From the ALABAMA BIGFOOT site

[#59]

The RFP Research Project (RFPRP) Report of Encounters

 

Preface:  The author of this report first met the primary witness, his uncle and one his cousins in November of 2008 while investigating a newspaper report of the killing of livestock and pets in an Arkansas county different from the one in which the encounters reported below took place. The uncle quickly told me that the case I was investigating was the result of the actions by dogs and not wild creatures, and he provided information that confirmed his opinion.
Our discussion led to the subject of “strange creatures” stories and it quickly became apparent from the uncle’s and cousin’s reactions to some of my questions that they had knowledge of something they thought I should know, but they were obviously waiting on the primary witness to speak first. At their urging, the primary witness said he might talk to me later, but he wanted to think about revealing the information first. He asked me to call him after a few days. I did. That call led to discussions and several trips to the area involved in this report. It became apparent we were talking about the same kind of creatures. After gaining his confidence that I was serious, and after promising that I would never reveal his name, personal information, or any information that might disclose even the approximate location of the area, he agreed to tell me about his unusual experiences when he had the free time to do so. He suggested that he tell me his basic accounts first, and promised to fill in the details later. I agreed because I had a gut feeling that his story was going to be unusual, and that he did not want to waste his and my time if I did not believe it. When he told me the basic history, I was surprised and somewhat skeptical. It would have taken a very bold person with unusual patience and scientific curiosity to have done what he claimed to have done.

A thorough two-month long investigation of the witness’s background and reputation was conducted. The writer also spent several hundred hours in the general area of the witness’s encounters, including camping alone at two different locations for several days in freezing weather. Without revealing personal information about this witness, or the data and sources on which my opinions are based, I will unequivocally state that his combined reputation for veracity, courage and intelligence is well established and beyond reproach. I will further state that his assertions and opinions about the presence of a group of reclusive forest primates within the area of this report were proven to the writer on the nights of January 1 and January 2, 2009, and reaffirmed numerous times from that time to the date of this report. The long-time presence of the creatures has also been substantiated by numerous older area residents since his initial report.

It should be noted that this witness has never before disclosed any details of his encounters and interactions with these creatures to anyone else; not even his wife. After deciding to tell me his story, he did talk briefly to her about his encounters.

Date report submitted to RFPRP:  February 12, 2009.

Dates of encounters:  From November of 2001 to 2004.

Time of incidents:  Various.

Weather conditions:  Various

County:  Not Disclosed. (See Preface.)

Nearest city or town:  Not Disclosed. (See Preface.)

Location:  South Arkansas.

Nearest road:  Not Disclosed. (See Preface.)

General land use:  Primarily timber production with a few scattered hay fields and cattle pastures, and some rural homesteads along and above the flood plain.

General terrain description:  The area generally consists of lowlands along a major river. The area is subject to periodic flooding. Inside the flood plain a great deal of the old growth timber has been removed and replaced with pine plantations, although there are still large tracts of very old hardwoods, mixed with holly, pine, birch, ironwood, and ash. Some of medium growth pine plantations are heavily infested with dense thickets of briars, vines and non-native, invasive hedges.

The area is heavily populated with deer, feral hogs, imported Russian Boar, coyotes and the typical smaller creatures that inhabit the Souther n lowlands. There are also black bear, cougar, and alligators that have been reintroduced to the area naturally or by man. There is reportedly at least one enigmatic canine in the area, as well as a confirmed population of enigmatic primates.

Nearest lakes and streams:  There are numerous small oxbow lakes/swamps, marshes and sizeable beaver ponds within this and other areas of the undisclosed river’s flood plain.

Witness profile:  A 34 year old male who is a lifelong resident of the general area. He has hunted the river bottom since he was 8 years old. He has extensively hunted and fished the area alone or with other during both daylight and nighttime hours since he was 10 years old. His knowledge and expertise as a hunter, fisherman and woodsman is well known to the residents of this area.

