Friday, June 5, 2009

Bigfooters from the Outside

As you may recall from our post,Anatomy of a Beast, penned by our very own Hermon Joyner; there are outsiders writing about what us bigfooters do and believe.
Add another to the list; Joshua Blu Buhs, the author of a previous book, about fire ants, takes up these questions in “Bigfoot: The Life and Times of a Legend.”
Buhs takes us on a long and windy tour of the early sightings, footprints, fur tufts, droppings and even abductions (at various times, Bigfoot was said to have kidnapped many women and children and at least one man). As amusing as these accounts are, Buhs’s more serious interest lies not in the ape but in the white working-class men who were the beast’s advocates, hoaxers, hunters and most ardent consumers.
His main characters are drifters, loggers and a small-town newspaper reporter in the Pacific Northwest. Buhs argues compellingly that Bigfoot’s heyday in the 1960s and ’70s was a difficult time for white, rural men in Ameri¬ca. They were threatened by women’s rights, civil rights and service-oriented, materialist culture that didn’t value working with one’s hands or backwoods know-how. Believing in Bigfoot was a way to snub effete, skeptical scientists. Hunting him re-engaged their imperiled backcountry survival skills. Sometimes, Buhs writes, they dressed as Bigfoot “to touch their essential selves.” Viewing predator-fantasy through a class lens is fresh and interesting, but Buhs overdoes it. Everybody loves a good monster tale. To the extent that Bigfoot transcended race, gender and geography, we have the human brain to thank. We’ve overcome our natural predators, and so most of our monsters now are de-fanged. We’ve imbued them with romance.


You can read other news sources reviewing this book below.
Sacramento Bee
Southern Oregon's Mail Tribune

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Holy Grail of Paleontology: The Link


On the heels of yesterday's post we now have even more info on Ida. Ida (pronounced ee-da) is the oldest and most complete fossilized skeleton of a human/primate ancestor. It is estimated Ida is 47 million years old. By comparison, Lucy, the Australopithecus afarensis and former most complete specimen is only 3 million years old.

One thing is certain If you are a true bigfooter you must watch the History Channel special this Monday the 25th. We encourage to go straight to the History Channel website and check out all the video they have for free on Ida. What are you still doing here?! Check out those Videos!

Then come back here and thank us!!

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Common Ancestor

(CNN) -- Scientists hailed Tuesday a 47-million-year-old fossil of an ancient "small cat"-sized primate as a possible common ancestor of monkeys, humans and other primates.


The fossil is believed to be an ancestor of monkeys, humans and other primates.

Scientists say the fossil, dubbed "Ida," is a transitional species, living around the time the primate lineage split into two groups: A line that would eventually produce humans and monkeys, and another that would give rise to primates such as lemurs.

The fossil was formally named Darwinius masillae, in honor of the anniversary of Charles Darwin's 200th birthday.

"This is the most complete primate fossil before human burial," said Dr. Jorn Hurum, of the Natural History Museum at the University of Oslo, who led the study of the fossil, a young female primate.

"And it's not a few million years old; it's 47 million years old," Hurum said, speaking at a news conference at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

The fossil was discovered in 1983 in the Messel Pit, Germany, near Frankfurt, and had been until recently in private collections, according to an article published Tuesday in the scientific journal PLoS ONE, a publication of the Public Library of Science. Read the report from PLoS ONE

However, because it was split into two parts, its significance was not immediately recognized.

An international team of scientists, which Hurum led, conducted a detailed forensic analysis of the fossil for the past two years, the release said.

Hurum nicknamed the fossil Ida after his young daughter, he said.

The fossil's body is nearly complete; only part of one leg is missing, according to Hurum. In addition to the bones, the softer features are also preserved, as are the remnants of its last meal: fruits, seeds and leaves, which were found in Ida's gut, according to the scientists.

"It's such a beautiful specimen," Hurum said of Ida. He said the fossil is about 2 feet long, "like a small cat in size."

The fossil has both adult and baby teeth, indicating that it was weaned and about 9 months old when it died, the PLoS article said.

She would have eventually grown to the size of a lemur, the article said.

The young primate fossil does not have two crucial anatomical features found in lemurs: a grooming claw on the second digit of its foot and a fused row of teeth in the middle of its lower jaw, known as a toothcomb, the scientists said.

X-rays revealed a broken wrist, which the team of scientists believe may have contributed to Ida's death, according to a news release from the museum at Oslo.

Ida may have been overcome by carbon dioxide gas while drinking from the Messel lake, which was often covered by a low-lying blanket of the gas, the news release said. Hampered by the broken wrist, the young primate may have fallen into unconsciousness and may have slipped into the lake. The primate sunk to the bottom and was preserved for 47 million years, the news release said.

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