from the brush in one area that sounded like a much larger animal. We couldn’t see what it was because of the dense scrub along the trail but we guessed that it was probably a deer as there were so many of them in the area. We never smelled anything unusual or felt like we were being watched at any time during our hike.

I think that this area is a perfect potential habitat for Sasquatch/Bigfoot creatures because of the vast tracts of undeveloped Pine Barrens wilderness, the abundant wildlife there including both smaller and larger animals like deer and bears, and the many accessible water sources in the form of lakes, streams, ponds and marshland in the area. I found wild berries growing on many bushes in the area which could be part of a potential food source for these creatures. There are many different small animals like mice, frogs, fish, rabbits, squirrels etc. in the area as well which could also be potential food sources. I would imagine that if it’s possible for large carnivores like bears to survive there that it should be possible for large, omnivorous bi-pedal primates to live there too. I think that the generally soft surface of most of the trails in the area and the muddy areas around the marshlands might possibly yield a good clear track eventually if these creatures do in fact live there. I plan on returning to the area again in the future to explore the trails more completely and to search for any possible tracks or other types of trace physical evidence.