Background:  The primary witness and a few relatives were members of a hunting club that held a lease on nearly 7000 acres in the river bottoms. There were approximately 100 members in the club. The club held the lease from about 1988 until 2004. The witness and some of his family members camped at a particular place along the riv er during the deer hunting seasons, and they often hunted for squirrels before deer season.

On a fall day in 1987 or 1988, when the witness was 12 or 13, he and his father and a small dog were hunting squirrels along the river. Their hunt carried them by an old, crude, one-room building which had reportedly been used years before as a temporary shelter by a family who lived on the opposite side of the river when family members hunted or worked on farmland on that side of the river. The building had no floor, ceiling or coverings on the inside walls. The roof near the center of the building was supported by a large wooden pole, and the building contained a wood heater made from a barrel. (Later the witness and his friends sometimes used the building as shelter during overnight fishing or camping trips when he was a teenager.)

The witness and his father paused outside the old building during their hunt. After a few minutes the witness noticed the unusually loud sound of buzzing insects. As he searched for the source of the sounds he looked through the open door of the building and saw and heard swarms of flies inside. He then saw the partial remains of a wild hog on the ground inside. As he stepped into the building  for a closer look, he stated he was shocked and alarmed to see that the floor (ground), walls, support pole, and the underside of the roof were splattered with blood. He immediately called his father inside. He said the hair on his head seemed to be standing up as they viewed the bloody scene. They could see that the hog had been killed by having been beaten against the walls and the exposed wall framing and against the support pole. While looking around they saw that some of the 2x4 wall studs had been broken and displaced by the force of the hog having been struck against them.

Near the center of the floor they looked at the battered remains of the hog. They saw that one entire front shoulder had been torn off and was missing. They also saw that the head had been torn off and was missing, except for the hog’s snout which lay on the ground with the other remains. They estimated that the hog would have weighed about 125 pounds when alive.

Outside, the man and boy tried to figure out what had killed the hog. They knew the creature was too large to have been forcibly killed in such a manner by a human, but they were unable to come up with a rational explanation for the gristly death of the hog. The witness never forgot what he saw that day.

Activities of witness prior to the encounter:  During the 2001 deer hunting season, the witness, his father, uncle and cousin camped within about 200 yards of the river. Each had their own camping trailer, and the trailers were positioned close together around the campfire site. The camp had a temporary “cook shack” which had an open side which faced the fire pit.

Although the modern gun deer season opened in mid-November, the primary witness scheduled his vacation around the Thanksgiving holidays so that he could hunt for a longer period of time by spreading his vacations days out before and after the holidays. During the middle part of Thanksgiving week of that year the witness was alone at the camp. A day or so before the holiday, it rained heavily and he hunted late anyway. When he arrived at camp he changed to dry clothes and went into the cook shack to see what he could find to eat. He opened an ice chest and found two steaks. He cooked the steaks with onions in a heavy cast iron skillet with a lid over a two-burner gas stove. In another cast iron skillet with lid, he fried some potatoes. He stated it was too wet to build a camp fire and he did not light any of the camp lanterns. The only illumination he used while cooking was a battery powered light inside the cook tent.

When the food was cooked he ate part of it and left the rest on top of the stove in the covered skillets, intending to eat it the next day. (It was cold that night and he knew the food would not spoil.) He then went inside his camper, set his alarm clock for 4:30am and went to bed.

Description of the encounter/incident: When his alarm clock rang the next morning he let it ring as he slipped on his pants and shoes to step outside to urinate. Before he stepped outside he heard gravel crunching and scattering. (The camp site was on an old road that had been coated with washed gravel.) He stepped outside to see a very large, dark colored human-like form running from the cook shack. The form darted between the corner of his uncle’s camper and a large oak tree that stood close to the end of the trailer. While running the creature either deliberately or accidentally struck the corner of the 28’ long trailer, dislodging that corner’s stabilizer support from its base block.

