The Field Guide to Bigfoot and Other Mystery Primates
by Loren Coleman, Patrick Huyghe
What They Said...
"The thousands of worldwide sightings of unclassified bipedal primates, including the Yeti, may be confusing because these sightings entail more than one species. This field guide attempts to sort out the different creatures, coming up with a classification of eight possible mystery primates. But this book makes no real attempt to persuade skeptics of the existence of any of them. It's sort of speculative taxonomy, but I think it is one of the most useful texts in the ongoing controversy over Bigfoot."
- Kevin Kelly, Whole Earth Review
"A very useful resource book describing the many unknown primate-like animals scattered to the four corners of the globe."
- Fortean Times
"If only one of these creatures is verified by naturalists, it would be a biological sensation...The book is well-researched with a good bibliography."
- William Corliss, Science Frontiers
"...a remarkable acheivement...It is a bold attempt to bring some order to a world-wide mystery, and will stand as a seminal work in years to come."
- Bufo Calvin's Weird World
"This book looks like any other field guide you might pick up. It has drawings, maps, tracks, descriptions of the organisms, and the details of the most prominent sightings or evidence....Anyone interested in folk zoology - especially anyone interested in how legends and animal lore intersect with modern scientific research - would find this to be an intriguing volume....It is an extensive...catalog of all the variations on the 'mystery primate' theme organized geographically and annotated extensively."
- Andrew J. Petto, Reports of the National Center for Science Education |
Book Description
The Field Guide to Bigfoot and Other Mystery Primates is a comprehensive study of the astonishing variety of puzzling primates that are being reported by eyewitnesses around the world - but that science has failed to recognize. This fully illustrated volume not only contains the references, range maps, and typical footprints that appeared in the first edition, but it also contains a new, complete index and new preface that updates the discoveries made since this book was first published.
From the Book Preface
We were not afraid to look at old data in legends and folklore, as well as some contemporary sightings along the same vein, and some skeptics took us to task for that also. In discussing the field worthiness of the drawings and range maps in this field guide, Benjamin Radford, the managing editor of the Skeptical Inquirer, jokingly suggested that researchers take along our field guide while doing fieldwork in Denmark looking for Grendel. Ha, ha.
But maybe the joke is on Radford as hominologists and cryptozoologists have done just that. In one widely noted instance dating to the spring of 1999, Bobbie Short, a respected California Bigfoot researcher, brought along our field guide to question native peoples in the Philippines. Islanders closely examined the illustrations in our guide when sign language failed. From this fieldwork, for the first time, Short obtained accurate composites of the Kapre, Waray-Waray, and Orang-Pendek (Oceania: Proto-Pygmy).
This field guide also proved useful to the February and March 2001 CryptoSafari expedition consisting of William Gibbons, John Kirk, Robert A. Mullin, and Scott T. Norman, who had gone to southern Cameroon, near the village of Moloundou, bordering the Congo, looking for evidence of Mokele-mbembe (e.g. an aquatic cryptid). Assisted by Pastor Phil Anderton, local tracker Pierre Sima, and ten Baka pygmy guides and porters, the expedition ventured deep into the rainforest.
During a break in their trek, the pygmies told of the existence of a fierce creature they had tracked through the forest for seven consecutive days in January 2001. Sima and the pygmies saw a three-foot-tall creature and discovered its three-toed, humanlike footprints on the forest floor. The Cameroon locals identified what they had seen as looking like the illustration of the creature on page 107 of this field guide-the Kalanoro, a small aggressive hairy hominoid said to live on Madagascar. When shown these depictions, the Baku eyewitnesses instantly identified the animal they call the Doudo or Dodu.
BOOK CONTENTS
PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION
- Fielding the Storm
- Field Worthy
- Errata
- New Primate Discoveries
- The Hunt for Unknown Hominoids
INTRODUCTION
- A Family Matter
- All Together Now
- The Lumping Problem
- Abominable Rosters
- A New Classification System
- Neo Giant
- True Giant
- Marked Hominid
- Neandertaloid
- Erectus Hominid
- Proto Pygmy
- Unknown Pongid
- Giant Monkey
- Merbeing
NORTH AMERICA, LATIN AMERICA, EUROPE, AFRICA, ASIA & OCEANIA
AFTERWORD
- Science and the Sasquatch
- All the Evidence
- Blunders, Hoaxes, and Hairy People
- Cultural Transformations
- Hiding in Plain Sight
- New Primates
- Best Bets
- If You Should See One
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS, CASE SOURCES, BIBLIOGRAPHY & INDEX
Reviews
Covers Every Inhabited Continent, July 22, 2006
Reviewer: R. McRae "Timjer" (Los Angeles, California USA)
Bigfoot, Yeti, Yowie, Orang Pendek, and Agogwe. All the most recognizable names in the world of mystery Cryptozoological primates are here. But the not so recognizable names really sale this book. Names like the Jimbra, Ngoloko, Tjangara, and the Tano Giant. And then there are those you may be a little more familiar with, like the Alma and the Didi. How about the Chinese Wildman, or the Yeren? Whether familiar or not, its probably mentioned in this guide. But that is also one of the shortcomings of the Field Guide; so many subjects, too few eyewitness accounts. My one reason for not giving it a 5 star rating. Hopefully more page additions are forthcoming in future revisions.
Coleman hits another homerun!!! , April 16, 2006
Reviewer: H.M. 2005
This book, originally released in 1999, was controversial for the sheer number of different species covered in it. Perhaps the most controversial classification was the oceanic primates, or "mer-beings." This book is not exactly a "straight" reprint of the original volume from 1999; there is a new preface in the beginning and a new index in the back. The rest of it is the original 1999 material, but a good deal of it is relevant to the present-day reports, and the book can be very useful for those searching for these animals. The illustrations are very well-done from other's descriptions (and in some cases, photos and film) and show a diversity of sizes and shapes and colors in these mysterious primates. I do highly recommend this volume (both versions) to give the reader an idea of the different hairy bipeds around the globe.
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