The witness went back inside and finished dressing. He then walked to the cook shack and turned on the light inside. He immediately noticed that one of the iron skillets was upright on the ground and all the contents were gone, including the grease. He then noticed that the lid for that skillet had been carefully set on a secondary shelf below the cook shack’s counter top. He looked at the other cast iron skillet which was still sitting on one of the stove’s burners, and the lid for that skillet was sitting on the other stove burner. The second skillet, like the first, was empty and clean. At that time the witness realized the contents of the skillets had not been eaten by any of the ordinary animals that inhabited the area. He walked to his camper and returned to the cook shack with his hunting rifle. He then made a pot of coffee. While waiting for it to brew, he more closely inspected the interior of the cook shack. (He was not in camp the first part of the season and did not know what was in the shack.) Against one wall of the tent-like shack was a picnic table that was partially covered with various types of food stuff. On the back side of the table against the wall he noticed a loaf of bread sitting on top of a large coffee can, and assumed the can contained extra coffee. He noticed rows of taller containers in front of the can and bread, and noted none of the containers had been overturned by whatever it was that had been in the shack the night before. After drinking some coffee, he picked up the rest of his gear and walked in the dark to his hunting stand.

When he returned to camp later that evening he went into the cook shack to get something to eat. He immediately saw that the loaf of bread and the coffee can were gone, and none of the taller containers in front of that empty space had been overturned or moved. He realized something or someone had reached across the table and over the tall containers to retrieve the bread and coffee can.

That night his uncle and his uncle’s girl friend came to the camp. They talked for a few minutes about deer hunting, and then his uncle asked him in an offhand manner if he had heard or seen anything unusual at night while he was at camp alone. The witness evaded the question and laughingly asked him what he was talking about. At first his uncle just repeated the question but when the witness would not directly answer him, the uncle told him about an unexplained incident that had happened to him when he was at the camp alone one night a week or so earlier.

The uncle said he had been at camp alone when his girlfriend drove there to bring a large cake that she had made for him and any of the other camp or club members that might be there. He said she had used three boxes of cake mix and cooked the cake in a large, oval aluminum pan normally used for cooking a whole turkey. The woman had used extra wide, heavy duty aluminum foil to cover the cake after it was cooked. The pan was placed on top of a section of the foil and the two ends rolled together above the cake. After she left, he ate a piece of it. He then neatly re-rolled the edges of the foil and sat the cake on the back side of the picnic table inside the cook shack before he went to bed.

The uncle told the witness that when he went to the cook shack early the next morning to make coffee he found the aluminum pan upright on the ground inside the cook tent. The uncle was reportedly surprised and somewhat disturbed to see that the cake had been uncovered by someone or something that had carefully and neatly unrolled the crimped edges of the aluminum foil and spread the sections without damaging the foil. He told the witness that every scrap of the cake had been eaten, with very few crumbs left on the ground around the pan. The uncle said the cake probably weighed at least three pounds. The uncle said the leaves on the ground inside the cook tent were wet from recent rains, but that morning there was a large area of dry leaves next to the pan. He told the witness that the leaves were dried by something sitting there eating the cake during the night.

After the uncle told him about that incident, the witness told him and his girl friend about the food and grease missing from the iron skillets and the missing bread and coffee can. His uncle told him that the coffee can contained bacon grease that had been saved for seasoning other food. Neither the coffee can nor the bread wrapper were ever found.

Nothing else unusual happened during that deer season. After the group broke camp the witness took steps to try to learn more about the mysterious camp visitor. Two days later he returned to the area and cleared the underbrush and small trees from between two trees that were about 40 feet apart. With a 6 foot step ladder he tied a rope about 9 feet off the ground between the trees. Near the middle of the rope he tied a heavy “drop” string. He then placed a loaf of bread in a Wal-Mart bag, and tied the string through the bag’s handholds so that the bottom of the bread was 6 feet off the ground. He then left.

Two or three days later he returned to find that the bag had been untied from the string, and the bag and loaf of bread were gone. He placed another loaf of bread in another such bag and tied the bag 6 to 8 inches higher off the ground. He returned 3 days later to find that the string had been untied and the bread and bag were gone. He placed another bag and loaf of bread and tied them at the same height as before. 2 or 3 days later he found the string untied and the bag and bread missing. At that time he attached another bag of bread to the string, but raised the loaf about seven and one-half feet off the ground. When he returned a few days later he found that one end of the rope had been untied from a tree and was on the ground. For about a month more the witness continued to hang a bag with bread, but dropped the height back to about six and one-half feet off the ground. Each time during that period the string was untied and the sack and bread were taken from the site as before.

At that time the witness devised a scheme to try to obtain a track of the creature taking the bread. He tied the usual bag and loaf of bread to the string, and then, with a yard rake he cleared a circular area of the ground underneath the string’s location. The area was about 12 feet in diameter. He then took a hoe and loosened the surface of the ground in the circle. Using two five gallon buckets, he brought water from the river and “made a mud hole” of the prepared area. (He said it took him over 3 hours to complete that work.) He left the area.

When he returned 3 days later he found that one end of the rope had been untied from the tree, and the rope was piled on the ground beside the other tree. The string was untied from the bag, and both the bag and bread were gone. There were no tracks in the mud, and no evidence that the bag had touched, or been dragged in the mud. He quickly realized that the creature had untied the rope from the tree, kept the rope taunt, walked in a half circle around one side of the cleared area and threw the rope on the ground beside the other tree. At that time he realized he was not dealing with a “dumb animal”. The witness found the incident to be both humorous and aggravating. He said he thought to himself, “I’ll get you this time”.

He got the rake and hoe from the truck. He cleared large circular areas around the base of both of the trees to which the rope was tied. He loosened and wet the ground in those areas as he had done before. He hung another bag with bread and carried more water from the river to again wet the dirt in large area underneath the bag.

When he returned a few days later, he could see as he approached the baiting area that the rope was still attached to the trees and the bag was gone. When he reached the site, he quickly realized he was not going to see any tracks. The creature had gathered large, individual piles of leaves and thrown them in a broken row on the wet ground in the large circle to provide places for it to step to the bag without leaving tracks.

[#59]

part II (split because of post size)

He continued to leave food, now including unopened jars of peanut butter and unopened cans of tuna fish that had “pop-top” lids, for the next several months. During that time he retained a schedule of always arriving just before dark. He had earlier begun a habit of speaking loudly or hollering when he approached the baiting site. He would often toot his truck horn twice when he parked.

He continued the feeding on a routine schedule, although there were times when he was unable to visit the site for a week or so. During the next deer season, he and the family members camped at the same location as before, and he occasionally placed bait at the site. The food was always taken.

During the first few days of that season, the men planned to have a cookout for family and friends who did not hunt. They planned the meal for a Saturday, but on Friday they realized they did not have enough venison on hand for the expected guests. About 4:00pm one of the hunters asked the witness to ride with him to a straight stretch of the road near the camp to get the needed venison. They parked, waited and watched until a medium sized deer walked onto the road from the woods. The other hunter killed the deer with a rifle equipped with a scope. As the deer was not a legal buck, the men hid it beside the road and drove back to camp. Just before dark two men went back to bring the carcass back to camp on a four-wheeler. The deer was gone. On the blood soaked ground in its place was a large piece of its flesh. The men looked closely and were “spooked” to see that the deer carcass had not been drug away, but picked up and carried away. There were no human tracks in the area except theirs and those of the men who had hidden the deer.

After the deer season ended, the witness began baiting/feeding again, but not as regularly as before. At the time he often worked away from his home area. From the end of December his trips to the site were spaced from 3 days to 3 weeks apart. One evening he arrived a bit later than usual. As he was tying the bag to the string he heard a stick fall in the woods in front of him. He looked and thought he saw a movement in the limbs of a holly tree. Looking through a thick stand of small ironwood trees he saw a “good sized” creature close to the ground walking toward him. He at first thought it was a deer. Then through a small open in the brush and leaves, he saw a eye staring at him from about five feet off the ground. The witness said, “And I tell you, I have never been afraid in these woods, but that eye put real fear in me.” He watched as the creature moved, but he could not tell what it was. It stopped in a gap between trees, and he and the eye continued to stare at each other. He then saw brownish black hair or fur around the eye.  As the eye continued to stare, he thought, “I’m getting out of here.” He acted as if he had not seen the creature, finished tying the sack to the string and left.

Three days later, he arrived at the site about dusky dark. While tying up another bag of food he looked along the wood line and saw a human-like form watching him from partial concealment behind a large tree. When he finished tying the bag, he looked directly at the creature and waved. He said that it appeared the creature closed its eyes when he waved. He then turned around, walked to his truck and drove away. He returned to replace missing food three or four more times but neither saw nor heard anything unusual.

The next time he returned, it was later than usual. He remembers he carried a flashlight with him because he knew he would need it walk back to the truck in the dark. As on all previous visits, he carried no firearm. As he was tying up the sack of food he noticed movement 60 or 70 feet away in the nearby woods. He finished tying up the bag and looked at the spot again. He saw the human-like silhouette of a creature about six and one-half feet tall standing beside a tree. He stood and looked at the figure a few seconds. He then said, “Here’s your food, have a nice day, bye”. He then waved at the figure, turned and walked to his truck. He continued to put out more food every three or four days for about a month. Each time the old food was gone, but he saw and heard nothing unusual during those visits.

Late one afternoon in February or March he returned to put out food. When he reached the rope area he clearly saw the creature for the first time. It was standing erect beside a tree and somewhat nervously watching him. He said it was about six and one-half feet tall, very stocky and muscular, and covered with hair that was streaked with both light brown and dark brown colors. The hair on its head, shoulders and feet was longer than that on the rest of its body, but in places on its chest and back (he saw its back a few minutes later) there were also patches of long hair. He thought that some of the longer patches of hair were actually loose from the body. He saw no evidence of the sex of the creature. The witness stated that he had a hard time forcing himself to look at the creature’s body features because he could hardly take his eyes off the creature’s eyes. He told the writer that it might sound funny or weird, but that it was almost like he was hypnotized by the creature’s eyes.  He stated, “I just saw eyes that were so human-like, I just couldn’t stop looking at them, they were breath taking to me. It was if a human’s eyes were trapped in that thing’s body.” He said that after each of his later close encounters with this and another larger creature, it might be hours or a day later before he could recall all of the details of the incidents because his mind’s eye seemed to dwell on the creature’s eyes and their intense gaze. The two stared at each other for about a minute. Then, with the food bag in his hand, the man began talking softly to the creature and walked slowly toward it. He stopped about ten yards from it. After a few seconds he held out his arm to offer the food bag to the creature. The creature became visibly nervous for a few seconds, turning its head from side to side looking into the woods. After another few seconds it calmed down and started walking slowly toward the man.

At that time the witness noticed a quick movement in the woods a few yards behind the creature. The witness stated, “And then, BOOM! A big old chunk of a rotten limb hit the creature on the head and back. It jumped and hollered , and I jumped back too because I was afraid the creature would think I had thrown the limb.” The man turned quickly to look at the area from which the limb had been thrown. From a thick growth of ironwood trees to his right, he was startled to hear very loud and aggressive ape-like grunting sounds and the sounds of limbs being broken. Through a three feet wide gap in the trees he could make out the face and partial form of another larger creature standing erect and shaking trees and limbs. The creature was very agitated and acting hostile. The witness said everything was happening fast. The first creature ran back into the edge of the woods and hid behind a large tree. The newcomer continued to grunt loudly. The witness did not move for a few seconds. He said, “Then I started cussing the one making the noise, ran over and grabbed the rotten limb it had thrown and hit the other one with and threw it back at it.” (He said the limb weighed seven or eight pounds.) He said he was still cussing the creature when he picked up another large stick off the ground, backed up a few steps and threw it toward it. (He said he backed up before he threw the second stick just in case he had to make a “clear run” to his truck. if he had to.)

By that time the witness had started yelling and hollering loudly at the creature. Its vocalizations changed to louder growling sounds mixed with the ape-grunting. At that time the smaller creature ran off into the woods. The larger one started backing up while continuing to growl and grunt, all the while watching the witness. He said, “The thing was really going off at me, and it was very scary.”

After the creature disappeared in the woods and it vocalizations ceased, the witness said that he walked back to his truck and sat down. He said that he sat there for an hour or so trying to grasp and understand what he had just seen and heard.

He returned to the feeding site three or four days later. The old food was gone. While hanging the new bag, he hollered “Hey” a few times but nothing happened and he left.

About a week and a half later, on about the third or fourth trip after he threw the sticks, he was tying a bag of food to the string when he felt a small twig hit his leg. He looked at the twig and saw that it was a branch from a holly tree. The branch had a few leaves and berries. He looked around but saw nothing unusual. As he continued to tie the bag, another small limb hit his leg. He looked around again and saw the smaller creature standing in the edge of the trees to his right. (He said the creatures had always been in the woods to his left when he had seen it before.) He spoke to the creature, saying, “Hey, hey Bud”. The creature stood passively watching him. The man then untied the sack from the string, began speaking softly to the creature, and slowly walked toward it with the food extended. Just as the creature reached to accept the food, they heard a series of loud, short growling/snarling sounds from a distance. The creature near the witness quickly withdrew its outreached arm, made mumbling and grumbling sounds and ran off into the woods. The witness stood watching and listening a few minutes, walked back and retied the bag to the string and left the area.

Three days later he returned with another sack of food. Before he left the truck, he tooted the horn twice. As always, the old food and sack were gone. When he arrived at the rope he hollered “Hey, hey” a few times and nothing responded. That time, keeping the bag of food in his hand, he began walking in widening circles in the woods around the baiting site. (He said by that time he was becoming more aggressive in seeing one of the creatures because he was reasonably sure they would not harm him.) He stated that his primary purpose for walking through the trees was to see if one or both of the creatures might routinely stay hidden from him in the branches of some of the large and abundant holly trees that surrounded the baiting area. He closely inspected each of the trees but saw no sign of the creatures. He said that day the leaves on the ground were very dry, and he made a lot of noise walking through the area. After finishing his walk without seeing anything unusual, he returned to the rope and began tying up the sack of food. Immediately he felt a branch hit his leg.

He said, “I looked around and there stood that sucker; where he came from I don’t know. I had looked in every dang tree around the place. It spooked the heck out of me when he seemed to appear from nowhere. It was like he had been let down from the sky on a rope. I never heard him make a sound in those dry leaves.” After a few seconds of getting over his shock of having the creatures slip in so close to him, he said, “Hey bud, how’re doing”. He said he continued to talk to the creature, again telling him his name and telling that he had brought it food. The witness said the creature was so human-like that he always though it could speak. He tried everything to see if the creature could speak in some fashion, but it didn’t. Then, while continuing to speak to the creature in a soft and gentle voice, he slowly walked up to it and reached out to offer it the food. For the first time, the creature took the bag of food from his hand.

The witness stated, “We were face to face. When it reached for the food I watched its hands closely. The palms were very slick, and the color of a black person’s. Its hands were as large as a very large person’s hands. It fingernails were long, and he could see that that parts of two of the nails had been chewed off. The back of the hand was covered in thick, dark hair. In places the hair was in dense clumps.” He said the creature’s head was not shaped like those he had seen in drawings; instead it was shaped almost like a human’s. It had long hair on the sides of its head. He said that he had seen no ears. Its head was attached closely to the shoulders with hardly any neck visible. Most of the face was covered by long hair that was so thick that its lips were not visible. He said again that when he was looking at the creature’s face, his focus was drawn to the creature’s eyes. He continued to tell the creature his own name, trying again to find out if it could speak. He also continued to periodically extend his hand as if to shake hands with the creature. The creature continued to stare into his face, occasionally glancing down at the extended hand. Then as he extended his hand again, the creature reached and very briefly touched his hand. The two stood for a minute or so, and then the creature slowly backed up, never looking in the bag it was holding. It stopped for a few seconds. The witness stepped back, waved and said “Bye”, and starting walking to his truck. While walking he saw the creature turn and walk into the woods. The witness left.

[#59]

pt. III (split because of post size)

On one occasion a few weeks after the creature had touched his hand, it accepted another bag of food from his hand. As soon as it took the bag, they heard the larger creature growling and snarling nearby. The smaller creature turned and snarled and growled also. Holding the bag of food, it then walked into the woods away from the other creature. The witness stated that as the smaller creature started walking away, the other one, “Started raising nine kinds of hell”. He said the creature began screaming and roaring and beating trees, limbs and brush with a large stick it was carrying. As it jumped and spun around beating the vegetation it came closer to him, but still did not show itself in the open. At that time the witness picked up a broken limb from off the ground and began cussing the creature while he beat the limb against a nearby tree. The intimidation match went on for a minute or so until the creature withdrew into the woods.

The witness continued to leave food at various intervals, but after the last close encounter with the larger creature he began to place a 9mm automatic pistol in his waistband under his coat when he stepped out of his truck. He was puzzled and surprised that the smaller creature stopped coming out in the open, and would stay partially hid from view when he carried the concealed pistol. He began to wonder if the creature had seen him put the gun under his coat, although the position in which he always parked his truck would have made it difficult for the creature to see that. The next time he arrived at the site, the creature was waiting behind a tree just inside the woods. The man walked to the rope area, unbuttoned his coat and watched the creature’s reaction when the firearm was exposed. He saw the creature flinch, and it remained behind the tree. He was constantly talking to the creature, but it would not move. The witness said he then took the pistol from his belt, turned and pitched it to the ground a few steps from him. As he began tying up the food bag, the creature slowly walked out of the woods and stopped to watch him. He did not try to hand the creature the food bag but spoke to it a little while longer and then left the area.

He continued to carry the pistol to the site, but placed it on the ground away from the rope. If the creature was there, it approached without hesitation. One day he decided to see if the creature now trusted him enough to approach if he kept the pistol in his belt. When he arrived the creature was waiting in the edge of the woods. With the bag of food in his hand, he began walking toward the creature. When he was in front of the creature, he unbuttoned his coat, exposing the firearm. It paid no apparent attention to the pistol, and took the food bag from his hand. He carried on his normal one-way conversation with the creature for a little while, and then walked back to his truck. He was pleased about the trust the creature appeared to be showing. When he opened the door of truck and withdrew the firearm to place it on the console, he said he was badly spooked when he saw the loaded clip for the pistol had been left on the console. He said he had goose bumps when the thought occurred to him that the creature might have approached him and the exposed firearm so quickly not out of trust, but because it knew there was no clip in the gun.

That incident, and his experiences with having the creature seemingly appear from nowhere, caused the witness to wonder if the creatures might not have some supernatural abilities. Although he realized they were unquestionably flesh and blood creatures, their obvious intelligence and ability to “appear out of thin air” were mysteries he wrestled with but could not solve. Sometime after the smaller creature first began openly approaching him, another incident occurred which bothered him the most. He had decided he would try to photograph the creature with the digital camera in his Razor cell phone when the creature became less skittish of him. One afternoon he arrived at the baiting area while there was still good light. As the creature walked slowly toward him it stopped in front of a large tree. The witness casually reached into his front pant’s pocket, retrieved the Razor phone, and in a slow, sweeping motion brought the camera up past his face and back to his side where he shoved the camera back into his pocket. He said that he did not look in the viewer when he did so, but that he snapped a picture when the phone was about head high. The action startled the creature, but it stayed in place after he pocketed the phone. He does not remember exactly what occurred until he left, because he was so excited and sure that he had made a photograph of the creature. Later, while walking back to his truck, he pulled up the photograph he had taken. He was at first furious at himself because the photograph showed only a section of the woods. He had used the Razor phone’s camera many times, and could not understand how he had botched the shot. Sometime later, it dawned on him that although the creature’s image was not in the photograph, there was an image of the tree that he thought the creature had been standing in front of in the center of the picture. He went back to the site a day or two later and compared the photograph to the area in which he thought the creature had been standing. He said the tree in the picture was the one he thought the creature had been standing in front of. He concluded that he was either mistaken about where the creature had been standing, or by some method or means the creature evaded being photographed. (The witness stated he never tried to photograph the creature again. He had been trying secretly for many months to gain the trust of the creatures, and after some success he began to think of them as something special that he should try to protect. He said that he did not want a photograph around which others might see. He did not want anyone to get the idea to try to kill one of the creatures for fame or profit. He said, “I know what they look like, and I don’t need a picture to remind me.”)

Afterwards, at various intervals, the smaller creature would step out of the woods take the bags of fresh food from his hands, but it never tried to communicate with him, and it never touched him again. The witness said, when asked about it, that the smaller creature took food bags from his hands only six or seven times. He said he had never gotten a good clear view of the larger, aggressive creature, but from what he was able to see that creature was at least eight feet tall and its hair was much darker than the other’s. Its body and head were of course more massive than the other’s. He said he was unable to provide any further description of that creature.

The witness also mentioned that toward the end of his feeding experiences, he began using mesh onion bags for the food. The first time he used them he filled two with food and tied them to the string. When he returned he found the string had been untied and the bags and the food gone. He used the same type of bags the next time or two. When he came back, he found that the string had been untied, the bag and food carried away, and one the previously used, and now empty, bags retied to the string. After that, he always found one of empty bags retied to the string when he brought fresh food.

The witness’s feeding of the creature or creatures (the food may have been shared with other creatures away from the site) spanned a period of about two and one-half years. The witness had to stop the activity because the land on which the club held the hunting lease was sold. The new owner cut a lot of the old-growth timber on part of the area in which the feeding had taken place. A very large area of the adjoining land was cleared with a dozer. Although road access to the area of the hunting lease was blocked when the new owner took control of it, the witness continued to make occasional visits to other nearby parcels of land on which he and others had acquired hunting rights and/or hunting leases. Even though he tried, during both night and day, he has never seen either of the animals again. But he did say that at times he had the eerier feeling that one or both of the animals were watching him. He still hopes to locate the animals again.

During the investigation of this report the writer confirmed the presence of a small group of large feral primates which forage or travel through an area that is within three miles of the witness’s old feeding area. That information was provided to the witness. That and adjoining areas are now under study.

Description of creature:  As described in the report.

Photos and drawing: None.

Description of relative sounds: As described above.

Description of relative scents:  The witness said the smaller creature had no odor that he could detect. He said the larger creature had a noticeable musky smell.

Other details: The witness stated that he could not possibly remember and recant every one of the many trips to the baiting area nor all of the details involved. He stated that in the majority of his visits to the feeding area all he saw was that the bag and food he had left on the previous visit were gone.

The witness now owns a small tract of land in the general area and continues to conduct private research in the river basin.

Historical notes and investigators comments: This area has generated numerous reports of sightings of enigmatic primates. Some of those reports are posted on this and other Bigfoot Research web sites. Such reports have also been published in Arkansas newspapers.

Other encounter reports that were received by the writer during the investigation of this report will be posted on this website when time permits.

Tal H. Branco – The RFP Research Project

http://www.alabamabigfoot.com/bigfoot/reports/RFPreport59.html